Gear Up! A Deep Dive into the Triathlon World With Navy Coach Billy Edwards

Episode Transcript
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Karl (00:14):
Hi everybody, my name is Karl Darden and I'd like to
welcome and thank all of you forjoining us today on Navy Sports
Central.
I'm your host and this is theofficial podcast of the Navy
Sports Nation, where we take adeeper dive into Navy Sports.
August is winding down inAnnapolis, which means that the
fall sports are just nowstarting to crank up.
The women's soccer team alreadyhas several games in the books.
The men won their home openeragainst VMI and the volleyball

(00:35):
team won two out of threematches in their first
invitation of the year.
And even though the footballteam had a very tough day, navy
still won the weekend againstNotre Dame, thanks to the men's
rugby team.
We've got all that, plus ourdeep dive segment and question
of the day, so don't go anywhere.
The 2023-24 sports season isfinally here.
Alright, welcome back to thestart of what promises to be

(01:05):
another exciting sports seasonat Navy.
Whether this is the first timeyou're checking us out or you're
a regular listener, thanks fortaking the time.
Let's go ahead and get oursports update started with the
women's soccer team.
The Mids won their first gameof the year and followed that up
with three hard fought draws,one of which was against the
University of Maryland, and inthat game senior goalkeeper
Maddie Gallagher came up huge.
At the end she turned away twobig shots within the last couple

(01:27):
of minutes to preserve a threeto three draw Over.
On the men's side, davidJackson's two penalty kicks gave
the Mids a three nil shutoutover VMI in their home opener,
and they've got two more gamesat home over the Labor Day
weekend against Howard andLiberty.
Now let's jump indoors and seewhat's going on with the women's
volleyball team.
They competed in the Universityof Albany Invitational over the
weekend and came out of itwinning two out of three matches

(01:48):
.
Both of the wins were sweepsover Syracuse and Albany.
Senior Jamie Llewellyn had 17kills against the host team, and
her sister Jordan came throughwith eight more In a match where
the Mids were pretty much incontrol the whole time.
Of course, most of the attentionthis weekend was focused on
Dublin, ireland, where thefootball team opened their
season against 13th ranked NotreDame.
Now, if you saw the game, youknow it wasn't anything to write

(02:10):
home about, so I'm not going tospend a lot of time picking it
apart, but the fact is, no oneshould have been all that
surprised.
Now, don't get me wrong.
I think the Mids will learnfrom that game, put it in the
rearview mirror and go on tohave a solid season.
But I have to tell you that I'mnot a big fan of these Navy
Notre Dame games that are playedin Ireland.
I don't have anything againstthe country In fact I'd love to
visit it one of these days butmy problem is that the only time

(02:33):
to schedule a game like this isat the very beginning of the
year, and that means that thenationally ranked Irish had the
entire preseason to prepare fora Navy offense.
That, in this particular case,doesn't have all the kinks
worked out yet, and it showed.
I do think that Mids will beable to move the ball against
most teams as they get more intotheir schedule, but they really
had no chance at all against aNotre Dame team that has designs

(02:54):
on getting to the collegefootball playoff, especially
since they have a quarterbackwho's the same age now as
Patrick Mahomes was when he wonhis first Super Bowl.
That's right.
This guy, sam Hartman, is agraduate transfer from Wake
Forest who used everyeligibility rule available to
him because of COVID so that hecould suit up as a college
football player at 24 years old.
He dominated the game and Iwould expect him to, since he's

(03:17):
taken over 3500 snaps as theDivision 1 quarterback.
When NBC flashed up thatstatistic, I just couldn't
believe it.
Anyway, I think the next threegames will be a better indicator
of Navy's potential this year.
So they need to focus on thefuture.
The good news is that, despitethe lopsided loss, the defending
national champion men's rugbyteam pounded the Irish by a
score of 78 to nothing.
The Mids scored early and oftenbuilding a 42-nothing lead by

(03:40):
halftime, and they were prettymuch on cruise control the rest
of the afternoon as they tackedon 36 more points.
So if you look at the weekendfrom a combined scoring
standpoint, navy came out on top81 to 42.
Maybe that's a bit over the topwhen it comes to positive spin,
but you guys should know by nowthat I'm an eternal optimist

(04:00):
when it comes to Navy sports andthat's never going to change.
Alright, that does it for oursports update.
Stick around, because our deepdive segment is next.

(04:25):
Okay, it is time for our deepdive segment here on Navy Sports
Central, and today we're goingto be focusing on the newest
varsity sport at the academy,that being the women's triathlon
.
The triathlon has actually beena co-ed sport at Annapolis
since the early 1990s and it hasbeen an emerging sport for
women in particular on thecollege scene ever since.
The support that has built overthe last several years led to

(04:47):
the announcement on March 1st soyou're looking at basically six
months ago that the women'striathlon has been added as the
36th varsity sport at Navy and,by the way, that ties Stanford
and Ohio State for the most.
In Division I the team willhave the same coach who has led
the club program for the past 15seasons.
He is a Naval Academy graduatehimself who was a professional

(05:07):
triathlete for five years.
He qualified for the IronmanWorld Championships twice as an
amateur and twice as aprofessional, and he's competed
in endurance races all over theworld.
So I am very happy to welcomethe coach of the women's
triathlon team, billy Edwards,to the podcast.
Coach Edwards, it is so greatto have you here on Navy Sports
Central.
I really appreciate it.
Thanks for taking the time.

Coach Edwards (05:29):
Awesome.
I really appreciate theopportunity.
It's a new varsity sport, greatopportunity to talk to your
audience and the alums aboutthis.

Karl (05:38):
Yeah, and we'll definitely get into that because, as we
spoke about in our you knowbefore we came on the air here,
there's a little bit ofsimilarity between this newest
varsity sport at Navy and theone that came on board right
before, which is rugby.
So looking forward to gettingyour thoughts on that.
But anyway, for those of you inthe audience who don't know,
coach Edwards is an Academy gradclass of 2000,.

(06:01):
Right, is that correct?
2000.
All right, good deal.
And you ran cross country andtrack when you were at the
Academy and I was just curiousas to which distances you
specialized in and which onesare your favorites.

Well, I went to Navy to run cross country and
track as a walk on.
I met actually didn't have afull on recruiting visit.
I ended up getting anopportunity to be a drag with a
bunch of guys that were on theteam.
It was my intent to run but Iwalked on and when it became
time for like indoor, outdoortrack, I thought I would end up

(06:41):
being like a 5K 10 gig guybecause I did a lot of longer
stuff in high school and then Iended up gravitating to the
middle distance because therewas a lot more opportunity for
this walk on to race.
So I just made myself a utilityguy and I raced a lot of middle
distance just because it gaveme a lot more opportunity to

(07:01):
race.
And I think I enjoyed the 1000because it was just a gut.
It raced where you had to gofast and gut it out.
I got to develop my speed at ayoung age, which was probably
better than me continue to dolonger distance and I think I
even had fun.
One year I was I paced out asub four minute mile Like we had

(07:23):
800 or 1000 folks in HalseyFieldhouse pushed up onto the
track.
It was.
It was fun to just like runwith people all the way up on
lane three.
I wasn't running for myself,right, comically, I was just
awesome trying to bring this guyaround in sub 32nd 200s in
Halsey Fieldhouse.

