California Polytechnic State University - San Luis Obispo Women's Cross Country

Conover was named Cal Polys Director of Track & Field and Cross Country on Dec. 30, 2009. Conover is currently in his 21st season overall at Cal Poly, and has led the Mustangs to 15 total appearances at the NCAA Cross Country Championships (with seven of those coming as a full team). He has coached the mens cross country squad to five Top 25 national rankings, including a 13th-place finish in 2003, 10th in 2004, 13th in 2006 and 11th in 2007. Conover has been named the Big West Coach of the Year a combined 14 times on either the mens or womens sides, as well as the United States Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association West Region Coach of the Year in three seasons (2000, 2003 and 2011). During his tenure at Cal Poly, Conover has directly coached a total of eight All-Americans, while the program as a whole has also produced an additional four All-Americans since he was appointed director. He has also coached 57 NCAA West Region mens and womens track qualifiers and 40 all-regional honorees in cross country. Conover also has coached 49 individual conference champions between track and cross country, and has mentored four Big West Track Athletes of the Year, 11 Cross Country Athletes of the Year, three Freshmen of the Year in track and 13 Freshmen of the Year in cross country. He has guided Mustang competitors to 49 top-10 all-time performances in Cal Poly track history, including the school record-holders for the mens 5,000 and 10,000 meters, along with the womens steeplechase. The programs women and men have also earned USTFCCCA All-Academic Team status a combined seven times in cross country on Conovers watch, as well as six consecutive times in track & field since 2011. Additionally, Conover has coached 27 national coaches association all-academic student-athletes on an individual basis. In 2016, Conover also saw Al Gamez Jr. claim a Big West Scholar-Athlete of the Year Award, making him one of 18 individuals among 2,500 student-athletes throughout the conference to be so honored. It was the fourth consecutive year in which one of Conovers student-athletes received the accolade (and the seventh occasion since 2000). He also coached the all-sports Cal Poly Male Athlete of the Year in 2007 and the Female Athlete of the Year in 2013. Conover was a nine-time All-American distance runner at Humboldt State, and earned the rare distinction of becoming an All-American in all three NCAA divisions (including a 23rd-place finish at the 1980 Division I Cross Country Championships). In the spring of 1981, he won the Division II national title in the 10,000 meters, before also winning the national championship in cross country that fall. In 1988, Conover was the U.S. Olympic Trials champion in the marathon and went on to run at the Seoul Games. He competed professionally from 1984-96 and was a four-time Olympic Trials qualifier. A graduate of Miramonte High School in Orinda, Calif., Conover earned his bachelors degree in natural resource planning and interpretation at Humboldt State in 1983 and his masters degree from Cal Poly in city and regional planning in 1989. Conover, who survived a battle with Hodgkins disease in 1993 and 1994, was inducted into the Humboldt State University Hall of Fame in 1993. Prior to coaching at Cal Poly, Conover was an assistant planner with San Luis Obispo County from 1989-92 and editor of The Runners Schedule magazine from 1992-95. He served internships in the planning departments for the city of San Luis Obispo in 1985 and Morro Bay in 1987. Mark lives with his wife, Kelly, in San Luis Obispo. They had triplets in May of 2007 (two girls, Audrey and Marley, and a boy, Cordell).

Bayley joined the Mustangs as an assistant coach in the summer of 2014. Bayley spent the previous three years coaching and serving as the recruiting coordinator for the Harvard womens teams. In November of 2013, she led the Crimson to their first national ranking (No. 27). That came a season after another milestone, when Harvard qualified for its first national cross country championship meet on a team basis since 1983. In track, Harvard won back-to-back indoor Ivy League titles in 2013 and 2014, as well as the outdoor championship in the latter year. Including track events, Bayleys middle-distance and distance runners (a group that included two All-Northeast Region honorees) broke more than 10 school records. Prior to her time in Cambridge, Bayley was an assistant coach at Santa Clara, where she mentored a trio of Broncos to All-West Coast Conference accolades. She also served as an assistant at Saint Marys in 2009-10. Before moving back into the collegiate ranks, she began her coaching career in 2006 with the Buffalo Chips Running Team in Sacramento. The junior womens club claimed two national AAU team championships and three individual national titles (one of which was won by a USA Junior World Team qualifier). From 2008 to 2013, Bayley also was the Elite Athlete Coordinator for the California International Marathon, which sent 25 women and eight men to the 2012 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials. As an all-conference runner at UC Davis, Bayley advanced to the 2002 national championship meet. In 2004, she finished 10th at the Stanford Invitational and went on to earn the Aggies Outstanding Senior Leader Award. She graduated from UC Davis in 2004 as a double-major in communications and Chicano studies, with an emphasis on social and public policy. Bayley has also earned certification for Level 5 Elite Coach Status from the IAAF and Level 3 for Endurance from USA Track & Field.