Charles Mays Jr., the son of 1968 Olympian Charlie Mays, has been hired as the new head coach of f the men’s and women’s cross-country programs at New Jersey City University, Athletics Director Larry Schiner has announced. Mays will also serve as an assistant coach for the men’s and women’s indoor and outdoor track and field teams.

"Coach Mays comes to us with a very strong background in both cross country and track and field,” said Schiner. “I’m confident that he will be able to develop a successful men’s and women’s cross-country program.”

“This is a dream I’ve been working towards, and I’m excited that I will get the opportunity to prove what I can do as a head coach,” said Mays. “I will get to use the tools that I’ve learned being an athlete myself, and being around Olympians and NCAA coaches.”  

Mays will serve as the first head coach of the men’s cross-country program since it was re-introduced at the University in June of 2003. The program was discontinued following the 1981 season. He will also guide the women’s program, replacing Mark Griffin, NJCU’s Associate Director of Athletics, who has resigned as the women’s cross-country coach after seven seasons, but will continue as a cross-country assistant coach this season, and remain head coach of the men’s and women’s indoor and outdoor track and field teams.

Mays comes to NJCU after serving as an assistant at several local high schools, most recently at Lincoln (2002-2003) in Jersey City, where he was the boys and girls cross-country and track sprint coach.

Prior to Lincoln, he was the assistant indoor and outdoor track and field and cross-country coach at his alma mater, McNair Academic (2001-2002) in Jersey City. He began his high school coaching career at St. Peter’s Prep (1998-2001) in Jersey City as an assistant indoor and outdoor track and field and cross-country coach. At St. Peter’s Prep, he helped lead the Marauders to the 1999 and 2000 Hudson County Indoor Track Championships.

Since 2002, he has also been involved in youth track & field as the Assistant Meet Director of the DeKalb County Youth Games in Decatur, Georgia, and the Assistant Camp Coordinator at the Mel Pender Track & Field Summer Camp in Atlanta, Georgia.

He has been the head track coach for the Team Walker Summer Track Club since 1999. Mays also helped out on the national level in 2000, when he was the assistant to the food service coordinator at the USA Track & Field Olympic Trials in Sacramento, CA.

The involvement in the sport of track comes naturally for the younger Mays, who has been exposed to it since he was born. His father, Charlie Mays, is a legendary name in New Jersey track history. A nine-time Amateur Athletic Union champion in the long jump and six-time champion in the 440-yard dash, Mays was a member of the United States' 1968 Olympic Team in Mexico City as a long jumper. The younger Mays was an infant when his family attended his father’s Olympic trials in Lake Tahoe in 1968.

His father was selected as an AAU All-American 11 times and was named the AAU Track and Field Athlete of the Year on three occasions. In college at Maryland State College (now Maryland-Eastern Shore), he was ranked No. 1 in the world in the indoor 500-yard dash. He was a two-time NCAA champion in the long jump and the mile relay.

The elder Mays, a current member of the Jersey City council for six years and an inductee into the Hudson County Hall of Fame is entering his seventh season as an assistant coach at Seton Hall University, where he has been since January 1998. He was an assistant coach for the Gothic Knights indoor and outdoor women’s programs at then-Jersey City State College (now NJCU) during the 1996-97 season under Griffin. The younger Mays lists his father as his hero.

“He never forced me or pressured me to do anything in the sport,” the younger Mays said in describing his father’s influence. “He just let me be me as a kid. In fact, I originally played baseball when I was growing up. I’ve just grown to love the sport of track & field. Now, he’s not just my father, he’s a teacher. He’ll quiz me on technical issues involved with coaching the sport, such as what I would do with an athlete in a certain situation, or how I would have a kid train.”

A May 1990 graduate of the University of Maryland-Eastern Shore with a Bachelor of Science in General Studies, and a concentration in Business Administration, Mays attended the Princess Anne, MD school on a track & field athletic scholarship from 1986-90. During his career with the Hawks, he captured the indoor and outdoor Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) championships during the 1989-90 season as part of the men’s 4x400-meter and sprint medley relay teams.  

Mays is currently employed full-time for the Jersey City Police Department as a Senior Records Management Representative, a position he has held since 1996. There he handles the documentation of criminal incidents and investigations, programs departmental computer equipment, and trains other employees on various system programs.