Jonathan Zimmerman begins his ninth season as the Head Coach of the Biola University men and women’s track and field and cross country programs in 2014-15. This year marks his 34th year overall as an instructor and coach. During his time at Biola, Zimmerman has more than quadrupled the size of the track and field teams, and led the two programs into the national spotlight.
Over the last eight seasons, Biola's women's cross country and track and field programs have vaulted to the top of the Golden State Athletic Conference, winning three GSAC Cross Country Titles (2010, '12, '13) and earning the program's first two Outdoor Track and Field GSAC titles in 2013 and 2014. He also guided Biola to a pair of National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics national runner-up finishes in women's cross country (2009 & 2010), six straight top ten finishes at the NAIA Indoor Women’s Track and Field Championships (2009-2014), 10 NAIA top-10 finishes (6 W/ITF, 4 WXC), and 16 top-12 team finishes.
The men's cross country team has also seen steady improvement and placed a program best runner-up at the 2011 GSAC championship meet after spending the better part of its history near the bottom of the pack. The Eagles followed that with a third-place finish two seasons later. The men’s track team also recorded a program best with their third place finishes at the 2013 and 2014 GSAC outdoor track championships.
Overall the track and field teams have also seen tremendous development and growth under Coach Zimmerman's direction. With the total number of participants growing from 12 to over 80 in just eight seasons, the Eagles have become a player on the national stage with the women’s indoor and outdoor teams recording program-best finishes at their respective national championships in 2011, placing fourth at the indoor championships and 11th at the outdoor championships.
Zimmerman has coached some of Biola's most decorated athletes of all time, including Natasha Miller, who graduated from Biola in 2010. Miller left Biola as the most decorated athlete in school history. She won 12 individual NAIA titles, including successfully defending her outdoor heptathlon and high jump crowns at the NAIA Outdoor Championships in May 2010. Miller also earned All-American honors in both events and the 100m hurdles to make her a 23-time All-American. Her efforts helped her get inducted into the Biola Athletics Hall of Fame in August 2013. She became one of the first six members to be enshrined.
In addition to athletic success, Zimmerman’s student-athletes’ have been exemplary in the halls of academia, as they have earned 141 NAIA Scholar-Athlete accolades. The six teams he oversees (men & women’s cross country, men & women’s indoor track and field, men & women’s outdoor track and field), consistently have shown to be outstanding scholar-teams as they have produced some of the top team grade point averages in the NAIA.
Zimmerman has been named GSAC Coach of the Year eight times (women’s cross country- 2007, '10, '12, '13), (women’s indoor track 2012 & 2013) and (women’s outdoor track 2013 & 2014). In his first eight years Zimmerman’s athletes have earned 188 All-Conference honors, 113 NAIA All-American honors, 47 individual conference championships, 12 individual national championships, five national track and field MVPs and one NAIA tournament most outstanding.
Zimmerman is very active in the GSAC and the NAIA. He currently serves the GSAC as the women’s cross country rater and the NAIA as the Secretary of the NAIA Cross Country Coaches Association as well as serving as a national women’s cross country rater. Zimmerman also serves the NAIA as a member of the Indoor and Outdoor Track and Field Qualifying Standards Committee. He has previously served as NAIA National Cross Country Championships Meet Referee as well as on the NAIA National Cross Country Scholar-Athlete Committee and the National Outdoor Track and Field Site Selection Committee.
Zimmerman earned his MS. Ed. with emphasis in coaching and biomechanics from Northern Illinois University in 1985. He graduated from Concordia University, Nebraska majored in business education and physical education, then taught and coached at the high school level for 25 years prior to arriving at Biola. His first six years were in Chicago, Ill. at Luther South High School. Here his teams won five consecutive Illinois High School Association sectional track championships, two IHSA runner-ups and the 1986 IHSA state track & field championship. For the next 19 years he served at Orange Lutheran High School where his teams won over 40 league titles, six California Interscholastic Federation-Southern Section runner-ups, five CIF-SS championships and a CIF state championship runner-up.
He was named the 1986 Northern Illinois Coach of the Year in Track and Field and was the Orange County Register Track and Field Coach of the Year in 1991. He is married to his wife Sharon (a two-time NAIA All-American). Both Jonathan and Sharon are frequent clinicians at track and cross country coaches clinics in the southern California area, together they have two sons one of whom is a recent Biola graduate.
Coach Zimmerman on Biola XC and T&F:
