Cook Announces Promotion Of Armbrust, Griffeth
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – Arkansas head gymnastics coach Mark Cook announced the promotion of Jaime Armbrust and Garrett Griffeth to Associate Head Coaches Monday afternoon. Armbrust recently completed her fourth season as an assistant under Cook, while Griffeth joined the staff prior to the 2018 season.
“Jaime and Garrett have shown great leadership in their roles as assistant coaches,” said head coach Mark Cook. “The ability to get our program back to the National Championships, coupled with their commitment to this program earned them this promotion.”
Armbrust, who was previously an All-American gymnast with the program and was the team’s director of operations prior to being promoted to assistant coach, was named the South Central Region’s Assistant Coach of the Year following Arkansas’ regional in Columbus, Ohio this past April.
Charged with coaching the team’s balance beam squad, the Ringwood, New Jersey native coached the Razorbacks to numerous records while counting just one fall on the event this past season. Despite having competed five underclassmen in the beam rotation, the Razorbacks had just five falls on the event in 2018.
Under Armbrust’s tutelage, the Razorbacks set four of the highest individual scores in program history on the event, including a pair of 9.975’s from freshman Sophia Carter against Georgia and in Arkansas’ Tri Meet against Denver and Iowa State. In Arkansas’ meet against Georgia, two additional Razorbacks in sophomore’s Michaela Burton and Jessica Yamzon tied the previous record score on beam with scores of 9.950 each.
Armbrust’s beam squad has set two of the three highest scores in program history on the balance beam with a 49.425 against Georgia and a 49.400 against Arizona. In 13-of-14 meets this season, she has coached the group to event scores of 49.000 or higher. Last season, the Razorbacks posted a 49.000 event score on beam in just six-of-12 meets.
Griffeth, who was an assistant coach at Texas Woman’s University and joined the staff in the fall of 2017, is charged with coaching the team’s vault group. This past season, the Razorbacks ranked inside the top-25 in Road To National’s weekly event rankings each week of the season. They ranked as one of the nation’s top-10 vault groups in three of four weeks to start the year.
Despite injuries forcing Arkansas to compete five vaulters in most meets, Griffeth coached Arkansas’ core vault group of Braie Speed, Amanda Wellick, and Sarah Shaffer to scores of 9.800 or higher in 39-of-42 vaults. Wellick and Speed took All-SEC status on the event, while Speed was named Arkansas’ 11th vault All-American, first since 2014, at this year’s NCAA Championships.
As an assistant at Texas Woman’s University in Denton, Texas, Griffeth helped the Pioneers to the title at the USA Gymnsatics Collegiate National Championships, while coaching seven gymnasts to 12 USAG All-America honors.
“Both will assume additional responsibilities in the forthcoming season,” said Cook. “They will continue their hard work in the gym, while recruiting the nation’s top athletes to the University of Arkansas.”
For more information on Razorback gymnastics, including in-meet updates, follow @RazorbackGym on Twitter.
