Dexter Benkard joined the Miami track and field/cross country coaching staff as an assistant coach (distance) in August 2024.
During his first year in Oxford, the Miami men took second at the 2024 MAC Cross Country Championships, with the women placing ninth. The women’s indoor track team came in seventh at last season’s MAC meet, while both the men and women placed fifth at the conference’s 2025 outdoor championships. Tom Heal earned a bronze medal in the steeplechase, continuing a string of eight consecutive MAC Outdoor Championships with a Miami male medalist in that race.
The RedHawks earned a total of 11 All-MAC awards and 64 Academic All-MAC honors in 2024-25, producing three Academic All-District performers.
Benkard came to Miami from Otterbein University, where he had been a graduate assistant and recruiting coordinator for the Cardinals since 2022. During Benkard's time at Otterbein, the program produced eight OAC champions, 11 track and field national qualifiers, and 21 All-OAC honors. The Cardinals' 2022 men's cross country team qualified for the national championships and claimed the D3 All-Ohio title.
Benkard's responsibilities at Otterbein included creating and executing individualized training plans, designing and implementing lifting plans, coordinating recruiting visits, helping organize meets, and working with the head coach and program director to lead practices and team events.
Benkard, a USATF Level One certified coach, previously served as an assistant cross country coach for Lindberg High in St. Louis, Mo. He graduated from St. Lawrence University in 2021 and was a team captain on the Saints' cross country and track teams. Benkard was a member of St. Lawrence's 2019 Division III National Championships-qualifying cross country squad and was named the program's Coach's Award winner in both semesters of 2021.
Benkard owns a Bachelor's degree in Government with a Sport Studies and Exercise Science minor from St. Lawrence and earned his Master's of Science in Allied Healthcare from Otterbein in 2024.
