Blue Tornado Track & Field

Track and field at McCallie is one of the oldest recorded sports in the school’s history. It is also one of the most popular and successful.

Rodney Stoker was named head coach of the program in December 2024 after serving as a McCallie cross country and track and field assistant since 2016. He replaced longtime head coach Mike Wood who stepped aside but remained on staff as an assistant. 

Coach Stoker brings a wealth of coaching experience to the position with coaching stints at nearly all levels of athletics. He served as an assistant for the University of Tennessee cross country and track and field programs from 2012 to 2016. He was the head coach of both the men’s and women’s programs at Bryan College for seven years where they won several conference titles, and he directed programs and taught physical education at several Chattanooga area middle and high schools.

A distance runner throughout high school and college, he began his collegiate cross country and track career at Georgia Southern University. He transferred to the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and earned a degree in 2000 in Exercise Science. While at UTC, the cross country teams won Southern Conference championships in 1997 and 1998. His senior year, UTC won a Region title and competed at the NCAA Championships in Lawrence, Kansas.

Coach Wood served as McCallie’s track and field coach for 33 years before handing the baton to Rodney. During that span, McCallie produced 32 individual State Champions in 39 different events. He led the Blue Tornado to the 2021 and 2024 TSSAA Division II-AA State Track and Field Championships and state runner up finishes eight times.

The 2025 track and field athletes worked toward the state meet in an attempt to repeat as state champions; along the way winning Fast Break, McCallie Invitational, Best of Preps, and Region meet titles. The team’s list of state qualifiers was impressive, and as the state meet progressed, Coach Stoker had his charges in strong position for a run at the title. In what turned out to be a three-way battle for the team trophy, Montgomery Bell Academy bested Christian Brothers by three points and McCallie by 15.

Juniors Andrew Smith and De’Shun Tipton paced the Blue Tornado, scoring 46.5 points between the two. Andrew raced to state championships in the 100 and 200 meters and was the anchor leg on the first-place 4x100 relay team, and De’Shun captured the long jump and triple jump state titles and placed fourth in the high jump. Senior Jack Bowen concluded his decorated career in distance running with three second-place finishes.

McCallie track athletes have gone on to compete for Wake Forest, Florida State, Harvard, Cal, Princeton, Virginia, Washington & Lee, Davidson, Yale, Cornell, Williams, Amherst, Georgia Tech, Furman, Appalachian State, Sewanee, Wyoming, Alabama, Ole Miss, Samford, Stanford, George Washington and other fine colleges and universities. Alums Tim Franklin (Florida State), Riley Young (Ole Miss), Will Raby (Appalachian State), Taylor Smith (Virginia), Jack Jones (Washington & Lee), Davis Couch and Alan Long (Sewanee), Matthew Hudson (Wyoming), Dylan Carmack, Ramsay Ritchie and Pierce DeRico (Davidson), and Eric Peterson (Samford) all made major contributions as all-conference or conference champions for their respective universities.