University of California, Berkeley ‘87
15th year
WEST COAST CONFERENCE WOMEN'S CROSS COUNTRY COACH OF THE YEAR
-2004, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012
WEST COAST CONFERENCE MEN'S CROSS COUNTRY COACH OF THE YEAR
-2005, 2010
Helen Lehman-Winters enters her 15th season in 2017-18 as the head men’s and women’s cross country and track & field coach at the University of San Francisco. During her tenure, her teams have won five West Coast Conference titles and clinched several at-large berths to the NCAA Cross Country Championships.
A seven-time WCC Coach of the Year, Lehman-Winters has coached 43 All-WCC student-athletes and eight All-Americans. For the second consecutive season, the women's track and field team were lauded for their academic excellence, earning the highest GPA of all Division I programs in the country. In 2014, her women’s cross country team posted the highest GPA of all Division I programs in the country and in 2012, her team posted the second highest GPAs of all teams.
The women’s cross country program, NCAA qualifiers in 2011, 2013 and 2015, won five consecutive West Coast Conference titles under Lehman-Winters’ tutelage from 2009-2013. Last season, her women's cross country team made their fourth NCAA Championship appearance and finished the season in a program best sixth place in the United States Track and Field Cross Country Coaches Association top 25 poll. They capped the historic year off by finishing sixth at the NCAA Championship, eclipsing the 18th place finish from 2013 to a program best finish. On the men’s side, Eric Causey became the first male runner in San Francisco program history to qualify for the NCAA Cross Country Championships. In 2014, Jose Madera backed this accomplishment up, becoming USF’s second male NCAA qualifier in cross country. In 2015, the men's cross country team soared to No. 7 in the West Region on Oct. 6, the highest ranking in program history. Additionally, Alex Short qualified for the NCAA Championships in 2015, making it the third year in a row the Dons sent an individual to the national meet.
On the track and field side in 2014, the women posted eight school records while the men posted five program bests. In addition, the Dons had a program-best eight NCAA regional qualifiers, with the women being represented at every distance from 800m to the 10,000m. In 2014, Jana Soethout finished eighth in the 10,000m at the NCAA Championships, earning All-America honors.
Lehman-Winters' Coaching Career Prior to the Hilltop
Lehman-Winters built an exceptional coaching resume with a history of constructing programs from the ground up at the prep level and coaching elite student-athletes at the collegiate level. Prior to her arrival on the Hilltop, she spent three successful seasons working at UCLA with the men's and women's middle and long distance corps. While at UCLA, the Bruins qualified for back-to-back berths in the NCAA Cross Country Championships (2001-02). Lehman-Winters also assisted UCLA's distance medley relay team to the 2002 NCAA Indoor title and Lena Nilsson to two individual NCAA titles (2003 Indoor 800m and 2002 NCAA Outdoor 1500m). In addition, Lehman-Winters served on the coaching staff for the Bruins' 2001 NCAA Indoor Championship team, and teams that finished second in the 2002 and 2003 NCAA Outdoor Championship teams.
Lehman-Winters built dominant teams as the head coach of cross country and track programs at El Cerrito High School from 1985-89 and Carondelet High School in Concord from 1989-2000. At the prep level, Lehman-Winters guided her cross country teams to nine California State meet cross country berths, eight North Coast Section titles and 12 league titles. On the track, Lehman-Winters' squads enjoyed even greater success, posting an unprecedented 109-1 league dual meet record, winning five North Coast Section titles and two national rankings (Carondelet #11 in 1997 and #24 in 1998). Lehman-Winters coached 23 distance runners to the California State meet, nine of which earned top-four finishes. In 1996, she mentored Kristen Gordon to the Footlocker National Championship title and a runner-up finish in the 3000m at the 1997 USATF Junior Nationals. The same year, Gordon also won the distance medley relay at the National High School Indoor Championship.
Lehman-Winters competed in cross country and track at UC Santa Barbara before graduating from University of California, Berkeley in 1987. Lehman-Winters earned her master's degree in sport psychology from John F. Kennedy University in 1997. She and her husband, John, have three children- Miles, Mathias and Milana and they reside in Richmond.
