June 01, 2006 - Tumbleston Tabbed to Academic All-District Team Thursday
ELON, N.C. For the third consecutive year, Elon cross country runner John Tumbleston (Boone, N.C./Watauga) was named to the 2005-06 ESPN The Magazine Academic All-District III Men's Track and Field/Cross Country First Team (University Division) Thursday by the College Sports Information Directors of America.
A member of the 2004-05 ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America Men's Track and Field/Cross Country First Team, Tumbleston is on the national ballot to be considered for 2005-06 Academic All-America honors, to be announced later this month.
The squad recognizes 10 student-athletes from NCAA Division I institutions in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia as selected by a vote of CoSIDA members within the district.
This marks the 25th time that an Elon student has earned Academic All-District distinction during the school?s seven-year tenure in the University Division. Tumbleston becomes the seventh Phoenix athlete to be named to an Academic All-District team during the 2005-06 academic year.
Tumbleston graduated Summa Cum Laude from Elon last month with a 4.00 cumulative grade-point average as a double major in physics and science education. The three-time TIAA-CREF Academic All-Southern Conference team member has also been inducted into the Phi Kappa Phi, Phi Beta Delta (International Studies), Pi Gamma Mu (Social Sciences), Chi Alpha Sigma
(Athletics) and Phi Eta Sigma national honor societies.
This past spring, the two-time team MVP earned both the 2006 Southern Conference/Dave Hart Postgraduate Scholarship and an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship. Last month, Tumbleston was honored as the A.L. Hook Scholar-Athlete of the Year at Elon's annual athletics banquet for the second consecutive year. He also received the Omicron Delta/John W. Barney Memorial Award, which is presented annually to the Elon senior with the highest career GPA.
A four-year letterman and two-year team captain, Tumbleston holds five of Elon's all-time top-10 cross country times, including one tied for the school record. He has competed in the conference championship meet and the NCAA Regionals all four years and was named the Southern Conference Runner of the Week as well as the TIAA-CREF SoCon Student-Athlete of the Week once each during the 2005 season.
Tumbleston has competed in 29 of Elon's 30 races during the past four years, scoring in 28 of those meets while emerging as the top Phoenix finisher on
14 occasions. He earned his team's Massey Family Sportsmanship Award in 2003 and ran to Southeastern Collegiate Invitational champion status in 2005. He represented his team on the Elon Student-Athlete Advisory Council the last three years.
An eight-time President's List and Athletics Director's Honor Roll student at Elon, Tumbleston has served as a North Carolina Teaching Fellow, an Elon Honors Fellow and a physics teaching and research assistant. He plans on attending graduate school in the fall of 2006, pursuing his master's degree and Ph.D. in physics on his way to becoming a university professor.