In his 30th year full-time with the University of Arkansas, Trainor is the chief public relations officer for Vice Chancellor and Director of Athletics Hunter Yurachek and Razorback Athletics.
As a member of Yurachek’s leadership cabinet and senior staff, Trainor is also in charge of the department’s engagement with former student-athletes in all sports, including the A Club. Trainor coordinates the department’s executive and crisis management communications, is the department’s FOIA coordinator, and is a department liaison with the Razorback Foundation, the University of Arkansas Sports Hall of Honor, University Relations, the National Football Foundation, the Arkansas Sports and Southwest Conference Halls of Fame. He is also in his 15th year as the sports administrator for Razorback Baseball and his third year as the sports administrator for Razorback Volleyball.
Trainor was a nearly 20-year media relations veteran at his alma mater before assuming his current role. During his tenure in that position, Arkansas boasted nine All-Americans, including 2006 and 2007 Doak Walker Award winner and Heisman Trophy runner-up Darren McFadden, 2007 Rimington Trophy winner Jonathan Luigs and 2003 Outland Trophy and Lombardi Award finalist Shawn Andrews.
As associate SID, Trainor worked closely with football and served as the primary contact for the 2000 SEC Tournament champion Arkansas basketball squad. He also served as the color analyst on the Razorback Baseball Radio Network for five years.
A university graduate in journalism in 1994, he earned his master’s at Arkansas in 2005.
Trainor currently serves as the 70th president of the College Sports Communicators (formerly CoSIDA). He also serves as a board member and treasurer for the Southwest District of Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) and the past president of the Northwest Arkansas PRSA Chapter. In addition, he is on the board of directors of the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame, the College Baseball Foundation, the Southwest Conference Hall of Fame and the Brandon Burlsworth Foundation, the Board of Trustees of the College Baseball Foundation and is an ex-officio board member of the Football Writers Association of America (FWAA).
He also serves as a communications consultant for the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee (USOPC). In addition, he is a member of the U.S. Basketball Writers Association of America (USBWAA) and the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association (NCBWA).
In 2013, he was honored nationally by PR Daily for “Best in Crisis Management.” He has also been recognized multiple times by the Northwest Arkansas chapter of PRSA for the Razorback Athletics Annual Report. He has also served as an adjunct professor in Sports Public Relations in the university’s College of Education and Health Professions.
Trainor has been selected to serve at some of the most prestigious sporting events in the country. He has worked as the primary team media relations liaison to one of the competing teams in each of the first 10 College Football Playoff National Championship games. For more than 13 years, Trainor has been the press conference moderator for the nationally televised SEC Football Media Days. He has also been selected to serve as the press conference moderator at the National Football Foundation College Football Hall of Fame induction weekend, numerous SEC Football Championship Games and the SEC Women’s Basketball Tournament. Trainor has been a member of the media relations team for more than 27 Cotton Bowls, two NCAA Men’s Basketball Final Fours and numerous Master’s Tournaments for CBS Sports.
Trainor and his wife, the former Ruth Whitehead, are the parents of two daughters, Emma and Ellie. Emma works as a graduate assistant in sports communications at Ole Miss. Ellie is a sophomore at the University of Arkansas. His brother, Kendall, a UA Sports Hall of Honor inductee, was a consensus first-team All-American at placekicker for the Razorback football team and a three-time letterman for the Razorback baseball team.
