Cole Hester joined the Butler cross country and track and field programs as an assistant coach in June of 2024.
Hester returns to his hometown as he is a 2013 Lawrence Central High School graduate who then went on to compete at Purdue, graduating in 2018.
Hester arrives at Butler after serving as an assistant coach at Columbia since 2020. Prior to that, he was an assistant at Notre Dame for two seasons.
At Columbia, Hester oversaw the cross country men record their best finish (since 2017) at the NCAA Northeast Regionals (fifth in 2021), three Lions earn NCAA Cross Country All-Northeast Region honors and Tyler Berg earn cross country All-Ivy League honors before running at the NCAA Cross Country National Championships.
On the track, Hester helped coach a pair of Ivy League champions in both the indoor and outdoor 4x800m and oversaw four men qualify for the 2022 NCAA East First Round.
During his time at Notre Dame, Hester worked with the men's cross country and distance teams, and during his first season on the staff (2018), he helped the men's cross country squad win its first ACC Conference Cross Country title in program history. Following the ACC Championships, Hester coached the men's team to a second place finish at regionals and a 14th place finish at the NCAA National Championships.
Hester was a part of a women's cross country squad that finished second at the 2018 ACC Championships, fourth at the regionals and eighth at the NCAA National Championships. Overall while on the coaching staff at Notre Dame, the Irish had three student athletes crowned All-Americans.
On the track, during the 2018-19 indoor season, Hester, helped the men win the One-Mile Run at the ACC Championships and he coached the men's Distance Medley Relay squad that won the ACC Championship, and qualified for the NCAA Indoor Track & Field National Championships by running the second fastest DMR time in NCAA history. At nationals, the Notre Dame DMR squad won the 2019 Indoor National Championship.
During the 2019 outdoor season, Hester helped qualify eight men for the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field National Championships and he mentored Yared Nuguse to a national title in the 1,500-Meter Run.
A four-year letterwinner for the Boilermakers, Hester was a member of what was at the time, the highest Big Ten and NCAA Regional finish in more than 20 years at Purdue.
