Virginia Commonwealth University

Austin Savage begins his fourth season as VCU's Director of Cross Country and Assistant Track & Field Coach in 2025-26. Over his first three seasons as Director of Cross Country, Savage has overseen continuous growth from both the men’s and women’s programs. 

During the 2024 Cross Country season, both the men’s and women’s teams recorded two top-3 team finishes which included a 2nd-place finish for the men at the Phoenix XC Invitational hosted by Elon University and the CNU XC Invitational hosted by Christopher Newport University. The women also finished second at the CNU XC Invitational and third at the Phoenix XC Invitational. The Rams also had four women and three men qualify for the NCAA Southeast Regional meet in Rock Hill, S.C. that November.

On the track in 2025, Savage oversaw several strong individual performances during the 2024 season. Junior Nia Warren set a personal record in multiple distance events during the season which included a 12th-place finish in the mile at the Doc Hale VT Meet. Junior Ava Miller also had a strong season on the track. She finished the season with a personal-best 18:17.96 in 5000-meters at the Widener Final Qualifier. She also finished 4th in the 3000 meter steeplechase at the UCF Black & Gold Challenge. 

For the men, Savage coached several distance runners including Nahim Abdallah who finished 21st of 53 competitors in 5000 meters at the GMU Dalton Ebanks Invitational. Abdallah also set a personal-best 4:07.03 in 1500 meters at the JMU Invitational. Julian Lawson also had a strong season, setting personal records in the 3000-meter, mile, 800-meter, and 1500-meter. Lawson also finished 13th of 35 competitors in the mile run at the Darius Dixon Memorial Invitational. 

2023 was a particularly strong year for Savage and the VCU Cross Country programs. On the men’s side, the team recorded their best finish in both the Atlantic 10 Championships and the NCAA Southeast Regionals since 2019 while also recording 2nd-place finishes in the CNU XC Regional Preview and the ECU Pirate Invitational. Savage also led a women’s team captained by Sophomore Lauren Tunnell who finished 1st in 4 of the 6 meets. Additionally, Tunnell finished 5th of 180 competitors in the Spider Alumni Open and 29th of 246 competitors in the Southeast Regionals.

During Savage's first season in Richmond, VCU's distance squad trended upward in their performance. The Rams set school relay records in the women's distance medley relay and the men's 4x1500m relay. Lauren Tunnell broke the school record in the women's indoor 1000m with a time of 2:49.26, and she became the third Ram woman ever to run under 4:30 in the 1500m with a time of 4:29.45. Overall, seven Ram distance runners put forth top-10 performances in VCU school history in their events during the 2022-23 season. 

Savage arrived at VCU after most recently serving as a volunteer assistant coach at William & Mary for four years. Prior to working with the Tribe, he spent time as an assistant at Gonzaga and worked as an intern coaching assistant for the District Track Club in Arlington, Va. Savage 
was a four-year member of the track & field team at George Mason, where he was a team co-captain from 2015 to 2017.

At William & Mary, Savage developed student-athletes competing in cross country, middle distance and distance events in track & field. He also assisted with the oversight and management of track & field and cross country program-related events, travel logistics and recruiting. 
 
During his tenure, the Tribe won the 2018, 2019 and 2021 CAA Cross Country team titles while two athletes earned NCAA All-American Honorable Mentions at the 2019 NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships. He coached seven CAA Outdoor Track & Field individual champions and oversaw seven indoor school records and 16 indoor IC4A individual event champions from 2018 to 2022. 
 
During Savage’s time at Gonzaga, he created and implemented training plans for the Zags’ middle-distance track & field athletes while assisting in training the cross country and track & field distance athletes. He also assisted in travel logistics, recruiting and social media for the cross country and track teams. 30 athletes broke into Gonzaga all-time lists during Savage’s year in Spokane and seven athletes qualified to the NCAA West Preliminary.
 
In 2016, Savage served as an intern coaching assistant for professional track & field team District Track Club where he organized and led practices, identified potential recruits and assisted in planning meet schedules and travel arrangements. 
 
As a student-athlete, Savage was a member of multiple Atlantic 10 title-winning teams and earned several A-10 all-conference honors. A native of New Kent, Va., Savage graduated from George Mason in 2017 with a bachelor’s degree in English and minor in Sport Coaching.