Neither Doug Renner nor his running shoes are strangers to McDaniel’s quiet hilltop campus.

Renner, a three-time cross country captain and one-time captain of the track and field squad, graduated from Western Maryland in 1980.

In 1985, he returned to the Hill to take the reins of the cross country program. At the same time, Renner also coached Westminster High School to the 1985 Maryland 4A girl’s title. In 1991, he assumed the head coaching responsibilities of the Green Terror indoor and outdoor track and field programs.

It was not until 1998, however, that Renner left teaching to coach full-time. With more time dedicated to the program, he has put together several outstanding recruiting classes while continuing to develop the athletes already in the program.

Under Renner’s direction, McDaniel produced its first-ever Centennial Conference (CC) cross country championship as well as its first male runner to reach the NCAA National Championships (Greg Davis, 1994)

Jill Krebs has since been to the national meet three times (1999-2001) and became the program’s first All-American in 1999, repeating the honor with a higher finish at the 2000 Championship.

The trend of success has continued into the new millennium. In 2003, Paul Hugus became the second runner on the men’s side to make it to the national championship meet and the first runner in the history of the men’s program to attain All-CC first-team honors. He repeated those feats in 2004, making Hugus the squad’s first two-time national qualifier.

Renner resides in the Taneytown with his wife Linda ‘87, 19-year-old son Colin, who graduated from McDonogh in 2011 and now attends McDaniel, and nine-year-old twins, Hannah and Noah.