(07:43):
It was super fun, so I enjoyedbeing a part of the team and
just trying to race as much as Icould.

Karl (07:50):
OK, all right, good deal.
So when did you first becomeinterested in competing in a
triathlon?
And I was wondering if youcould just kind of from the time
that you came to that, from thetime you came to making that
commitment, say, hey, I want todo this right up until the time
you finished your, your firstone.
If you could just kind of walkus through that, just the
highlights of that.

Well, I'm a child of the of the 80s and the ABC
wide world of sports and I lovedwatching like some of those odd
things like race across Americawas on there, which I actually
did as a team eventually, andthe Ironman triathlon, and so I
was intrigued every fall towatch the replays of the Ironman

(08:33):
track on and so I watched thatand that's was like when I was a
child and I wore like neonshorts, when I was like a little
kid runner and I wanted to beMark Allen and Dave Scott, who
are legends of the sport, andthen that all kind of pushed
aside because all I wanted to dois run.
I want to run.
In high school I wanted tocompete at the highest levels
and I was never great, but Ijust keep like kept plugging

(08:56):
away until 11 seasons into beingat the Naval Academy.
I was just fried from running.
I had burnt out, I was done.
I could.
I was not ready to run, Icouldn't.
You know I was running greatworkouts but I every time when
the gun would go off, I justdidn't want to do it.
I needed something new and Istarted to go like I bought a

(09:16):
bike and I started doingtriathlon and I was not a great
swimmer.
The first race I came out ofthe water so far back I had
struggled to take my wetsuit off.
I think something happened tomy brakes on my bike during the
bike leg and I was on this fancybike and I had I literally had
a grandma go by me and I saidGrandma, older women go by me

(09:39):
and she goes, keep it.
She's like keep it up.
And I'm like my bike won't gofast.
And then I got off the bike andran like 16 minutes for a five
gauges, blazing everybody butfinishing so far back.
So my first race was 10 in, 10plus years after my first like
ideas of doing a trap on.
But I was hooked right awayjust because of it spoke to my

(10:03):
things that I wanted to do.
It had running in it, so I hadwhat's good at something in it
and I enjoyed the challenge.

Karl (10:10):
Right, right, okay, by the way, a quick funny story for
you.
When when I first heard about atriathlon I believe the very
first Ironman, I believe was in78.
But I had not heard about theevent until probably, I'm going
to say, mid 80s.
I think I was still in flightschool and we were like playing
basketball or something likethat, and I don't even know who

(10:32):
it was, but it was a classmateof mine.
I remember that clearly.
They came up and they said hey,I just saw the weirdest, the
craziest thing on Wide World ofsports.
It was like this event called atriathlon, where these
competitors swim 2.4 miles, thenthey jump on a bike and ride
112 miles and then they go run amarathon and I go wait, all in
the same day?

(10:52):
And they go.
Yeah, they said you are lyingto me.
Nobody would put themselvesthrough that kind of crazy test,
you know.
And of course he wasn't.
And I ended up going through thechannels like a couple years
later and I happened to fliponto the channel right when they
were doing the replay of it andit was the most dramatic thing
I'd ever seen in terms of justhow they captured the video and

(11:14):
they put the sound to it and theguy that was narrating it and
the athletes, of course, likeyou'd mentioned, your Mark Allen
were some of the greatestaround.
But yeah, and from that pointon, I mean I don't know quite as
much anymore.
But from that point on, there'sa stretch from about like 10
years in a row where, okay, thisis about the time that Iron
Man's supposed to be televisedand I would like watch it just

(11:35):
because of that.
So, yeah, pretty wild.

I mean, it was appointment viewing for my
friends when I did the raceseveral weeks later.
We would all like schedule tohave a party and we would like
drink beers and have a barbecueand watch it, even though some
of us had been at the race.
But, yeah, it was super fun towatch, just because I mean, and
you watch till the end andyou're like I'm not crying, no,

(12:00):
I'm not crying.

Karl (12:01):
No, are you crying?
No, I'm not crying.

You're like watching this race because you
would watch these peoplefinishing it and for what's
worth, that was like that wasintriguing to me, like wow, this
, that is so hard.
I want to, I want to figure outwhy, like I want to experience
that aspect of the sport waslike it's got to be so hard.
I just want to finish one.
That was my first thing.
I just, I just want to finishit.

Karl (12:22):
Right, right.
So to that point.
On the subject of mentaltoughness here, right, I think
when you talk about a triathlete, there's got to be just a level
of mental toughness that itjust so different than some of
the other sports.
And I was wondering if youcould kind of speak to that a
little bit in terms of what didyou do to develop that?
Or is it in fact to a certainlevel innate in all athletes and

(12:44):
then just needs to be developeda little bit?

I mean it's interesting as a coach and as a
I don't know as an athlete, likeI think there's a bit of it
that's an innate in some of itsexposure.
So I think the innate side isit's probably in you, it's in me
, but it's also exposure toopportunities, like when I was a
young kid, my dad, my dad, likedo you want to go run a 5k?

(13:09):
And I was like nine years old,my friends weren't running a 5k
at like nine years old and I waslike sure, an opportunity to go
hang out with my dad and run.
You know, like down the line Iwent up to like a bike ride and
like it was like a hundred, itwas a hundred and twenty mile
ride.
I got lost and it ended upturning into a hundred and fifty
six mile ride.
But when I got lost and gotback on course it wasn't like,

(13:32):
oh, I'm going to drop out, itwas a okay, I just tacked 30
miles onto this ride.
So some of its exposure at ayounger age.
To that end I have a lot ofathletes that are exposed to
different sides of not extremeor longer endurance sports.
Like ladies are like one of myladies is not like, as a kid,

(13:55):
one another one of my athletesher dad does a lot of ultra
races, so they're exposed tothis and the fact that, like you
know, they know the hate.
As a human, as a person, I'mmeant to move and I can
challenge myself and push myselfand try to find different
limits of physical capability.
And then, as a coach, when Iget to work with these athletes,

(14:16):
it's presenting thoseopportunities.
Like we'll do, you know, atsome point during the year we'll
do, like a hundred mile bikeride.
Our race distance at the clublevel was 25 miles and at the
NCAA level it's 12 and a halfmiles.
But and so a hundred miles,like what's the point of that?
Well, it's pushing yourself,finding those limits and you
know, at that point you're like,oh, when I race 12 and a half

(14:38):
miles, you know super fast, it'snot on the bike for five or six
hours.
So it's, you know, it's peoplehave been able to push their
limits and so figuring outdifferent ways to push people's
limits, presenting a workout andthen tacking on a surprise at
the end, stuff like that.
You know, having people pushand then figure out, oh, now
what do I do?

