Vin Lananna And Southern Illinois Head Coach Connie Price-Smith Named Team USA Head Coaches For 2016 Olympic Games

USATF Press Release
July 15, 2015

INDIANAPOLIS — Four-time Olympian and Southern Illinois head coach Connie Price-Smith and TrackTown USA president and University of Oregon associate athletic director Vin Lananna will serve as the respective women’s and men’s head coaches for Team USA at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, USATF announced Wednesday. Marsha Horan and Tracy Sundlun will serve as head managers.

The Team USA staff also includes women’s assistant coaches Bonnie Edmondson, Robyne Johnson, Rose Mondayand LaTanya Sheffield, and men’s assistant coaches Troy Engle, Curtis Frye, Cliff Rovelto and Mario Sategna.Medical and other additional officials will be announced later this summer.

Experienced coach, athlete

Price-Smith recently completed her 14th season as head coach at her alma mater. After spending her first three years as the head women’s coach, Price-Smith took over the combined men’s and women’s program in 2004-05 and has since kept SIU track and field among the top programs in the Missouri Valley Conference.

Under Price-Smith, a 1990 Saluki Hall of Fame inductee, SIU’s women’s team has won five conference titles and finished a program-best ninth in the nation at the 2010 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships — the third-best finish of either gender in SIU history. The SIU men’s team recently ended a 23-year drought with their first conference title since 1992. A five-time MVC Coach of the Year, Price-Smith has coached SIU athletes to a combined 184 MVC individual titles, 51 All-American honors and eight individual NCAA champions during her time as both the head women’s coach and at the helm of the combined program.

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A 25-time national champion in the shot put and discus, and a member of 34 international U.S. squads as an athlete, Price-Smith is an experienced member of national team staffs. She was the head women’s coach for Team USA at the 2011 IAAF World Championships and the 2007 Pan American Games. She served as an assistant coach at the 2008 Olympic Games, as well as the 2004 World Junior Championships in Kingston, Jamaica, the 2005 World Indoor Championship in Budapest, Hungary and with the U.S. 2006 World Cup Team in Athens, Greece.

From TrackTown to Rio

Lananna has enjoyed tremendous success as a coach and administrator. In a coaching career that spanned 35 years, Lananna led teams to 11 NCAA titles and 42 conference crowns, while nearly 60 NCAA individual titles were awarded to athletes under his guidance. Lananna was named to the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA) Hall of Fame in 2012.

Lananna served as an assistant coach for Team USA at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, and was head coach at the 2011 IAAF World Championships in Daegu, South Korea. He was an assistant coach at the 1999 IAAF World Championships, head coach for Team USA at the 1990 and 1996 IAAF World Cross Country Championships, and head junior team coach at the 1994 IAAF World Cross Country Championships.

As the president and visionary of TrackTown USA, Lananna has led the local organizing committee that secured the NCAA Outdoor Championships through 2021, as well as the 2014 IAAF World Junior Championships, 2016 IAAF World Indoor Championships and the 2021 IAAF World Championships. The 2016 U.S. Olympic Trials – Track & Field will be held in Eugene, following in the footsteps of 2012 and 2008.

Fans are invited to join the conversation by following USATF on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook and use the hashtag #Rio2016.

Women’s Staff

Robyne JohnsonAssistant Coach – Jumps/Combined Events

The Director of Cross Country and Track & Field at Boston University, Robyne Johnson is a former American record holder in the triple jump and participated in four U.S. Olympic Trials. She ranked in the top ten for ten years and was considered to be one of the first elite triple jumpers in the U.S. Her track and field career started at a young age with a trip to the 1980 Junior Pan American Games, where she finished fourth in the long jump.

Rose Monday, Assistant Coach – Distance

Monday, who most recently coached at the University of Texas-San Antonio, is nationally known as one of the top minds in middle distance and distance running. In 2003, she was appointed USATF Development chair for women’s distance events. She was an assistant coach for the U.S. team at the 2005 World University Games in Izmir, Turkey, and served as head women’s coach for Team USA at the 2006 IAAF World Junior Championships in Beijing, China. She most recently served as the assistant coach for women’s distance for the U.S. women’s team at the Olympic Games in London, and has served as the Team USA women’s distance coach at the IAAF World Relays in 2014 and 2015, as well as the head women’s coach for the 2015 Pan American Games.

LaTanya Sheffield, Assistant Coach – Sprints/Hurdles

LaTanya Sheffield is a retired Olympic hurdler and American record holder. She was a standout hurdler at San Diego State, where she was a two time all-American and a 1985 NCAA champion. 1985 was also the year Sheffield ran an American record in the 400m hurdles with a time of 54.64. Sheffield was an Olympic finalist in 1988 and again represented the U.S. at the World Championships in 1987. Over the course of her career, she won two 400mH gold medals at the Olympic Sports Festival and a bronze 400mH medal at the 1987 Pan American Games. Upon retirement in 2000, Sheffield went over to the coaching side and eventually coached national teams at numerous international events, including the World Championships and Pan American Games. Currently, Sheffield is an assistant coach at Long Beach State, working with the sprints, hurdles and relays.

