A former PSAC Champion, Brady Wert enters his fifth season as an assistant coach with the California (PA) track & field teams in 2023.
Wert has mentored a pair of league champions and a combined 15 All-PSAC honorees over five different events while with the Vulcans. Additionally, Cal broke a combined five school records during the 2022 campaign and featured its first All-American in the high jump in over 35 years.
Last season, Beyoncé Kelly placed eighth in the high jump at the NCAA Outdoor Championships after entering the event seeded No. 20 nationally. She tied her personal record of 1.73 meters (5-8.0 feet) to earn First-Team All-America status. Kelly, who is a three-time All-PSAC honoree in the high jump, also set the indoor school record in the high jump last year at 1.71 meters (5-7.25 feet).
Additionally in 2022, Jalen Cloud became the first individual selected as PSAC Track Athlete of the Year in school history. He accomplished the feat during the indoor campaign when he captured the league title in the triple jump and set school records in both the long jump and triple jump at the PSAC Championships. Logan Pfister won the conference crown in the high jump as a freshman at the 2022 indoor championships while also tying the school record with a height of 2.05 meters (6-8.75 feet).
Wert also played a pivotal role in the development of multi-event standout Anna Ebersole, who was selected a 2022 CoSIDA Second-Team Academic All-American. She earned All-PSAC status and USTFCCCA all-region laurels in both the pentathlon and heptathlon, plus the high jump, last season. Ebersole set the school record in the heptathlon with 4,749 points at the PSAC Championships, which was a 300-point improvement from her personal best.
Prior to his time at Cal, Wert spent two years as an assistant coach at both Kutztown and Saint Francis (Pa.). He started his coaching career as an assistant at Slippery Rock after being a standout for The Rock from 2007-11.
Wert was responsible for sprints, hurdles, jumps and multi-events at Kutztown, while also assisting in recruiting. He was instrumental in the development of standout McKenzie Fagan, who was selected a CoSIDA Academic All-American as a senior. Under Wert, Fagan captured the league title in the high jump during both the 2017 indoor season and the 2018 outdoor campaign. Additionally, Kelly Groth broke a 35-year old school record during the preliminaries of the 100-meter dash at the 2018 PSAC Championships. Jhaloni Johnson eclipsed the indoor school mark in the 200-meter dash after the previous record stood for 18 years and Anthony Bullaro established a school record in the 60-meter hurdles at the league championships in 2017.
A native of New York, Wert previously served as a volunteer assistant for the Vulcans during the Fall 2016 semester when he worked with throwers before being named an assistant coach at Kutztown.
Wert gained NCAA Division I experience while being responsible for sprints, hurdles and jumps at Saint Francis from 2014-16. He helped mentor a trio of Northeast Conference (NEC) Champions with the Red Flash claiming multiple league titles in the men's high jump during the 2016 season. Additionally, Wert coached the league champion in the men's pole vault during the winter of 2015.
As a college athlete, Wert was a three-time PSAC Champion at Slippery Rock and held the school record in the heptathlon with 5,016 points. He repeated as the league champion in the decathlon in 2010 and 2011 and also captured the conference title in heptathlon in 2011. As a junior, Wert claimed his first conference title by winning the decathlon with a score of 6,444 points. The following year, he won the heptathlon during the indoor campaign before recording the third-highest decathlon performance in the nation during the spring with 6,785 points while also repeating as the league champion in the event.
Wert served as an assistant coach with The Rock from 2011-14 and worked with vertical jumps and multi-events. Slippery Rock captured the women's team title at the 2014 PSAC Indoor Championships while the program won league titles in the heptathlon and men's and women's pole vault.
He earned his bachelor's degree in business administration with a concentration in marketing from Slippery Rock in 2011. He later completed a master's degree from Saint Francis in business administration with a concentration in organizational communication in 2016.
He and his wife Sandy, an assistant coach for the Vulcans, reside in California.