Karl (14:56):
Right, right, okay, so we already spoke that you came from
a running background and I waskind of curious when you look at
the athletes that that end upcompeting in a triathlon, is
there a pretty good mix fromwhere their heaviest experience
is?
In other words, are most ofthem runners, are most of them
cyclists, are most of themswimmers, or is it a good mix

(15:17):
between all three?

Well, admittedly it's.
It's mostly swimmers andrunners, I think cycling is not
is not being exposed as much.
There definitely are.
Like I said, there are folksthat definitely come with head
opportunities to go ride bikeswith their parents, so they rode
mountain bikes.
From time to time we getathletes that did do some road
racing, but most of them come.

(15:40):
Most of the athletes that Iwork with, whether at the club
level for the last 15 years ornow the team that I currently am
working with.
A lot of them are coming for Iwould say it's kind of different
with the club athletes.
I was bringing on a lot ofrunners and swimmers and folks
that were just kind of likemyself back when I was a mid,

(16:01):
burnt out on the sport andneeding something new, still
having that competitive edge,very high level, if not ability
to walk on or be recruited byNavy for cross country or
swimming.
So it's about 50 50.
To that end, though, withregards to the way the varsity
level of sport is it, the swimis paramount, because the bike

(16:24):
is done in a pack and you ridetogether as opposed to solo, so
you need to be able to get outearly on the swim, and so now
I'm recruiting a lot more, orpulling a lot more swimmers,
your folks with swimmingbackgrounds, to the program,
because it's, it's, it's a lotmore necessary.
You need to have a deepbackground in swimming in order

(16:47):
to make some of those those bikegroups, which is kind of sad,
because that means I'm notrecruiting athletes that I can
relate to.
I feel you know, I we broughtover seven athletes from our
club program.
I kind of saw the writing onthe wall.
I wouldn't say I got all ofthose athletes to the club

(17:08):
program because of knowing wewould go varsity, but I it was
sort of, you know, starting tosee that swimming was being
coming more important.
But to that end.
Then I see, like I have a goodathlete that we left on the club
program.
She's, you know, she swam as akid, but not to that level,
she's just a beast.
But hers is on the running andso she'll probably stay in the

(17:29):
club program and be very good asa runner.
She'll be able to work harderby herself across the distances
as opposed to needing to comeout of the water and be in the
packs for the swim like it is invarsity now.

Karl (17:40):
Right, right, you know, as you were explaining the
importance of swimming therejust now, I kind of flashed on a
quote.
Has nothing to do withtriathlon, but when I used to
watch a lot of golf and theMasters tournament, one of the
things they always said was youcan never win the Masters on the
first day, but you can lose it.

(18:01):
And it sounds like this is kindof where the triathlon is as it
relates to swimming.
Right, I mean, you've got to beable to have a strong swimming
foundation just to put yourselfin the mix, because if you don't
, then you're just basicallygoing to be chasing the pack.
Is that fairly accurate?

That's 100% correct and for what's worth
like and that's where now thevarsity level of Traffon is it
definitely requires you to evenmore.
So you can totally lose the racein the swim and you would know
kidding.
Just get left in the groups.
You know the groups, even ifit's three to four athletes, can

(18:37):
work together and move up theroad, but if you're a minute and
a half off the back, you knowover a 10 minute, you know the
swims are only it's 750 meterswim.
We have athletes that are aminute and a half back.
That ends up being four to fiveminutes in a 30 minute bike,
whereas in a longer distanceTraffon you can make up that

(19:03):
time on the run and you don'tlose it on the bike because,
like in an Ironman or a andthat's the biggest difference
from, like, you know, an Ironman, traffon or other what we call
non-draft Traffons, where yousee athletes on bikes, where
they're like they got their armsout in front of them and
they're in the arrow position,those athletes are riding solo,

(19:26):
where our athletes are workingtogether on the bike and so the
bike has meaning that reflectswhat their swimming abilities
are.

Karl (19:35):
Right, right, okay.
So now I want to kind of slowlytransition into the Traffon at
the Naval Academy and the firstthing I want to talk about was
how it relates, how this sportin particular relates to the
physical mission.
In other words, you know, basedon your experience, what is it
that connects you to thatphysical mission of the Naval

(19:57):
Academy?
When you consider the Traffon,in other words, what makes it
unique compared to some of theother sports, do you think?

I think it encompasses everything you want
in a midshipman and the factthat morally, mentally, you are
challenging yourself, you'reexposing athletes to different
aspects of sport that require alot of technique.
So there's a mental game to it.
It's making it's.
People have to be in charge ofgear, they have to take care of

(20:23):
their gear, because if they takecare of their gear, their gear
takes the care of them.
So I have to teach them that.
That my Marine Corps mentalitythere, right, right, but then a
part of the physical mission,it's more important than just
like becoming a better runner ora better swimmer, and I don't
want to like, I don't.
You know running and swimming,both have you know aspects of

(20:44):
obstacles, but in a Traffon youare out more in the elements and
you are exposed to other peopleand what they're doing.
And so you it's not just yougoing down a lane, it is you.
Potentially having someonehitting you in the face with
their hand when they're swimmingis potentially someone clipping
you on the bike and you have tobe able to recover on your bike

(21:06):
and the run comes late in therace, and so there's so many
more obstacles that I think it'sso much more what the military
wants out of us as leaders isnot just complete the mission,
but overcome obstacles along theway.
And so I feel like thementality is perfect for what we

(21:26):
want to see as future navalofficers, and since that end, I
feel like I need to recruit thebest midshipmen.
They're like someone who wantsthat challenge, someone who
wants to overcome obstacles,because if they have that
mentality, then they're not onlyare they going to be a
tremendous athlete for me,they're also for our team, but
they're also going to be a greatnaval officer down the line.

Karl (21:47):
All right, well put.
Okay, so you touched on some ofthe distances for the college
triathlon, so let's go into alittle bit more detail on those.
Just run down the standarddistances for me.
And the thing I'm most curiousabout is recognizing I was kind
of taking a look at yourschedule and there is, like you
know, you have your first meetwhat on September 3rd and then

(22:08):
one, I believe, on the followingweek, but usually there's about
, I'm going to say, about twoweeks in between competitions.
After we talk about thedistances, let's go with the
time that you do the regionalI'm sorry, the time that you do
your last event and that twoweek period to the NCAA regional
qualifier.
What would that training cyclelook like, recognizing that it's

(22:30):
a buildup to, ultimately, thechampionships which are going to
be in November?

