The Penn track and cross country programs got a little younger in the past few days.
The Quakers hired a new assistant coach for the men's and women's team, the fresh-out-of-college Steve Walsh.
Walsh will primarily work with the distance and cross country runners. In past seasons both the men's and women's teams have lacked a distance coach to work specifically with the cross country runners.
Walsh is also not the only new-hire to the track scene at Penn.
Gwen Harris became the head coach of the women's program over the summer, after the abrupt retirement of long-time coach Betty Costanza in January.
Walsh and Harris will be learning the ropes at Penn together in the coming weeks. Walsh, however, is familiar with the area.
He graduated from Penn State with a bachelor's degree in accounting in 2001.
Walsh was a four-year letter winner during college and garnered a number of awards while running for the Nittany Lions.
Walsh was three times named to the All-East cross country and indoor track teams, and a member of Penn State's 2000 IC4A Cross Country Championship team. He also was named to the second team All-Big Ten team in 2001 in cross country.
Academically, Walsh garnered Academic All-Big Ten honors three times and received the Student-Athlete Achievement Award in 1999.
Walsh, a Blue Bell, Pa., native, attended St. Joe's Prep in Philadelphia. He competed in the Philadelphia Catholic League, which ran its home meets at Belmont Plateau, the same course that the Quakers call home.
The Penn men's track team won the Heptagonal Championships in the spring, edging Princeton in the final event. The women's team was ninth.
The Quakers' cross country season begins, for both the men's and women's squads, on Sept. 14 when they compete in the Fordham Invitational in Van Cortlandt Park in New York.
