Before the arrival of head coach Kym Tucker, the El Diamante Miners had never won a Central Section high school championship in girls’ cross country and track and field.
That changed in less than two years.
In the fall, in her first season as the girls’ cross-country head coach. Tucker directed El Diamante to the 2025 Central Section Division II team championship.
Six months later, in May, the Miners also made school history, becoming the first girls’ track and field team to capture a Central Section plaque, winning it all in Division II. Tucker just finished her second season as the head track and field coach at El Diamante.
How did the Miners go from no section titles to back-to-back historic runs?
Through determination and a commitment to conditioning and strength training.
That started last June with Tucker’s training plan, starting with workouts at 5:30 a.m.
On Tuesdays and Thursdays, her student-athletes laser in on strength and conditioning, including powerlifting and squats. Sprints followed those sessions.
On the other days, the Miners focus on long-distance running to increase their mileage.
“They’re doing so much more than the average athlete,” Tucker said.
That’s resulted in a pair of section titles.
At the Central Section Division II championship cross-country meet in November, sophomore Isabella Vazquez led the way with a first-place finish in 18 minutes and 2.54 seconds. That performance was followed by Brooklyn Bawanan in fourth (19:16.01), Kai Bawanan in eighth (19:40.94), Danai Preciado Bernal in 15th (20:09.20), and Hannah Dlugonski in 16th (20:21.43).
Those outstanding runs sparked El Diamante to a first-place team finish as the Miners edged Clovis West 44-64 in the 22-team field.
How did Tucker elevate the running culture at El Diamante?
“I feel like, honestly, a lot of it has to do with strength and conditioning,” she said. “Just making sure their bodies are prepared. Being an athlete in general, but being a runner is really, really hard on your body, so I just focused on, ‘How can I keep them healthy so we can keep progressing and hit those numbers later in the season?’ “
That proved to be the difference, too, at the 2026 Central Section Division II Track & Field Championships in May.
El Diamante won the team section title, scoring 111 points to outlast Monache (60 points) for first place.
That championship was aided by outstanding showings from Brooklyn Bawanan, who won both the section’s Division II 100- and 300-meter titles (15.23 seconds and 45.25 seconds).
Kai Bawanan also captured an individual section championship, claiming the crown in the 400 meters (57.76 seconds). Vazquez continued that championship success with an individual first-place section medal in the 1,600 meters (5:10.78).
Kai Bawanan, Bernal, Poppy Cheney and Brooklyn Bawanan also teamed up to win the section’s Division II 4×400 relay championship.
The Bawanans, identical twins, set the standard for Tucker’s vision.
“They are the blueprint of what an athlete should be,” Tucker said of the Bawanans. “Their personalities, their characteristics, them as human beings, I mean, it’s unmatched. If I can have all Bawanans, I’d be set.”
Kai Bawanan credited their championships to Tucker and those early 5:30 a.m. summer morning workouts.
“She’s definitely changed this whole program,” Kai Bawanan said. “My freshman year, she wasn’t the head coach, but once she did become the head coach, the whole program honestly changed. The intensity, the workouts were much harder. We do a lot of strength training, and that showed. That helped us win championships.”
Were those morning sessions hard to get up for?
“Yes,” Kai Bawanan said. “It’s hard to wake up for, but that’s just how it is. If you want to be part of that sport, that’s just how it is. You wake up every morning. You know what you have to do. It’s hard, but you just have to do it.”
That created a team-first atmosphere.
“Tucker definitely understands the mental side when it comes to running, so she’s able to make everyone be a team,” Brooklyn Bawanan said. “She’s really good at making everyone come together, and also, understanding mentally, that this is a hard sport. Her ways of motivating, she understands how that can vary from athlete to athlete, and she’s really good at motivating each athlete specifically to themselves, and then, she’s also really good at designing programs that are specific for each athlete to excel.”
Tucker established a competitive culture with the Miners, too.
So much so that sometimes she ran and trained alongside her girls.
“Sometimes, we will get competitive, and we’ll have push-up competitions,” Brooklyn Bawanan said. “She’s undefeated.”
What’s it like to have an active coach?
“It’s pretty cool,” Brooklyn Bawanan said. “She likes to work out with us, sometimes. And sometimes, all of our coaches run with us. It’s fun. It’s honestly really cool because it’s good to know that the person who is telling you how to do it is doing it as well. It’s empowering. I really love it, honestly. I feel like you’re able to relate to them more on a personal level because you’re able to see them do what you’re doing. It’s really fun when they’re like, ‘I’m practicing today.’ ‘Alright, coach. Let’s go.’ It’s a really fun experience to have.”
Tucker, whose maiden name is Callahan, is no stranger to El Diamante.
A three-sport standout, Tucker ran cross-country and track, and played soccer with the Miners. She graduated in 2008.
Today, she is back at her alma mater, teaching and training the next generation of Miners.
“I feel like, at first, it was so weird, but now, it’s exactly what I was meant to do,” Tucker said. “I really love it. Teaching already, I loved it, but coaching is my bread and butter. If I could coach full-time, I would do it. Teaching, I go at it with the same mentality. I’m a mentor. Yes, academics matter, but I care more about them as a person, so we focused on all different aspects. How to help them mentally, socially, academically, athletically.”
What’s Tucker’s favorite thing about coaching?
“The kids,” Tucker said. “I just love being around them. I’m thinking about some of these kids graduating that I’ve been with for four years; it’s hard. It’s tough. I’m not going to be OK.”
This article originally appeared on Visalia Times-Delta: Track and field coach Kym Tucker building championship culture at El Diamante
Reporting by Vongni Yang, Visalia Times-Delta / Visalia Times-Delta
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Vongni Yang, Visalia Times-Delta | USA TODAY Network