Yeah.
So I think it's important tounderstand the distances.
You know you've spoken to theIronman and the Ironman being, I
think it's just.
You know you've said thedistances, but for our race it's
an hour long race which, forwhat it's worth, is longer than
pretty much any other NCAA sportor individual sport.

(22:56):
Like the longest with being ofthe men's 10K, whether 10K cross
country, which is going to lookat, you know, 28 to 33 minutes,
and for women, the 6K, we'retalking 20 to 24 minutes.
So it's a long race, eventhough we call it a sprint
distance triathlon.

(23:16):
So our sprint distance triathlonstarts with sorry, so I
apologize to all the sprintersout there, but it is a 750 meter
swim, but that is by no stretchof the imagination, a sprint
distance swim.
So 750 meter swim, somewherebetween eight and a half and a
12 minute swim, depending on theathlete a bike which is 20

(23:38):
kilometers or tries to be about20 kilometers.
So it's, you know it could beanywhere between 25 and 34
minutes and you know I'm givingyou the very the highs and lows
of those times.
And then a 5K run.
So everybody's pretty clued inon a 5K run and our ladies we're
looking to try to get ourladies around 20 minutes and,
honestly, some of the betterathletes you know, if an athlete
can run so 20 minutes for 5Koff the bike, they're going to

(24:03):
be, you know, a top 10 to top 20, top 20 athlete there at
Nationals at the end of theseason.
So to that end, our schedule is, you know, unlike anybody
else's schedule, where a firstyear school and I know this
opportunities to race is key.
So a lot of schools aren'tlooking for the opportunity to

(24:24):
race as much Our athletes.
I want our athletes to race.
I want us to become the bestracers.
My plan is to recruit strongathletes that want to race and
so I want to get our athletes,currently and future athletes,
opportunities to race.
That's where that's why theycame to school.
They want to race.
So we have a full season.
We have four races, fourregular season races.
Most of our races are thatsprint distance race, which is

(24:47):
also our regional championships.
So we will qualify for startingspots at our regional
championships with individualperformances at the regular
season races.
So those will give us startingspots on the regional
championship and we will beusing along the way, speed work

(25:11):
actually with each sport, thetimeframe between our last
regular season race and ourchampionship will be done with
our base work.
We'll be done with our long bikerides.
We'll be done with our most ofour long runs, even though our
championships is in November.
But we will start to refinespeed.
Actually, most of our base workhas been done.

(25:32):
We over, or a lot of our basework has been done over the
summer.
We'll train through quite a fewof our races coming up and then
we'll start to refine and workon technique and work on, you
know, making sure we're therefined athlete over the next,
over the time periods as we getinto late October.
But in that and that's in everysport, whether it's, you know,

(25:56):
whether it's shorter, fasterintervals in the swim and or
getting shorter segments on thebike as far as efforts and
making sure we're even morerefined with regards to like
working together on the bike,cause quite a few of our ladies
are going to come out of thewater together and so they need
to be ready to ride together anddo turns on the bike together

(26:17):
and figure out how to move upthe road together fast.

Karl (26:20):
All right, cool.
So one of the things I wasthinking about is when you break
down and analyze your athletes'performance While back I did a
feature.
One of the sports I'm reallyinto now at Navy is rowing Right
.
In fact, I bought a concept torowing machine about four months
ago just to replace my 25 yearold lifecycle bike.
But I actually had theopportunity and it was a great

(26:44):
chance.
About almost two years ago I wasout in Annapolis for the
football game and I wanted to doa piece on the lightweight
rowing team because they'd justcome off of the national
championship that year and CoachBagnell was nice enough to take
me out on Saturday morning whenthey were practicing and he had
all three.
He had three boats out at thesame time and he'd just be kind
of weaving in and out and justchecking each rowers technique,

(27:05):
you know and talking to themabout the stroke mechanics and
all that sort of thing.
So it was mostly visual and nota lot of tech, whereas in
football, you know, there isthose eyes on the target for
technique and everything.
But then they got all kinds ofstuff to analyze explosiveness
and this and that and the otherthing.
What's your primary method?
Is it eyeballs or is it astopwatch and heart rate monitor
?
Is that as simple as it gets,or is there something more to it

(27:27):
?

I would definitely say it can get super
techy.
We now have devices where youcan measure power output per
pedal stroke and, to be honestwith you, as a varsity sport now
it's awesome in the fact thatwe can probably start to expose
our athletes to more of thatstuff.
When you tell somebody to goout, like specifically to the
bike, you know the bike is amachine.

(27:49):
Let's just call it what it is.
It's a machine.
And if I tell an athlete to goout and do a fast bike ride, do
do I buy five minutes fast?
No, an athlete finds a.
You know, if I were justlooking on speed, they could do
five by five minutes goingdownhill and like, yeah, you
went fast, but you probablydidn't do anything.
So to that end you need tomeasure the actual power that

(28:09):
you were pushing into the pedal.
So the beauty of being avarsity sport now is we will
probably we can utilize some ofthose resources and get things
like you know, the power for thebikes down the line here, but
we're actually not doing thatyet.
The beauty and what I've found,especially through the club
athletes as well as evenindividuals that I've worked

(28:29):
with, I don't work with I'veworked with a lot of individuals
for like the last 15 years aswell, and what I've found is
athletes that get out there andwork towards an effort level or
work to learn how to pushthemselves and find out what it
is to like push themselves, whatwe would call threshold, or
right where your body feels likeit's kind of like uncomfortable

(28:53):
.
Those athletes are the onesthat, like, we can speak to and
I also try to speak to whatthreshold is and we define our
effort levels based on aperceived effort scale of like
one to 10.
But we also define those thingsas what they are, with what
your blood is actually doing.
To that end, I do a lot to getthem to be exposed to that and

(29:17):
understand that and read theirbody, and then we can start to
bring in numbers and be like,okay, all right, like I want
them to go out there and dotempo runs or effort levels out
on the road without a distance.
For the first couple of runs Iwant them to start to.
I don't want them to like lookat the clock and see how fast
they're going.
I mean, we have these Garminwatches now that are like they
tell us instantaneously how fastwe're going.

(29:39):
But if I have an athlete that'scompletely wedded into the
numbers right away, they're notgoing to push themselves, so
let's pull the numbers.
I prefer to pull the numbersaway, especially as we're
starting out or as an athletesin their infancies in any one
sport, and then learn how theirbody feels.
Then we'll weave numbers intoit and start to go for pace and
try to push to numbers or usenumbers as a carrot, not as a

(30:03):
strict.
This is where you need to be.

