Longtime cross country coach Wingard retiring

Longtime Peninsula and Gig Harbor High School cross country coach Joel Wingard is officially retiring.

Wingard has coached in the Gig Harbor area for 37 years. He coached at Peninsula from 1974 to 1978, at Gig Harbor from 1979 to 1998 (taking ’83 off) and returned to Peninsula for the 2003 season, where he’s stayed since. He’s coached both track and cross country, served as Gig Harbor’s athletic director for two stints in the 1990s, and taught math in the district for 35 years.

In 1973, the year before Wingard started coaching at Peninsula, there were seven boys on the cross country team. Now, Peninsula usually has 60 or more runners in its cross country program.

Wingard, 72, has coached three state championship teams, all at Gig Harbor High School: the girls in 1980 and 1992, and the boys in 1995. He’s coached multiple state champions, including Patty Ley (who later came back to coach at Gig Harbor) and John Hogan in the early 1980s, Geoff Perry in 1995 and Curtis King at Peninsula in the 2010s.

“I feel like we’ve built the program up and I’d like to see them make an effort to get someone who’s going to continue to build it and take it to another level,” Wingard told the Gateway in the fall of 2014. “I’ve been fortunate to get to do a lot more than most people get to do in a career.”

Wingard could not be reached for comment on Tuesday afternoon.

This story was originally published November 25, 2015 at 10:27 AM with the headline "Longtime cross country coach Wingard retiring."