Duke To Host 2000 NCAA Outdoor Track And Field Championships

Jillian Schwartz selected to compete in pole vault, legendary coach Al Buehler to retire

Duke University will host the 2000 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships May 31-June 3 at Wallace Wade Stadium. The event arrives in Durham for the second time in 10 years as Duke hosted the 1990 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships at Wallace Wade Stadium.

SCHWARTZ TO REPRESENT DUKE AT NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS
Duke junior Jillian Schwartz was selected as one of 20 pole vaulters to compete in the 2000 NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships at Wallace Wade Stadium May 31-June 3. Schwartz is the Blue Devils' lone competitor in the championships and will compete in the women's pole vault.

Schwartz will enter the NCAA pole vault championships with a career-best 3.94m/12-foot, 11-inch vault. The ACC women's pole vault champion, she won the ECAC pole vault title on May 20 at Princeton with her school-record 12-11. She currently holds the Wallace Wade Stadium and Duke school pole vault records. Schwartz is coached by Duke volunteer assistant coach Scott Still, who works primarily with the Blue Devil pole vaulters.

Schwartz becomes the first Duke women's athlete to compete in the NCAA Outdoor Championships since Kim Voyticky qualified in the 800-meter run in 1998. Duke freshman Sheela Agrawal represented Duke in the NCAA Indoor mile championships this winter.

She will compete Friday beginning at 6 p.m. on the East Runway.

Schwartz's Athlete Bio

DUKE LEGEND AL BUEHLER TO RETIRE
The 1999-2000 track and field season marks the final campaign for legendary Duke director of track and field Al Buehler. Buehler is in his 45th season coaching track and field at Duke. His career will come to a close with the hosting of the NCAA Championships May 31-June 3 at Wallace Wade Stadium. He is serving as the Meet Director in his final meet at Duke. SEE BIO INCLUDED IN THIS PACKET.

FITZGIBBON MISSES 1,500-METER CUT BY .01
Duke's Brendan Fitzgibbon missed the NCAA field by one-hundreth of a second. He entered the NCAA declarations with the 25th-best mark, a 3:43.79 NCAA provisional time. The NCAA took the top-20 1,500-meter declarations with the low time being a 3:43.78 by North Carolina State's Brendon Rogers.

WALLACE WADE STADIUM HOSTS SECOND NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS
Wallace Wade Stadium has hosted some of this country's premier track and field meets in addition to serving as the permanent home for the Blue Devil team.

An excellent training and competition facility, the track itself is an eight-lane, Olympic-size 400-meter oval with a Mondo Super-X Double Density surface. Enclosed on three sides, Wallace Wade Stadium provides seating for 33,941 fans and can host all the field events inside its confines, a pleasant rarity in the 1990s.

The facility's excellent reputation as a fast track can be backed up by the impressive list of stadium records and the big meets and big crowds it has often attracted. NCAA Championships, Olympic Festivals and international dual meets are regular features at Duke, and the 1994 Pan-Africa?USA International track meet made another assault on the record books.

Every April, the Duke Invitational is host to over 1,500 athletes from around the nation in a top-flight collegiate competition. The 2000 General Motors Duke Invitational attracted a record 2,400 athletes. In addition, Duke drew 29,000 fans in 1996 for the pre-Olympic Gold Rush meet televised by ESPN.

OTHER MAJOR MEETS HELD AT WALLACE WADE STADIUM
1971 US-Pan Africa 1974 US-USSR 1975 US-Pan Africa-West Germany 1979 Life Summer Games 1982 US-Pan Africa-West Germany 1983 TAC National Junior Olympics 1987 Olympic Festival 1990 NCAA Championships 1994 US-Pan Africa 1996 Gold Rush at Duke Annual Duke Invitational 2000 NCAA Championships

AL BUEHLER
45 Years of Service to Duke Track and Field Director of Track and Field (1997-2000) Head Track and Field Coach (1964-2000)

Duke track and field continued its tradition of success in 1999-2000, and for the 45th season head coach Al Buehler again led the way. The chairman of the physical education department at Duke, Buehler has earned an array of honors in the world of track and field. In addition to producing a number of All-Americans, the 69-year-old Maryland graduate has fielded 12 state champion and six ACC championship cross country teams. Chairman of the NCAA track and field committee for six years, Buehler has also served as president of the NCAA Track Coaches Association.

Three times Buehler has been associated with the U.S. Olympic Track and Field team with his most recent appointment coming in 1988 at Seoul, South Korea. He was the team manager in 1972 in Munich, Germany and at Los Angeles in 1984.

In 1992, Buehler served as the head men's coach for the U.S. Junior National Team that competed in a dual meet against Canada at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg.

Buehler has acted as meet director for several international meets held at Duke and was responsible for bringing the NCAA Championships to the Wallace Wade Stadium track in 1990. Among the other events that Buehler has headed up at Duke are the 1994, 1982, 1975 and 1971 Pan African Games, the 1974 USA-USSR dual meet, and the 1979 Lite Summer Games. He was commissioner of track and field at the 1987 Olympic Festival in Wallace Wade as well. The NCAA meet returns to Duke in the year 2000. He is vice president of the executive committee for North Carolina Amateur Sports and was named to the state's Hall of Fame in 1988. Buehler concluded an illustrious 45-year career with Duke track in June of 2000, when he served as the NCAA Championship meet-site director. Buehler is married to the former Delaina Underwood of Burlington, NC. They have two children, Beau and Beth, and four grandchildren, Julia, Katherine and twins Ruth and Will.

THE BUEHLER FILE
Education
*B.S. in Math & History, Maryland, 1952 *M.A. in Education, North Carolina, 1958

Competition Highlights
*Southern Conference indoor 880-yard champion, '51 *Southern Conference outdoor 880-yard champion, '52 *Seventh in 880-yard AAU National Championship, '52 *Finalist in 880-yard NCAA Outdoor Championship, '52

Coaching Experience
*Head Cross Country Coach, Duke, 1955-2000 *Asst. Track Coach, Duke, 1955-1964 *Head Track & Field Coach, Duke, 1964-2000 *Director of Track & Field, Duke, 1997-2000

International Team Experience
*Team Manager, U.S. Olympic Team, Munich, '72 *Team Manager, U.S. Olympic Team, Los Angeles, '84 *Team Manager, U.S. Olympic Team, Seoul, 1988 *Head Coach, U.S. Jr. National Team, Winnipeg, '92 *Head Manager, Pan-America Games, Cali, Columbia, 71 *Head Manager, World Indoor Championships, Lisbon, Portugal, 2001

Duke To Host 2000 NCAA Outdoor Track And Field Championships

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