Karl (30:06):
All right, yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
I'll tell you what.
We're going to take a shortbreak, but first I wanted to let
you all know that you can staytotally up to speed on what's
going on with Navy Sports byjoining our group Facebook page
and by following this podcast.
I'll put a link in the shownotes to get you to our Navy
Sports Nation group page, andfollowing the show is even
easier.
All you gotta do is tap thefollow button.

(30:26):
Whether you're listening toApple Podcasts, spotify, google
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This will automatically dropthe most recent episode into
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It is definitely the easiestway to show your support for
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So go ahead and hit that followbutton right now.
We'll be right back.

(30:47):
All right, thanks for stayingwith us on Navy Sports Central.
Karl Darden here with you, andI'm joined by Billy Edwards from
the class of 2000, who coachedthe Navy Sports Nation group and
the Navy Sports Nation group.
So we'll be right back.

(31:07):
We're live now, so stay safe.
Stay telling us about NavySports, nahd.

It's a dream, honestly.
I was part of some of theearliest thoughts of going to
NCAA.
I got to write, and I got towrite verbiage that was
presented to the NCAA CollegeWomen's Committee.
I had Brad Hecker.
His name is Brad Hecker.
He was the guy who wrote amaster's thesis about NCAA

(31:56):
triathlon.
He's like this is something youcould do eventually, and I was
like you know.
I was like you know I mean to dotriathlon at this level in what
we call a daily trainingenvironment, versus programmed
coaching and programmed as inlike writing workouts and then
seeing an athlete from time totime, which is what I was doing

(32:17):
with the club to now see myathletes on a daily basis and
the other day going out on aneasy run with them, which they
honestly didn't want me to, butgoing out there and seeing and I
was in, and now you know forwhat's worth being compensated
for my time and but also divinginto the weeds with my athletes

(32:40):
and like starting to like reallyspend time with them and now
have the time to like buildthese athletes into, you know,
not to take them to the nextlevel with regards to their
abilities.
I mean, we've always I thinkwe've always pushed the mental
game really well and I feel likeI've done a good job pushing
the mental game and making themstrong athletes, whereas now

(33:02):
it's fun I can it's just a toldlevel of fun to like add more
technique and spend a bit moretime, like I can actually spend
an extra couple of moments, youknow, talking to an athlete
about like why they're like.
I talked to another athlete theother day and she was, she had a
hamstring issue and I was like,no, well, this is why we need

(33:22):
to be, you know, we need to beworking on strength here and not
working on stretch, and this iswhy and she was like like mind
blown, like like okay, all right, this makes sense, and so I can
get a little, a lot more buyingin on some of the refined
things.
So I think we're just going tomake just another level of
athlete, which is just super funbecause they've always been
there and we've taken some ofour athletes to that like

(33:47):
borderline elite level.
You know we've qualified eightto 10 athletes over the years to
be elite level athletes, tojust haven't we actually haven't
actually utilized them at thatlevel because of the time
restrictions, but now we have alittle more time and so
hopefully we can take some moreof our athletes to that elite
level and do even more things atthe national and potentially

(34:09):
international level down theline.
So it's super exciting to justinteract with my athletes a lot
more or have the opportunity tointeract with my athletes so
much more.

Karl (34:20):
Okay, that actually provides a nice segue into the
next question here.
So what I'm going to do isyou've got a total of seven
athletes on your team, correct?

Yep seven athletes this year.

Karl (34:31):
So what I'm going to do is I'm just going to name them off
one by one and I'd like for youjust to kind of throw out one
thought that basically you knowcaptures what they're all about
as a competitor.
Okay, so we'll start with ZoeAdama.

This is fun self reflective.

Karl (34:49):
Okay, cool.
And what makes you say that?

Oh, you want me to add more to that?

Karl (34:53):
Yeah, just a little bit.
I'm just looking for a littlecontext around each observation.

Very, very introspective with regards to
how her workouts go and how andhow she races, she's very, very
analytical.

Karl (35:05):
Okay, all right, very good , hailey Harris Beast.

She can threat.
She just she's ready to grind.
She's so ready to grind.
I got almost.
I almost need to hold older.
I need to hold her back alittle bit.
This is my first year workingwith her.
She actually came over from theswim team.

Karl (35:22):
Oh, is that right.

I mean, hailey Harris is a Patriot League
rookie of the year as a plea,but, like I said, she was a bit
burnt down on swimming.
She needed a new avenue for forcompetitiveness and she had
started talking to our team as aearly, early in her youngster
year and at this point I'm like,well, now we're going to go

(35:48):
with what's worth?
With your abilities, you can bea freaking, tremendous NCAA
athlete.
So yeah, no, she's a beast.

Karl (35:57):
Okay, very good, sarah Jarman.

Tactician.
She's a tactician.
She's a racer.
She's she.
She did junior triathlon or didshe track on as a high school
student, and she knows how togame.
She's raced in the top 10 atclub nationals with inferior
physical abilities to someathletes.
She knows how to get herselfinto the race in all the

(36:24):
elements swim, bike and run.
So yeah, she's a tactician.

Karl (36:28):
Right, right, maddie Klippenstein.

Mad Dog, she brings the fun.
She wants to go fast but she'sfun.
But she brings the fun to theteam.

Karl (36:39):
All right, reagan Quilty, who is your team captain.

I mean we're not doing this sport this year.
Like I, mr Gladchuk asked mewhen do you want to start?
And I said this year and he waslike he was kind of taken aback
, like because we knew weweren't going to start until
March.
But I was like no, no, sir,we're starting this year.
Like I want to start this year.
I have Sarah Jarman, who's atactician and can game, and then

(37:03):
I have Reagan Quilty, who isthe leader of the team.
She is the road captain.
She has no problems, you knowspeaking up and she will not
interrupt me, but respectfullycaveat things I say and put them
into her own language.
She is the road captain, she isout there.
She picked it all up.
She did also did traffic on asa as a high school student.

(37:25):
I mean, her parents are bothgrads, her moms are freaking
tremendous traffic on coach aswell.
Her brother is a submarineofficer and was on the rugby
team actually, but to that end,reagan's our leader and she's a
leader within the brigade aswell.
And so to have her and Sarah asfirst years, it was like yeah,

(37:45):
no, we do this this year becausethis is how we step up on the
right foot and she's doing allthe right things with regards to
developing, taking our culturefrom the club program and bring
it over to varsity.

Karl (37:56):
Yeah, and how important is that?
Right?
I mean, get that cultureestablished early, so then you
have something to feed into for,you know, future recruits and
so forth.
So good job on her, emily Vela.

