Same campus. New chapter.
 
15 years after arriving on the Grand Canyon University campus to help start up the Lopes' NCAA Track & Field program, GCU Club Sports has announced it has hired Todd Lehman to do the same thing on the club sports level as he commences the brand-new GCU Club Track & Field program as the head coach. Lehman will oversee both the men's and women's sides of the club track & field program after spending a decade-and-a-half as the associate head coach on the NCAA level.
 
"Todd's enthusiasm and dedication to his sport made him an ideal person to start this up," said GCU Club Sports Director Dr. Dan Nichols. "His vast experience will attract some quality student-athletes for this program."
 
Lehman has been involved in just about every facet of Phoenix-area college track & field scene since the turn of the millennium. A Phoenix native who starred on the track himself at both North High School and then at the University of Southern California, Lehman began his coaching career with two-year assistant coaching stints at both the U.S. Air Force Academy (1993-95) and Indiana State University (1995-97) before returning home to the Grand Canyon State in 1998, where the next two years were nothing but doors opening for him. Lehman opened Kiss the Sky Pole Vault Center in Phoenix and runs camps each summer in northern Arizona. A year later, Paradise Valley Community College came calling, and Lehman signed on as assistant track & field coach, later becoming the Pumas' Co-Head Coach. During his 14 years on the PVCC campus, Lehman coached 27 Pumas to NJCAA National titles and a dozen broken national two-year records, plus 62 NJCAA All-Americans and 33 NJCAA Academic All-Americans. By 2010, Lehman's coaching prowess drew the Lopes' attention, which started the GCU Track & Field program on the NCAA D2 level that year with Tom Flood as the head coach and Lehman the associate head coach – a powerful combination that brought the Lopes 25 Western Athletic Conference titles (15 indoor, 10 outdoor) in just 12 years.
 
Lehman continued to wear both the GCU and PVCC hats until 2013, when he stepped down from the Pumas to spend the next 12 seasons focusing exclusively on the Lopes' ascension to Division 1 and ensuing successes. In his 15 years, Lehman – who mainly coached pole vaulters and multi-event athletes – coached 20 different WAC Pole Vault champions, including six-time titlist Scott Marshall, GCU's first NCAA D1 All-American. He also coached six GCU student-athletes to spots at the NCAA Division 1 Championships as well as 15 NCAA All-Americans. Along the way, the USATF Level II Coach has earned a National Collegiate Pole Vault Coach of the Year award, an Indoor Track and Field Assistant Coach of the Year honor, and induction into three Arizona Halls of Fame - the Arizona Community College Athletic Conference (2017), Phoenix Union High School District (2022) and this spring, as part of the 2012 Lopes' T&F team that won NCAA Division II Indoor Championship, the GCU Athletics Hall of Fame.
 
Lehman now takes on the task of developing what has easily become GCU Club Sports' most-requested new program over the last three years. Club Track and Field joins the list of over 40 different club sports programs heading into the 2025-26 season. Lehman's first official day on the job was Tuesday, July 1.