UTEP track & field great Suleiman Nyambui to be part of Collegiate Athlete Hall of Fame inaugural class

EUGENE, Oregon - Suleiman Nyambui, a 15-time national champion at UTEP from 1978 to 1982, will receive the prestigious honor of being inducted into the inaugural Collegiate Athlete Hall of Fame.

The presentation will take place Monday night, June 6 starting at 8:30 p.m. MT/7:30 PT at the Hult Center for Performing Arts in Eugene, Ore., two days prior to the NCAA Outdoor Championships.

The Class of 2022 compiled 205 national collegiate individual titles, 99 world records, and 19 Olympic gold medals as collegians.

The inaugural class will feature 30 athletes representing 25 different institutions.

The presentation will webcast on YouTube.

NYAMBUI’S RUN TO SUCCESS

Nyambui, a mid-distance/distance runner, won all but one time he lined up for an NCAA final.

Along the way he racked up four-straight wins in the impressively unlikely combination of the 10,000 meters and indoor mile.

His overall title of 14 NCAA titles in track events is tied with University of Oregon’s Edward Cheserek, while Nyambui’s total of 15 NCAA titles ranks second behind Cheserek (17).

His 1980-81 academic year of racing also included his lone NCAA cross country title, matching the first distance collegiate triple crown registered by another Hall of Famer, Gerry Lindgren.

During his Triple Crown season (1980-81), Nyambui won the 1980 NCAA cross-country title (29:04.0), the 1981 NCAA indoor 2-mile title (4:01.85), and capped it with victories in the 1981 NCAA 5K (13:38.2) and 10K (28:34.23) titles.

He never lost a race at the NCAA Division I Outdoor Track & Field Championships, winning four consecutive races in the 10,000-meter from 1979 to 1982, plus three consecutive races in the 5000-meter from 1980 to 1982.

Suleiman, a native of Tanzania, was a dominant as his team.

The Miners won team titles all four years Nyambui was on campus and completed the rare Triple Crown three years in a row, having won NCAA team titles indoors and during the cross-country season (1979-80, 1980-1981, 1981-82).

The only year that UTEP didn’t win the Triple Crown with Nyambui on its roster in 1979 when it lost by one point to Villanova.

Indoors, he also won seven titles and is a four-time mile champion (only Jim Ryun has as many as three).

MORE ON THE CEREMONY

In the induction ceremony will be co-hosted by John Anderson from ESPN and Jordan Kent from CBS Sports and the PAC-12 Network, and be conducted in a show format production without speeches that will not exceed two hours.

The evening will present a great opportunity for student-athletes to see some of the sport’s greatest collegiate athletes, learn a little history and get out of their hotel room for a couple of hours two days before the Championships.