Oh, she's my silent assassin and I don't even
think she knows it.
She's got a lot of tools I'mconstantly sharing, I'm
constantly showing her how touse them and, as she, when she
figures it out and puts it alltogether, yeah, she's are.
She's a little quieter, butshe's, she's.
She's got a lot of tools andshe's pretty tenacious, right.

Karl (38:30):
Okay, and Anna Wecklick.

Oh, aggressive, aggressive, so aggressive, like
as a club athlete.
She was the fastest swimmer inthe club in the club program
last year in the in the country.
She can freaking motor.
So yeah, she's, she'saggressive.
I have to hold her back.
We have to refine how to makethis aggressiveness reflect into

(38:57):
her racing across the hour.
But, yeah, no aggressive, andshe's.
She's our only youngster aswell.
Oh, is that right?
Which is, which is no problem.
It's all good.
I appreciate aggressiveness andwe just have to figure out how
to direct it properly.

Karl (39:12):
Okay and actually kind of leads into to the next question.
You talked about what standsout about these athletes and I'm
wondering I don't know if thisis just too vague a question of
I'm not even sure how easy it isto answer but looking at all
the different things they bringto the table, how is it that you
can leverage them to help makethe team better?
What are some of your processesaround that?

I mean I feel like I've got like such a great
mix of athletes and they allhave such a great attitude and I
mean, to that end, like, aswe've pressed on, I felt like it
was the right thing to do to dothis, this, to do this this
year.
But as we've moved on, it'sjust in the end to have them
hang, you know, hanging outtogether more often.

(39:55):
And I want to reiterate thefact that the club program, this
club program, has been going onsince the early 90s.
So this is not just me, this is, this is a lot of for what's
worth.
It's found, a found on thementality of, you know, nsw guys
, like seals, we seals have beenthe backbone of our team.
When we have more seals going,you know, tossing their covers,

(40:19):
guys going seals, we are awesome.
Like, when we have more womentossing their covers and putting
a pinning on second lieutenantbars in the Marine Corps, we are
awesome.
Those are, those are athletes.
They're the ones that want thechallenge.
So what we currently have isjust a, you know, a great
mixture of you know like leadersand followers in the, in the

(40:40):
even.
Even our second, like our coregroup is our second class right
now and you know they're goingto be the ones that you know
they, they, they are, they havesimilar abilities, which is
great, but they all, like, comeat it from totally different
angles.
With regards to, like you know,some of our seniors, having done
the sport, a couple of, likeone of our athletes, probably I

(41:02):
would say I don't want to callour weakest, but like one of our
weaker athletes, like she was,like she came to visit as a, as
a senior in high school, and oneof my team captains was like,
who she never got to race with,was like coach, this girl's got
to be on the team, she'sfreaking, like she's, she's what
we want, and I mean she knowswho she is and she's and she is,

(41:23):
she's exactly what I want anathlete.
So we have a mix of folks thatcome at it with, like, different
attitudes, like whether theythey knew they wanted to be a
traffic when they came to theacademy.
Or, like Sarah Jarman, she cameto run at the academy and
realized, you know, collegiaterunning wasn't for her and so
she went back to track, you know?
So it's.
We have a huge mix of wherepeople come from.

(41:44):
You know how they compete and Ithink, to that end.
They they get along and theyhave.
They have different, they havegreat midshipman beliefs and and
I think that's, I think maybethat's the core of of of who
they are and why they're makingeach other better right now.

Karl (42:02):
Okay, all right, so I'm going to kind of stay on that
track a little bit.
And as it relates to recruitingand recognizing, obviously,
that this is your first year asa varsity sport but it's as an
established sport at the academy, you've got the club program
that you can draw from andobviously your athletes can act
as recruiters themselves whenthey're you know out and about

(42:25):
whether it's in within thebrigade itself or maybe they see
some people with some promisein their hometowns or whatever.
But has the sport gotten to thepoint where there are colleges
actively recruiting triathletesor is it still just something
that's in a building process?

No, there's.
There is high school.
There are high school athletes,there is junior triathlon.
Is it high school programs?
No, it's, it's club programs,probably club programs, probably
more similar to like, likeswimming and the fact that it
does require more, more time andtechnique and more details, as

(43:01):
opposed to like.
I mean running requires moretime.
Running swimming requires moretechnique, so maybe more similar
to like a swimming club.
So there are, there aretriathlon clubs.
You know I have, I'm trying toestablish relationships with
some of these clubs and to thatend, I guess I'd you know if
you're a recruit and you'vegotten to the four, you know
whatever point in this talk,know that like.

(43:25):
It's not that it hasn't been apriority, but it's been
something I definitely am likebehind on a little bit.
I've definitely been tracking alot of athletes, so we want to
bring on more athletes that havebeen exposed to triathlon and I
think, in as a now varsityprogram, we now have the ability

(43:47):
to bring on the athlete thatwants to go to number one, a big
school with a solidly supportedathletic department, and that's
what we are.
We're a division one NCAAschool.
So we have that, we have theability and we have the desire

(44:08):
to compete at the highest level.
We have that.
And then two more things.
We have a tremendouseducational opportunity, which I
don't wanna like say that theother schools that are currently
in the sport don't, but we havethe highest academic standards
out of the current schools outthere.
And then, finally, we presentan opportunity for athletes, and

(44:28):
some of these high schoolathletes, some of them, really
have the desire to make theOlympic team and there's one or
two programs that are out therethat they're probably gonna give
them the opportunity topotentially see more opportunity
to maybe be in an Olympicpipeline, which is super, super
tight.
But what we have is anopportunity to be a school that

(44:51):
gives you the education and theathletic opportunities and then
have a great, exciting and acareer that reflects your sport.
So I'm looking for those kindsof athletes.
I'm looking for some of theathletes that maybe just started
, maybe it swam and ran and justgot into the sport and they're
finding successes and I wannarefine those successes with them

(45:14):
and bring them be a part of ourorganization, because I think
those are the ones and I mean, Idon't for what's worth, I don't
feel like we're that muchdifferent this year than what we
were last year as a clubprogram, because we have been
developing those athletes.
But I just think now we'regonna get the ones that wanted
to compete.
They wanted to wear that, theywanted an opportunity to be a

(45:37):
varsity level athlete, and sonow we have the opportunity to
give people.
If I look back on myself as ahigh school student, that's what
I wanted to do.
I wanted to compete at divisionone level, I wanted to compete
at the highest level and Ialmost feel like it's not fair,
as like it's not fair to my clubprogram, because that club

(45:59):
program competes at a very highlevel and we developed
tremendous athletes.
But now I also have now I havethe NCAA badge and the NCAA
varsity backing and a largerbacking from the athletic
department and to that end we'llalso we have more opportunity
now to even expose some youngmen as well.

