Every program has an origin story. Ours starts in 1969, when Milpitas High School opened its doors and the track became a gathering place for anyone willing to test themselves against the clock, the pit, the bar, or the ring. From day one, this was a program built on versatility. Multi-sport athletes. Busy schedules. A culture that valued showing up prepared and competing hard, even when nobody was watching. Inside the Central Coast Section, Milpitas quietly built a reputation as a place where effort mattered and development was the point.

Then came the 1990s, when the program found its fastball. The sprints and hurdles groups took shape behind athletes like Deltha O’Neal and Lenzie Jackson. Speed, discipline, confidence. These were the years when Milpitas started to feel like a highlight reel waiting to happen. Around them, athletes such as Damon Hamm embodied the program’s multi-event, team-first identity. You didn’t just run here. You competed. You contributed. You were part of something.

As the years rolled forward, the program expanded its toolbox. In the throws, athletes like Siua Musika brought power and presence, turning strength into points. In the jumps, the Yanagacio family helped establish a tradition that felt less like a hot streak and more like a franchise trait. Long jump. Triple jump. Season after season, Milpitas athletes showed up in the results, quietly stacking consistency.

That jumps consistency never went away. Different years, different uniforms, same results. Athletes like Robin Yoo, Simone Tayaba, Cynthia Mallory, and Alex Dillon carried that lineage forward, reinforcing a program-wide belief in fundamentals, rhythm, and showing up ready to execute. No gimmicks. Just reps and results.

Then came the stretch nobody planned for. From 2020 to 2023, the COVID and post-COVID years disrupted everything. Seasons paused. Routines broke. Momentum vanished. Like a team stuck between eras, the program had to reset before it could reload. The focus shifted back to habits. To consistency. To remembering why the work mattered in the first place. Slowly, the pieces came back together.

That return showed up in leadership recognition. In 2024, head coach Franco Mannucci was named SCVAL Coach of the Year, a nod not just to results, but to rebuilding something sustainable. Structure returned. Confidence followed. The program started to feel like itself again.

Today, the story keeps moving under the leadership of Austin Nguyen, a Milpitas alumnus from the Class of 2006 whose return feels like a deep-cut callback for longtime Trojans. After joining the staff as jumps coach in 2023, Nguyen helped reinforce the program’s technical backbone and athlete buy-in. Now leading the program, he brings institutional memory, modern perspective, and the understanding that tradition only matters if you keep adding chapters.

The legacy? Still rolling. Names like O’Neal, Jackson, Musika, the Yanagacio jumpers, and Hamm are baked into the program’s DNA. Coaches like Paul Abbott, Mannucci, and Nguyen make sure the standard doesn’t drift. Every season adds new faces, new PRs, new stories. Same lanes. Same pits. Same expectations. Trojan Track & Field keeps moving forward, one rep and one generation at a time.