Juli Benson, one of the most
accomplished distance runners and coaches in the country, joins the Penn Cross
Country/Track and Field staff as an assistant coach for the 2016-17 season.
Benson will work with the men’s and women’s cross country and track and field
programs.
Benson’s first season with cross
country proved to be a record-breaking one for the Quakers who earned the first
NCAA Championship berth as a team in school history, where they finished 24th
and ahead of every Ivy League school at the meet. Senior Ashley Montgomery
flourished under Benson’s tutelage and earned USTFCCCA All-America, All-Region
and First-Team All-Ivy honors in addition to Clarissa Whiting being named a Mid-Atlantic
All-Region and Second-Team All-Ivy selection in 2016.
Benson brings a plethora of
experience to the Red and Blue including previous coaching stops at the Air
Force Academy, George Mason, Georgetown and James Madison. Most recently, she
served as the head men’s and women’s cross country coach and the assistant
track coach at Air Force from 2009 to 2014. During that time, Benson worked
with the middle distance and distance specialists that captured the 2012
outdoor and 2013 indoor Mountain West Championships while being selected as the
conference coach of the year during that span.
While at Georgetown, Benson coached
Chris Lukezic to a USATF Junior National Championship, a fourth-place finish at
the 2004 U.S. Olympic Trials, a runner-up finish at the 2005 USATF Outdoor
Championships as well as a semifinalist spot at the 2005 World Outdoor
Championships in the 1,500 meters in Helsinki, Finland. She also guided
Treniere Clement to a runner-up performance at the 2004 NCAA Outdoor
Championships and led more than 20 athletes to USATFCCCA All-America honors
during her five years with the Hoyas.
On the international stage, Benson
coached U.S. distance star Jenny Barringer Simpson to a gold medal at the 2011
World Championships in Daegu, South Korea as well as a 2012 berth to the London
Olympic Games. She also assisted Kevin Sullivan to Canadian records in the
indoor and outdoor 3,000 meters and Lukezic to a seventh-place finish at the
2006 World Indoor Championships and the seventh-fastest 1,500 of all-time in
U.S. history.
Additionally, Benson was selected as
an assistant women’s coach for the 2007 U.S. World Championship team in Osaka,
Japan and as the junior women’s coach for the 2003 U.S. Cross Country team that
captured their highest finish in history at the World Cross Country Championships
in Lusanne, Switzerland. She has also been elected to the United States Women’s
Track and Field Coaches Association advisory board and was a representative for
USATF Women’s High Performance in the middle distances.
As an athlete, Benson was a
preeminent talent in the middle distances and represented the U.S. in the 1,500
meters at the 1996 Olympic Games. Sponsored by Reebok International and Asics
Tiger Corporation, Benson competed in over 200 national and international
competitions during her time as a professional athlete. She holds a B.S. in
Political Science and a M.S. in Sports Administration from James Madison
University and was a 2002 inductee into the JMU Athletic Hall of Fame.
Benson and her husband, Penn
associate head football coach Bob Benson, have a daughter, Kaylyn.