Bonnie Edmondson, Assistant Coach – Throws

Bonnie Edmondson is a two-time national champion in the hammer throw. As an athlete, she was ranked in the top ten in the world and in the top five in the country. Edmondson has coached at all levels, including high school, college and Team USA. An assistant coach at the 1998 World Junior Championships, she was Team USA’s throwing events coach 2012 and 2014 IAAF World Indoor Championships. She is currently the Assistant Men’s and Women’s Indoor and Outdoor Track and Field Coach at Trinity College.

Marsha Horan, Women’s Head Manager

Horan is a 17-year veteran coach who has served on the Team USA staff as a manager for 12 international junior and senior teams, including the last two IAAF World Championships. Horan was also the head manager for Team USA at the inaugural IAAF World Relays in 2014 and is currently the assistant track and field coach at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, joining the IMG Academy staff in November 2013. Horan represents women’s track & field on the USATF High Performance Development Committee.

Men’s Staff

Curtis Frye, Assistant Coach – Sprints/Hurdles

As one of the most well-respected track and field coaches in the country, Frye’s coaching career started at his alma mater, East Carolina, in 1974 and moved on to NC State and the University of Florida before landing at South Carolina, where he is entering his 20th year as head coach. Frye has coached over 60 NCAA champions, 116 SEC champions and more than 450 NCAA All-Americans. Frye has also coached 25 Olympians who have garnered 13 medals at the Olympic Games. Frye’s success has earned him a spot in the US Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Hall of Fame as well as 2001 USATF Nike Coach of the Year and 2002 National Coach of the Year honors. Frye has also served as an assistant coach at the 2004 Olympic Games and 2013 IAAF World Championships and was head coach for Team USA at the 2001 Goodwill Games.

Mario Sategna, Assistant Coach – Throws

Sategna was named head coach of men and women’s track and field at the University of Texas in 2013 when the programs were combined. His promotion came after 10 impressive years as an assistant coach for the men’s team. During his time as an assistant coach, Sategna helped coach seven throwers, jumpers and multi-event athletes to 11 NCAA titles. Considered one of the top combined and field event coaches in the nation, Sategna delivered a career first as he mentored former Longhorn Trey Hardee to an IAAF World Championship in the decathlon in 2009. It marked the first time in Texas men’s track and field history that a Longhorn won a World Championship. Sategna was a standout decathlete and three-time All-American at LSU.

Cliff Rovelto, Assistant Coach – Jumps/Combined Events

One of the most respected high jump coaches in the world, Cliff Rovelto is entering his 24th season as head coach at Kansas State. Rovelto has coached numerous successful sprinters and hurdlers, but is best known for his work with jumps and combined events, currently working with Olympic high jumpers Erik Kynard and Jesse Williams. At Kansas State, he has coached 59 All-Americans and 32 conference champion high jumpers, along with 25 All-Americans and 19 conference champs in the long and triple jump. Rovelto has worked in U.S. high jump and combined event development programs for both junior and senior competitors and is a Level III jumps instructor. Over the course of his career, Rovelto has coached 14 individuals to a combined 18 Olympic Game appearances. Rovelto has served as the women’s head coach at the 2014 Thorpe Cup, the men’s head coach at the 2011 Pan American Games, and has served as an assistant coach for the 2010 IAAF Continental Cup, as well as the 2003, 2005 and 2007 IAAF World Championships. Rovelto was recently named 2015 Big 12 Conference Women’s Indoor Coach of the Year.

Troy Engle, Assistant Coach – Distance

Troy Engle has been involved in the U.S. track and field circuit for years. Following two stints at West Point as an assistant coach, Engle accepted the head-coaching job at Army, where he remained from 2008-14. During his tenure at West Point, Engle helped lead the track and field program to 11 victories over Navy. Engle has been an assistant coach for Team USA at the 2013 IAAF World Outdoor Championships, 2011 Pan Am Games and 1995 World Indoor Championships. He is a previous chair of USATF Coaches Education and was the associate director of the Paralympic Division of the USOC before his head coaching stint at Army from 2008-14.

Tracy Sundlun, Men’s Head Manager

Tracy Sundlun is currently the senior vice president of Global Events for San Diego-based Competitor Group, Inc. and was a co-founder of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon Series, which will welcome more than more than 500,000 professional and amateur runners to 30 events in 2015. He is the Director of the 2004, 2012 and 2016 U.S. Olympic 50K Race Walk Trials, and before turning his attention to the roads, Sundlun was also the co-founder of what are now the New Balance Indoor and Outdoor Nationals, where virtually all of the U.S. Team ran as high schoolers. Known now as an event organizer, he started as a coach, and at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, he became the youngest person to ever coach in the Olympics, and he has since served as a Coach, Manager or Administrator at four other Olympics and a host of other U.S. National Team events, including as the Head Men’s Manager at the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto. He has coached over 100 men and women in virtually every event from 15 countries who have made their national teams, and in addition to several prominent road racing and track clubs, he coached at Georgetown University, the University of Colorado, and USC, and Sundlun was inducted into the Running USA Hall of Champions in 2015.

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