Which NCAA coaches were fastest in their prime?

Stanley Redwine ran 1:44, is an Arkansas great, and was close to making 1996 Olympic Team in his 30’s.

Carl Lewis

Quincy Watts wasn't too bad back in the day, and won 2 team titles last year.

Pat Tyson never made a US team(?) but had a few good years as a runner at Oregon. Has been at Gonzaga a while.

Aries Merritt is coaching at Texas State now, that surely counts

Webb coaches in the NAIA which is roughly equivalent to NCAA D2, just a different set of schools - most of whom compete against NCAA schools other than at conference and nats.

In just a few years, Webb has taken the Ave Maria University team from a team with guys running 29:00+ being in the top 7 in XC to winning conference/going to nationals for the first time. Really good team for a school that size.

He also developed a 1:50 800 HS guy into a 1:47 guy in just his freshman year.

Lots of CV work, some top-end speed work, and a hard mid-week long run

Edrick Floreal

Barrett DahI 36:57 10K

Lacena Golding-Clarke, 60 Metres Hurdles 7.83, 100 Metres Hurdles 12.68, Long Jump 6.87m. Sprints and hurdles coach at Auburn University.

Carl Lewis. Leroy Burrell

I always thought that being super good at running might make you a worse coach.

The best can get away with almost anything in training. So if you've never dealt with adversity, injury, you may think others can simply do what you did in training which is not going to work.

Now you want someone who was at the elite level.

Also, if you are coach someone to win NCAAs, you need a freak talent to do that anyway.

And most phenoms do have to battle setback, etc. Ritz was injured a ton. Salazar had lots of issues as well. So during their own careers, later in them, they had to learn about their bodies and how to train - not just roll out of bed with talen 99.99% of us don't have.

Deion Sanders.

I count that for sure. BTW who wouldnt want him coaching at D1 level?

Per my previous post, any coach who was elite as an athlete needs to understanding the "process" and the "grind", which includes being injured and managing adversity. Equally important is the ability to communicate with their athletes. Workouts are a dime a dozen, and are easily accessible via the internet. A coach who has previously done the work at a high level can translate that to their athletes more so than someone who hasn't. If my coach was a retired Olympian, NCAA Champion, USA Champion, etc...I'm buying in at 100% of what he or she is selling. Who wouldn't?

Correct. And the longer the coach persisted in the sport as an athlete the more insightful he/she is likely to be as a coach.

It's not a surprise that people like Chris Fox and Ed Eyestone, who both competed continuously from their teens to their late 30s, were outstanding coaches almost from the get-go. There is almost nothing they would not have seen or undergone as athletes in all that time. Compare this to someone who only ran in college, then a few years as a pro. He/she might have achieved more competitive success than a Fox or an Eyestone, but they could never match the latter's experience with and overall insight into the sport.

When it comes to transitioning from athlete to coach, I think the most important variable is not how good you were (largely beyond your control) but how long, hard, and systematically you approached your own running.

And, yes, 9 times out of 10, a good athlete is going to make a better coach than someone with little or no direct experience doing the sport. That said, I'm always amazed by the outliers-- people who never ran themselves, yet went on to be great coaches. They must have incredible natural intuition, motor empathy, etc., to be able to do what they do.

Paul Ereng won three world/olympic championships in the 800 and coached Sam Whitmarsh at Texas A&M

Marcus O'Sullivan. Four time 1500m World Indoor Champ. Six time Wanamaker Mile champ. Four time Olympian. 101 sub 4 miles. Great coach and nicer person.

You distance dorks are the worst. Carl Lewis. Leroy Burrell. Ngoni Makusha.