Director and Founder

Jonathan Lyau began running in 1979 at age 15. He has coached runners of different abilities. His runners range from pre-teens to 80+ years of age.  He is currently an assistant girl’s cross country coach at Iolani School.  He was the girl’s distance track coach at Kamehameha School for 10 years and the McKinley H.S. boy’s head XC coach for 1 year and also the head coach of Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s marathon training program, “Team N’ Training” (1996-2013).  In 1996 he established Personal Best Training where he trains runners towards personal goals. Jonathan is one of Hawaii’s most accomplished road runners and a Hawaii State high school 3200m track champion (1982). He is a 17x Kamaaina (local-born) Champion in the Honolulu Marathon from 1993 to 2004, 2006 to 2009, and 2012. He is the 1994 and 2002 Great Aloha Run champion. In 2009, he was inducted into the Honolulu Marathon Hall of Fame.  In 2022, he was inducted in the inaugural Hawaii Running Hall of Fame. In 2022, he became the first person from Hawaii to run a Sub 3 hour marathon in 5 different decades.

 
Staff (2025): 

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Nate Carlson has coached from high school to the professional level. He is currently an assistant cross country and track coach at St. Martin's University and a civilian Dr. of Physical Therapy at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, WA.  Founded Champion Running Group in 2012 (Oahu, HI) that originally started with coaching adults and evolved into coaching middle school to high school mid to long-distance runners in their off season. ​

Castle High School Distance Coach 2017-2019
Aloha Cross Country Camp Coach 2011-2019
Saint Martin’s University Assistant Cross Country Coach 2004, 2023-present
Accomplishments:

• Inducted into the Saint Martin’s University Athletic Hall of Fame for Track and Cross Country.

• NCAA DII All-American in the 1500m, placed 8th at the NCAA National Championship.

• Placed 32nd at the 2012 USA Cross Country National Championships as a member of the All-Army Team.

• Saint Martin’s University School record holder and conference champion in the mile, 1500m, Indoor Distance Medley Relay. Runner Up GNAC 1500m Conference Championships in 2002 & 2003.

• Washington State high school State Champion in the 800-meter and 1600-meter.

• 2 Time ESPN The Magazine Verizon Track & Field/XC Academic All-American

• 9 Time NCAA Academic All-American (XC, Indoor, and Outdoor Track)

• GNAC Sportsmanship of the Year Award Winner 2004-05

• GNAC Academic Athlete of the Year 2004-2005

• APTA board-certified Orthopedic Clinical Specialist

• NSCA Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist who further specializes in running form analysis and teaching running form

• Served 8 years as an active-duty Army physical therapist where he also continued to run competitively around the world for the Army and received the Bronze Star Award while serving in Iraq as a physical therapist from 2009-2010.
  
  Since 2011 - taught running form classes, spoke at national conferences, and taught at cross country camps - performing over 7,000 individual video running analyses of patients and runners from ages 13 to 60 years old.
  Currently, he lives in Tacoma, WA with his wife and works at an Army outpatient clinic and runs a bi-weekly running form video analysis class.

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Kristen Imada is the Head Girl's Cross Country Coach at Iolani School.  She actively competes in marathons and has run in the Tokyo, Boston, New York City, Chicago and Honolulu Marathons.  She was the 2023 Honolulu Marathon Kamaaina Champion.

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Rise Morisato is a Clinical Dietician @ Kuakini Medical Center.  She is an assistant cross country coach at Pac 5.  She ran Track and XC at Marynoll School and was 2013 Aloha Cross Country Camper.

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Kainani Kam Brandi ‘Kainani’ Kam ran Track and XC at Kamehameha Schools-Kapalama and attended the University of Nevada Las Vegas (UNLV) where she studied Nutrition and Kinesiology Science.  She is also an assistant girls cross country coach at Kamehameha School.  She was a 2014 Aloha Cross Country Camper.  
 

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Shane “Aka” Akamine - Retired XC and Track coach

Paul Oshiro - Kamehameha-Kapalama School assistant XC and Track coach

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Workshop Speakers (2025):

Nate Carlson

Jacob Melnick (Dr. of Physical Therapy Director of Clinical Education @HPU)

Rise Morisato, MS RD

Kainani Kam, MS 

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Special Guests:

2015
Polina Carlson is Hawaii’s fastest female distance runner. Finding running later than most professional runners, Polina was a competitive tennis player at the University of West Alabama before her coach noticed that she outran everyone in running drills, including the members of the men's team. His encouragement to work out with the cross-country team to simply “stay in shape” for tennis led to her giving up tennis in order to focus solely on running. Since that time, Polina has seen success in her running career, taking victories at the 2014 Great Aloha Run, the 2013 XTERRA World Championship Half-Marathon and finishing 5th in the 2013 Honolulu Marathon. In December of 2014 Polina placed 6th at the California International Marathon with a time of 2:35:15, and has her sights now set on the Olympics.
Sponsored by Brooks Running, Polina currently resides and trains in Hawaii. Her rise has been meteoric and her potential is still untapped. She believes that with God by her side nothing is impossible.



2014, 2016, 2017
Tim Marr is a professional triathlete. He was born and raised in Hawaii. Tim is a 1997 graduate of Mililani High School where he was a standout athlete in cross country, track, and swimming. He currently lives and trains in Hawaii. Tim has won countless triathlons in Hawaii and also competes in triathlons around the world. He has placed as high as 15th in the Ironman World Championships held in Kona.



2013
Gerry Lindgren is widely recognized as having been the best high school long distance runner in the United States. In 1964, in his senior year of high school, he ran 5000 meters (3.1 miles) in 13 minutes and 44 seconds, setting a U.S. high school record for the distance that would remain unbroken for 40 years. Among his other records he established that year was a time of 8:40.0 in an indoor 2-mile race, a mark that he would hold for 49 years until it was broken on February 16, 2013.  

On July 25, 1964, after graduating from high school, Lindgren outran two Russian runners to win the 10,000 meter event a the dual US-USSR Track Meet. Later that summer in the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo, he finished ninth in the 10,000 meters behind gold medalist Billy Mills after having sprained an ankle during training. In 1965 Lindgren also competed against Mills in the 1965 National Championship meet, where they raced the 6-mile where both were timed in 27:11.6, a new World Record.

Lindgren attended Washington State University. While at Washington State, Lindgren won 11 NCAA Championships. He was one of only two people to ever defeat Steve Prefontaine in an NCAA Championship.
Gerry has lived in Hawaii since the 1980’s. He continues to run regularly and is active in the Hawaii running community.
Gerry has been inducted into the National Distance Running Hall of Fame and is truly one of America’s all-time legends of distance running.
High school personal records (1964)

• 1500 meters - 3:44.6 

• 1-mile - 4:01.5

• 3000 meters - 8:06.3

• 2-mile (3.2 km) - 8:40

• 3 miles (4.8 km) - 13:17

• 5000 meters - 13:44

• 10000 meters - 29:17.6