Peter McGinnis enters his 34th season working with the Cortland pole vaulting squad in 2022-23. In 2009, he was named the Atlantic Region Men’s Outdoor Track and Field Assistant Coach of the Year by the United States Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association. Since his arrival in 1990, Cortland’s pole vaulters have ranked among the best in the state in Division III and have dominated SUNYAC competition.
Since the 2007-08 season, McGinnis has coached an men's outdoor pole vault NCAA champion (Jake Zanetti in 2009) and a total of 10 NCAA qualifiers. His pole vaulters have also won a combined 18 men's and women's league titles in that span, including a sweep of the men's and women's indoor and outdoor crowns in 2008, 2009 and 2010 as well as three titles in 2014. The Red Dragon women captured the first six places at the 2009 SUNYAC Outdoor Championships and took six of the top-seven spots, including first and second place, at the 2009 indoor conference meet.
McGinnis is a graduate of Swarthmore College, where he competed for three seasons on the varsity track team in the pole vault. He garnered All-America honors in 1975 at the NCAA Division III Championships and still holds the outdoor school record in the event. He was inducted into Swarthmore's Athletics Hall of Fame in October 2014. McGinnis has done volunteer coaching stints at the U.S. Air Force Academy, Oregon, Illinois and Northern Colorado. He is currently a member of USA Track and Field’s Sports Science Committee as a biomechanist for the pole vault.
