Chris Beene is in his seventh season as head coach of the cross country and track and field teams at South Plains College.

Since his arrival in Levelland, Beene has led the Texans and Lady Texans to a combined 15 NJCAA championships in men's and women's cross country, half-marathon, indoor track and outdoor track. Most recently, the Lady Texan half-marathon team won a share of the national title in November, 2010. The following March, the Lady Texan indoor team took top honors when they outscored the competition by 92 ½ points and earned Beene NJCAA Indoor Coach of the Year honors, the seventh time he has won the award in indoor and outdoor track and cross country.

Beene helped guide six athletes to nine All-American awards during the 2009 cross country season that culminated with the Texan men defending their title at the NJCAA half-marathon held in Overland Park, Kansas. Later that spring, Beene coached Kelly Closse (shot put, discus), Colleen Felix (javelin), Shakeeri Cole (800), and Marcelis Lynch (800) to individual titles in addition to helping guide the 4x800 meter relay team easily win in Hutchinson where both the men's and women's teams took home team titles for the second year in a row. For his efforts, Beene was later voted by his peers as Coach of the Year for both men and women.

The 2008-09 fall and spring seasons may very well have been the best in a rich history of South Plains College track and cross country teams as SPC won five championships out of eight possible, with the SPC men coming just short of sweeping all four. It all started with the Texans coming away with a half-marathon championship in the fall. The Texan and Lady Texan track teams then blew away their competition in the spring by sweeping each of the NJCAA indoor and outdoor national championships and are only one-of-four schools to ever win all four titles in the same year at any collegiate level.

In the last six years, Beene has coached athletes that currently hold 9 NJCAA meet or national records. His athletes who have won over 100 individual and relay national championships, and a host of all-American awards.

Beene came to South Plains College from Wayland Baptist University in Plainview, where he was named Women's NAIA Region 5 and 6 Coach of the Year in 2003 and 2004. He also earned Men's Sooner Athletic Conference Coach of the Year honors in 2003 and 2004 and also won the NAIA Sooner Athletic Conference championship in 2003.

Before Wayland, Beene served four seasons as an assistant coach at Texas Tech University where he was in charge of coaching the multi-events, pole vault, and javelin. He has also had previous coaching stints at Abilene Christian University and Texas A&M University-Kingsville.

During his time at Abilene Christian, Beene was part of 12 NCAA Division II national team championships. He also coached two decathletes to individual national championships as well.

Additionally, Beene coached Stephen Moore and Trafton Rodgers. Rodgers went on to win the USATF Men's Heptathlon Indoor Championships, while Moore won a USA Indoor championship and went on to place fourth at the World Indoor Championships in Barcelona, Spain. Both have competed in the United States Olympic Trials, with Rodgers in 2000 and Moore in 2000 as well as 2004. Moore also won a gold medal in the decathlon at the Pan-American Games.

A former all-American decathlete, Beene received both his bachelor and master degrees in kinesiology from Angelo State University. He and his wife, Corye, have a daughter, Faith, and a son, Sage.