(46:20):
So I mean the club program willcontinue, will continue to
develop athletes.
If an athlete hasn't donetriathlon and they're a good
swimmer, runner, but maybethey're not great, we could put
them into the club program andthey can develop.
And if they do develop theirskills more, we can bring them
over to the varsity program.

(46:40):
And if they don't, and maybethey're just not and maybe
they're just a great.
You know they're a tenaciousathlete that has a challenge,
but they just don't have thequite the speed on the swimmer
of the run.
They can stay in the clubprogram and compete in triathlon
at the highest level, causewe've been in the top five
overall as a club program everyyear, except for one in my last

(47:01):
15 years, and it still presentsan opportunity to be a part of a
big school and compete at avery high level.
So I hope that explains.
But yeah, so we have multipleavenues to compete.

Karl (47:15):
So yeah, and it is very nice to have that kind of
flexibility within your program.
I think the triathlon eventitself is kind of cool because
it does allow athletes tocompete either at the varsity
level now or the club level.
And considering that the clublevel is, you know, going
against a lot of high levelprograms anyway, I think that's

(47:36):
awesome because you know I waswhen I was at the academy.
I was not a varsity guy, I mean, first of all, even if I had
the athletic skills I mean withme, based on the major I picked,
it would have been pretty diceytrying to finish the sport and
graduate.
So I made a business decisionthere where I was gonna just
focus on just the intramuralstuff and just, you know, get

(47:57):
through the whole academicexperience.
But I think that those clubopportunities are incredible
that they have to offer at thetriathlon.
You know the sport triathlon,rugby, any of the other ones
there is, hockey is another one,so anyway.
So thank you for that.
Now, coach, I do wanna spendsome time discussing your vision
for how you wanna grow andexpand the triathlon program,

(48:19):
but before we do that I wantedto ask you two things.
First, what's one of yourfavorite memories in your 16
years of coaching these athletes.

You know, I think in 2017, we lost the Klesi
National Championships by a fewpoints due to some weird scoring
elements.
You know, it's see, you beat usbased on the score, but our
team had.
When we raced it was in theclub environment.
They raced to the.
They raced.
Six of my men finished withinthe top 16.

(48:52):
Four of our ladies raced in thetop or no.
Six of our men finished in thetop 14,.
Four of our ladies finished inthe top 16.
And we had what they call amixed team relay.
And these are relays.
It's like a male female, malefemale each person gets to do a
single triathlon, a very, very,very short, single triathlon.

(49:13):
And this is before.
You only allowed one team andwe had two teams out on the road
and we were out there like weput two teams out there and we
started out with Brian Holderand Kevin Brian Primo and Kevin
Holder to our best swimmers, andyou know we, we, you know I
actually had athletes that werelike coach, we're putting
together two teams and I'm likeI don't know if that's a good

(49:34):
idea.
Like coach, no, we're gonna puttogether two teams, so we're
gonna be fine.
All right, I'll support it,let's do this and I had my A
team and I had my B team and myB team was like, no, we're gonna
be the A team, I'm like,anyways, they got out there and
we were, they got went throughthe first leg and they were one
and two and then they handed offto the ladies and we were still

(49:55):
one and two and that raceactually never finished.
But I had my two teams, my men'sthey were in the on the second
leg of four and my two ladieswere just going away from the
entire pack and the race was inTuscaloosa, alabama, and they
shut down the race because of athunderstorm coming in.
It was a good call, but thebest part about was walking

(50:17):
around and just listening toeverybody say, oh my God, have
you seen what Navy's doing toeverybody?
And I was just like, and I juststood there Wherever I went,
people were just going likeNavy's killing it and for what's

(50:38):
worth, statistically I'velooked at the numbers it was the
best team to that point.
I mean, there's actually beensome teams that may have done a
little bit better recently, butit was statistically to that
point it was the most dominant.
Even though we didn't winTechnically, it was the most
dominant team and it was soawesome to see these athletes
none of only having like oneathlete who'd ever done

(51:00):
triathlon just taking it tothese grad students and
professional triathletes in theclub environment and just then
having people say, wow, look atNavy.
And so to that end, I hope wesee a bit of that down the line.

Karl (51:15):
Yeah, yeah, no doubt, and thanks for that story.
I really appreciate you sharingit.
That was pretty awesome.
The other thing I wanted totalk to you about was your
experience at your first IronmanTriathlon World Championships.
I think that was in 2005.
So there's just no way I couldlet you get away without
checking in with you on that.
So could you account that forus?

(51:36):
What were your goals going intoit?
What was your mindset as youwere continuing with your
training and the run up to therace?
And then I was wondering if youcould describe the feeling that
you had immediately aftercrossing the finish line.

It was October 2005.
It was I had done my firstIronman in Tempe, arizona, in
April.
I had had a phenomenal race.
I was 18th overall.
I was the third amateur.
I had smashed it, had aperfectly paced day.
Then I ended up doing triathlonfor the Marine Corps, doing
short course triathlon.

(52:11):
I had also run cross country.
I was also then also slated tobe on the marathon team and I
was doing a lot.
I was coming in.
I had just in 2004,.
I was the top Marine CorpsMarathoner.
So I had all sorts of abilitiesand along the way towards my
first Kona I was like it waslike training and I think I've

(52:34):
talked to my athletes about thisrecently and the fact that like
I had a pizza in front of meand I want to eat the whole damn
thing right away and I went forit.
I mean I just trained andtrained.
I went out to on a trainingcamp with a Marine and we did
like back to back 112 mile rides.
We did a ride.
We did a ride where I think werode about.

(52:56):
We rode like like a hundredmiles with all these you know
top level pro athletes and thenI got off the bike and I ran
like 23, 24 miles, like at likeI'm not godly pace.
It was a phenomenal training day.
And then, like a week or twolater, I freaking did it, went
out and did like the hardesthilliest run around my area.

(53:17):
And then I did, oh, and I thinkthe morning of or I had done
like a like a 8K road race in mytown and you know, smashed it,
like crushed everybody and likeset a five.
You know, and then don't knowif I set a five mile PR, but I
freaking killed it.
So, all that being said,phenomenal training, got to Kona

(53:38):
cooked.

Karl (53:40):
Oh man.

