Vanitta Kinard - Assistant Coach - Men's Track & Field Coaches

Vanitta Kinard

Title:
Assistant Coach
Email:
vanitta.kinard@csun.edu
Phone:
2228

Vanitta Kinard will begin her third season as an assistant track and field coach at CSUN in 2021. Kinard will work with the Matadors' jumpers. Under Kinard's tutelage, Mathieu Tshani won the 2021 Big West Championship in the men's triple jump.

A former world-class track and field athlete, Kinard comes to CSUN after most recently working with the sprinters, hurdlers, and jumpers at Michigan State.

At Michigan State, 29 of the Spartans' points came from Kinard's athletes, leading the women's program to the 2014 Big Ten Championship, it's first since 1982. Highlighting individual success under Kinard was Tori Franklin who finished fifth at the NCAA Division I Outdoor Championships in the triple jump and repeated as the Big Ten Indoor Champion in the triple jump in 2015.

Prior to joining the Michigan State staff, Kinard worked at Ole Miss, where she helped coach two triple jumpers to All-American honors and one who earned Southeastern Conference All-Freshman team recognition in 2011. In her first season at Ole Miss, Kinard helped coach a triple jumper to a win at the 2009 SEC Outdoor Championships, the first Rebel since 1992 to accomplish that feat. Kinard was also the recruiting coordinator for the Rebels, helping bring in one of the top recruiting classes in school history.

She began her coaching career prior to the 2002-03 season where she served as an assistant coach at her alma mater Kansas State before opting to pursue her individual career as a triple jumper.

As a collegiate jumper, Kinard began her career at Santa Monica College where she was the 1995 CCCAA triple jump and long jump champion under legendary track and field coach Tommie Smith. Kinard transferred to Kansas State where she competed for the Wildcats from 1996-98. She was a six-time All-American with five distinctions in the triple jump and one in the long jump. In her first year with the Wildcats, Kinard finished second at the Big 12 Outdoor Championships in the triple jump, turned in a fourth place showing at the NCAA Outdoor Championships and finished 10th at the U.S. Olympic Trials.

As a senior, she won a Big 12 Outdoor Championships in the triple jump, finished third at the NCAA Outdoor Championships, placed fourth at the USA Outdoor Championships and took 14th at the qualifying World University Games. Kinard continued her career by winning her first national title in the triple jump at the 2002 USA Indoor Championships, knocking off the defending champion. She then finished second in the triple jump at the 2002 USA Outdoor Championships, before repeating as national champion at the 2003 USA Indoor Championships.