DES MOINES, Iowa - Illinois track & field and cross country head coach Mike Turk and 18-time All-American and Illinois Athletics Hall of Famer Celena Mondie-Milner will be enshrined into the Drake Relays Presented by Hy-Vee Hall of Fame on Thursday, April 25, as announced by Drake University Athletics on Friday afternoon. Turk will become the 88th member of the Drake Relays Coaches Hall of Fame, and Mondie-Milner joins Olympian Reese Hoffa as the 218th and 219th inductees of the Drake Relays Athletes Hall of Fame.
Turk will be enshrined into the Drake Relays Coaches Hall of Fame, which was established in 1977. He becomes the fourth Illinois coach to be inducted into the Drake Relays Coaches Hall of Fame, joining charter members Harry Gill and Leo Johnson as well as former women's head coach Gary Winckler who was inducted in 2010.
At the Drake Relays, Illinois has been very successful under Turk. The Illini have captured 10 Drake Relays titles, including seven individual events, and four consecutive Hy-Vee Cup men's championships from 2013-2016.
Historically, Illinois men's track & field has been the most dominant program in Drake Relays history, with 140 overall titles, 68 individual titles and 72 relay titles. Each number of titles, in overall, individual and in relays is the most in Drake Relays history.
Turk is in his eighth season as head coach at Illinois and 13th season overall with the Fighting Illini. He assumed head coaching duties of the combined men's and women's programs in 2018. In his time as head coach, the Illini men have tallied four Big Ten runner-up finishes and placed first at the 2015 Outdoor Big Ten Championships.
Turk has guided the Illinois program to four top-15 NCAA Championship finishes, including a 10th place finish at the 2015 NCAA Men's Outdoor Championship, the best finish for Illinois since 1988.
Celena Mondie-Milner is the ninth Illini athlete to be inducted into the Drake Relays Hall of Fame. She joins charter members, Harold Osborn, Dwight Eddleman and Don Laz, who were each inducted in 1959, hurdler Lee Sentman (1963), half-miler George Kerr (1966), javelin thrower Milton Angier (1967), horizontal jumper Charlton Ehizuelen (1987) and hurdler Perdita Felicien (2010).
Mondie-Milner was the outstanding women's performer of the 1988 Drake relays, winning the university-college division 100m title with a time of 11.67 seconds, and led off the winning 4x200 relay, with Illinois finishing with the top time of 1:33.74. She also anchored the 4x100m relay to a Drake Relays record finish time of 43.94.
At Illinois, Mondie-Milner earned 18 All-American honors and won 17 Big Ten individual and relay titles. She was the Athlete of the Big Ten Outdoor Championships in 1990 and placed second in the 100m at the 1990 NCAA Outdoor Championships.
Mondie-Milner was inducted into the Illinois Athletics Hall of Fame in 2018. She currently lives in Austin, Texas, where she serves as the director of New Student Services at the University of Texas at Austin.
The Illini will compete at the 2019 Drake Relays Thursday, April 25 through Saturday, April 27.
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