ITHACA, N.Y. -- After over 30 years of college coaching, including 27 years as the mentor for the Big Red men's and women's throwers, Mark Bilyk has retired from coaching this summer. For the past two seasons, Bilyk has also balanced his duties as the head equipment manager for the Cornell Athletic Department, a position he moved into full-time on July 1.

Bilyk's contributions to the Cornell track and field teams are many and legendary. He has helped coach the Cornell men and women to 35 Heptagonal track and field team championships, and his athletes have won 49 Ivy League Heptagonal individual titles. A quick perusal of the current all-time indoor and outdoor top 10 lists at Cornell shows his influence, as he has coached men and women to 49 school records. Every single women's thrower on the all-time top 10 lists in Cornell school history have been coached by Bilyk, and he has mentored 45 of the all-time top 10 performers in the throwing events on the men's side.

His athletes have continued to enjoy considerable success in recent years on the national level with Marc Duquella '97 earning All-American honors in the 35-lb. weight throw in 1997, Karen Chastain '01 winning the ECAC Championship in the discus in 2001, Scott Benowicz '03 competing at the NCAAs in the javelin in 2003, Maria Matos '09 competing at the NCAAs in 2007, 2008 and 2009 in the discus, and rising sophomore Victoria Imbesi '13 competing at the 2010 NCAAs for Cornell in the javelin. In the 12 Heptagonal outdoor championships from 1998 through 2009, his women's discus throwers captured the individual title eleven times, including eight in a row from 2002-2009. Furthermore, Bilyk has coached 39 NCAA Regional Qualifiers in the weight events over the past seven years and was also a tremendous high jump and pole vault coach at Cornell for the first 15 years of his coaching career at Cornell.
 
"Mark's consistent and dedicated service to the Cornell track program will be sorely missed by our current athletes and his fellow coaches," said Nathan Taylor, the George E. Heekin Head Coach of Men's Track. "It will be hard to imagine Cornell track without Mark.His presence, along with that of Rich Bowman, has been the constant that has seen the program through thick and thin.For me, Mark has been a significant balancing force within the program.He has never reserved his opinions and thoughts and we are all better coaches for it.

"He has been a consummate professional in every way and a genuine student of the sport and, in particular, the throwing events. When I began my Ivy League coaching career at Penn, Mark immediately stood out as the most serious competitor within the league. It has been an honor over the last 11 years to go into a meet side by side with Mark at Cornell, and much better to go into battle with him than against him.”
 
Similarly, Lou Duesing, the Alan B. '53 and Elizabeth Heekin Harris Head Coach of Women's Track, has fond memories of working with Bilyk.

“I first came to know Coach Bilyk while we were both pursuing M.S. degrees at Penn State," Duesing said. "He was an assistant coach working with jumpers, and I was immediately impressed by him, his coaching style, his feedback methodology, his quick analysis and the excellent rapport he had with all of his athletes. I was very fortunate to be hired at Cornell, but I was more fortunate to have Mark Bilyk as an assistant coach. I will miss him, and the many abilities he brings to his coaching and teaching. Those with whom he works on a daily basis at practice, though, will miss him even more. What has always been true, wherever he has coached, is that people improved – most often that improvement was dramatic.
 
"About the only things his charges will not miss are the moustache (now long gone) and the chili dinners," Duesing joked. "Check that, some actually will miss the chili dinners.

"We all wish him well. We know we will see him regularly and will work with him. But I sure wish there was a way for him to continue to contribute his vast array of skills as a coach, as a teacher as a mentor and as a friend.”

A Big Red assistant in 1978-79, Bilyk coached for five years at Penn State before returning to Cornell. While at Penn State, he coached four NCAA All-Americans, two IC4A champions and two ECAC champions.
 
In 1975, he received his Bachelor of Science degree in physical education from Penn State, the same school from which he received his master's from nine years later. Bilyk was a four-year performer in track and served as captain for the 1975 squad that won the outdoor Central Collegiate Conference title. He was also a member and All-East scorer in the Decathlon when Penn State won the IC4A Championships in 1974. He was given the Nate Cartmel Award in 1975 for outstanding leadership and performance.
 
Bilyk has a TAC Level 2 certification in the throwing events and is working on his level 3 certification. He has been involved with the U.S. Olympic Committee for the decathlon and the horizontal jumps as an instructor and coordinator.
 
A native of Lansdale, Pa., he graduated from North Penn High School, where he was selected the outstanding high jumper, most valuable field events man and most valuable track man in 1971.
 
Bilyk and his wife, Kas, reside in Ithaca and have two sons, Christopher and Matthew.