t-and-f: Lananna Named Associate AD/Director of Oregon Track and Field

[Ricky Quintana]

Lananna Named Associate AD/Director of Oregon Track and Field

EUGENE, Ore. – Vin Lananna, who owns a distinguished reputation as one of 
the nation’s top collegiate track and field coaches, has been named 
Associate Athletic Director/Director of Track and Field and Cross Country at 
the University of Oregon, Ducks’ Athletics Director Bill Moos announced at a 
press conference Wednesday at Hayward Field.

“I am thrilled with Vin's decision to join the University of Oregon's 
intercollegiate athletic program,” Moos said.  “His tremendous success in 
coaching, along with his experience in collegiate administration, makes him 
the perfect person to lead Oregon's track and field and cross country 
programs.  During all of our conversations, I could tell that Vin has a 
genuine respect for the Oregon tradition and legacy and shares with me, and 
many others, the vision of what our program is capable of achieving."

In his 11-year career at Stanford that began in July 1992, Lananna quickly 
built the Cardinal into the sport’s top combined men’s and women’s program. 
His cross country and track and field squads claimed four NCAA team titles 
(3 men’s/1 women’s) among their 36 top-10 NCAA finishes (21 men’s/15 
women’s), and Stanford athletes won 22 NCAA track and field individual 
titles. At the Pacific-10 Conference level, the Cardinal men and women 
racked up 17 team titles (8 men’s/9 women’s) and 45 individual crowns (25 
men’s/20 women’s).

In return for Stanford’s excellence, he was a multiple honoree as NCAA Cross 
Country Coach of the Year (1986, ‘96, ’97, 2002), NCAA West Region Cross 
Country Coach of the Year (1995, ’96, ’97, ’98, ’99, 2002), Pacific-10 
Conference Cross Country Coach of the Year (1994, ’95, ’96, ’98, ’99, 2001, 
’02) and Pac-10 Track and Field Coach of the Year (2000, ’01).

He has served as director of athletics and physical education at Oberlin 
College (Ohio) since July 2003.

“After listening to the vision that Bill has about what the American track 
and field capital can be and should be, there’s no other place better to do 
it than Eugene,” Lananna said. “There’s an amazing love of the sport in this 
community that you can’t find anywhere else. I’m excited about extending the 
program’s tradition of excellence at the national level year-in and year-out 
so it spills over to the national arena.”

Prior to his tenure at Stanford, Lananna was tabbed as track and field head 
coach at Dartmouth College in 1980 and was later promoted to assistant 
athletic director for track and field and cross country in 1985.

At the NCAA level, his Dartmouth teams posted six top-20 cross country 
finishes – including runner-up efforts in 1986 and ’87 – to go along with 
two top-20 women’s placings, and more than 25 combined All-America honors in 
track and field and cross country. His men’s squads also captured eight 
consecutive Heptagonal League cross country titles (1984-91) and one 
Heptagonal League track and field crown (1988), and his women’s squad 
claimed four Heptagonal track and field runner-up finishes in cross country 
and two in track and field (1988, ’89). In return for their success at the 
Hanover, N.H. institution, he was selected as NCAA Cross Country Coach of 
the Year (1986), District Cross Country Coach of the Year (1983-87, 89, ’90) 
and District Track and Field Coach of the Year (1985, ’87, ’88, ’91).

At the U.S. and international levels, he was appointed men’s assistant coach 
for the 2004 Olympic Games and 1999 World Championships, as well as junior 
coach for the 1990 and 1996 World Cross Country Championships.

His Stanford pupils have also shined at the national and international 
levels – a list that includes 2000 Olympians Brad Hauser (5,000), Gabe 
Jennings (1,500) and Michael Stember (1,500), 1999 and 2003 World 
Championships qualifiers Hauser (10,000) and Lauren Fleshman (5,000), and 
Dartmouth graduate and two-time Olympic marathoner Bob Kempanien (1996, 
’00).

He began his coaching career as cross country head coach at C.W. Post 
College in Greenvale, N.Y.,  in the fall of 1975 after graduating from the 
institution with a bachelor of arts degree in history and psychology in the 
spring. As a track and field athlete from 1971-75, he ran cross country and 
track and was captain of the 1974 harrier team that finished fourth in the 
NCAA Division II Championships. He added a master’s of science degree in 
education from Long Island University in 1989.

Lananna (6-17-53) and his wife Elizabeth have two sons – Brian (21) and 
Scott (19).


Lananna’s Stanford Career

- 3 Men’s Olympians

- 22 NCAA M&W Indiv. Crowns

- 5 NCAA Team Crowns
 (4M – 3X, 1OTF / 1 W – XC)

Olympians

Brad Hauser, 5,000 (2000)

Gabe Jennings, 1,500 (2000)

Michael Stember, 1,500 (200)

Jonathon Riley, 5,000 (2004)*-Farm Team

3 World Championships Qualifiers

Lauren Fleshman, 5,000 (2003, ‘05)

Brad Hauser, 10,000 (1999)

14 Men’s NCAA Indiv. Champs
(9 Outdoor / 5 Indoor)

Brad Hauser (5 – 3 Outdoor / 2 Indoor)

5,000 – Indoors – 1998 (13:58.50), 1999 (13:52.79); Outdoors – 2000 
(13:48.80)

10,000 – 1998 (28:31.30), 2000 (30:38.57)

Gabe Jennings (2 – 1 indoor / 1 outdoor)

1,500 – 2000 (3:37.76)

Mile – Indoors – 2000 (3:59.46)

Nathan Nutter (1)

10,000 – 1999 (29:11.96)

Jonathon Riley (1)

5,000 – 2001 (13:42.51)

Grant Robison (1)

1,500 – 2003 (3:40.39)

Donald Sage (1)

1,500 – 2002 (3:42.65)

Toby Stevenson (1)

Pole Vault – 1998 (18-2 1/2)

Distance Medley Relay (2 indoor)

Indoors - 2000 (9:28.83), 2001 (9:30.01)

8 Women’s NCAA Indiv. Champs
(6 Outdoors, 2 Indoors)

Monal Chokshi (1)

1,500 – 1998 (9:20.18)

Alicia Craig (1)

10,000 – 2003 (32:40.03)

Lauren Fleshman (4 – 3 outdoors, 1 indoors)

3,000 – Indoors 2002 (9:07.45)

5,000 – 2001 (15:52.21), 2002 (15:53.91), 2003 (15:24.06)

Tracye Lawyer (1)

Heptathlon – 1999 (5,855)

Distance Medley Relay (1)

2000

Men’s NCAA Team Wins
(4 – 3 XC, 1 Outdoor)

1996-97 – 1st (xc)

1997-98 – 1st (xc)

1999-2000 –1st (outdoors)

2002-03 – 1st (xc)

1 Women’s NCAA Team Win (1 XC)

1996-97 – 1st (xc)


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