So I had, I had done, I had probably done my
Ironman somewhere in the in theweeks leading up to that race
and I just wanted it all.
I just wanted it all.
And so I mean I, I, I racedwell, I think I think it was
just outside of the top 10 of myage group, which you know.
I think I think I finished justoutside the top 100, which is

(54:01):
phenomenal because you havepeople coming in from all over
the world.
I was, but I was extreme, I wasextremely disappointed.
I was so disappointed.
I didn't, I was.
I looked back on it and I'm alittle, you know, I wish I'd had
someone like myself to tell melike what I had done.
It's taken me years to figureout, but I mean, it was magical.
At the same time, you know,this adds a whole another

(54:22):
element to it, but I had justlost my sister.
So that was like with me, as Iwas like running down a lead
drive.
My parents were there.
It was a very emotionalexperience for me.
There was a lot of things thatwere like in my mind.
So, oh, I think you, when youend about their racing for you
know, nine plus hours is what Iwas doing.
You are just absolutely exposed, both physically as well as

(54:46):
mentally and emotionally, and Ilost it, you know, at the finish
line.
You know, just thinking aboutit right now it makes me I'm
holding back a little bit here,trying to, like you know, be,
but yeah, I mean it was.
It was a hugely reflective dayas an athlete.
I was super disappointed as acoach.
Looking back on myself, I had agreat year and I need to look

(55:07):
at that.
So it was always, you know,iron man World Championships for
me was never a great reflectionof my abilities.
But at the same time I, youknow, I didn't fully enjoy the
experience.
I wish I looked back on some ofthese world championships and
realized, billy, or, as Inormally do, william, william,

(55:28):
it's the freaking worldchampionships, dude, relax like
you're, you know you're doinggood man, and so I wish I could
go back and self coach myself alittle bit better in that
respect.

Karl (55:40):
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
But so I mean you went on tocompete in the in the worlds for
several years, right, I meanthrough?
I see I actually got someresults in front of me here
through 2009.
Is that correct?

Yeah, I qualified as an amateur my first two
years and then as a to the Ironman World Championships.
I went into my first year as apro, my first year out of the
Marine Corps, qualified for Konain my first shot and then the
next year I had a lingeringhamstring injury, came back the
following year with a differentcoach and a different training

(56:15):
mentality, qualified again andthen what's not on there is that
I did a couple Iron Man's in2015 and 2016 and I did
something I'd tell people not todo and I turned down my Kona
slots so I could have gone backand raised age group I could.
So I can say that I've actuallyturned down two Kona slots.

Karl (56:36):
Yeah, how many.
How many people can say thatright?
I know it's kind of a flex,it's a little bit of a flex,
right, right, and now let's,let's.
Let's talk about what was Imean.
You mentioned your very firstone and how well you performed
on that one the Arizona, theIron man, arizona.
Was that your favorite one, oris there another?
What's your favorite triathlonvenue?

(56:56):
Let's look at it that way.

Oh, madison, wisconsin.
Okay, it's phenomenal, it was,it's always has the greatest
crowds.
I did that race after and thishas had so many elements to it.
I did that one year afterhaving done a 1200 kilometer

(57:19):
ride in France three weeksbefore, and that was.
And I did that 1200 kilometerride in 49 hours without sleep.
And so then I went and didIronman, like three or four
weeks later I can't remember ifI was still working with my very

(57:40):
scientific coach, dr Phil, whoactually worked on the like the
sub two marathon project, but hewas not pleased with this runup
to my Ironman.
My Ironman obviously reflectedthat I had ridden my bike so
long that I couldn't feel thelast three fingers on each hand.

(58:02):
I I don't hope I'm not puttingraces together, but at one point
, like I was, I was getting outunder the bike course and I
didn't pay attention to whichgearing I was in and I totally
like went from big or went frombig ring to small ring, pushed
it hard, going into a turn andkick, like literally kicked

(58:25):
myself onto the ground.
And then I'm like yelling andthe volunteers are like who did
someone, did someone crash youout?
And I was like no, yelling atmyself for my idiocy, but I mean
, it was an.
It was an event that Idelivered to myself way too many

(58:45):
or not too many.
I delivered to myself morechallenges than were potentially
necessary.
But again, on the you know, onthe day I was, you know,
potentially disappointed, but inretrospect it was.
It was a good performance.
It was.
I'm glad I did everything thatI did.
I went to Ironman Wisconsinmultiple times over cooked.
In fact, one year I did pastemy friend Blake Benke it fell a

(59:10):
Marine to like lead bill andthen, like two weeks later or
three weeks later, like I ran 50miles with him at lead bill and
then raced Ironman Wisconsinseveral weeks later, knowing
full well after I paced myfriend that I was like, yeah, I
probably ruined my opportunitiesat Ironman not ruined and I
want to say ruined becausethat's what's worth.

(59:31):
Like I would never like give upLike that was.
Like even that pacing my friendwas one of the like for 50
miles of a race was justprobably one of the more
athletic, one of the highlightsof my athletic life.
So, anyway, so I would say that, like you know, like Wisconsin
has always been a great race forme to like reflect on what

(59:53):
other adventures I have donebeyond it, and I also loved the
Ironman Wisconsin course,because you run through Camp
Randall and the day before therace when you go to the mountain
to pick up your pack andthere's a race, you see like the
Wisconsin folks like out thereat barbecue and before their big
games and stuff.
So it's a lot of elements.

(01:00:13):
So anyways, Okay, great.

Karl (01:00:16):
Now I wanted to wrap things up by getting back to
that question around your visionfor the program.
Obviously, there's a lot ofexcitement around this first
year competing at the NCAAdivision one level.
How do you see things growingover the next three to four
years with respect to rostersize and the competitive
schedule?

Coach Edwards (01:00:32):
So we're small.
I wish I had one or two moreright now, but seven is.
But we have the right athletes,so I'm happy with that.
So so to that end, I would liketo get our roster size up to
about 10, or 10 or 11 next yearand then probably 12,.
You know, I don't see us evergetting up to 15 unless the

(01:00:53):
opportunities to the I thinkthis is the biggest thing I
wanna say is like opportunitiesto race.
I mean, I definitely want myathletes to come to want to
train and have fun training, butI want to give them the
opportunity to race.
So if I can't give an athletethe opportunity to race in the
varsity environment, I want themto be in the club environment
so they'll.
You know, if an athlete's likegonna be a walk on, I'm gonna be

(01:01:15):
like you are a good athlete.
I need you to be a greatathlete.
Why don't you go to club and bea great athlete in club and
potentially be common move, be agreat athlete in the varsity
sport?
So, sort of speaking back toyour last question, I do want to
develop to be about a 10 to 12,at most 15 athlete.

(01:01:36):
To look back on the club programat one more time.
You know we do have 23 rosterspot on the club program.
So we actually are limited onthe club program.
But yeah, so we will.
We're not there right now.
So we'll try to boost up ourclub roster spots to get back to
it to those numbers 21 to 23.
And then, racing wise, we'regonna race.

(01:01:57):
I want to.
My current thought is to racemore, race as much as we can,
take the opportunities to raceand expose our team, you know,
to as many races as possible.
Maybe down the line wedetermine that we don't race or
not every athlete's races everyrace and maybe they only race

(01:02:17):
two to four races before thechampionships, the regional
championships, the nationalchampionships.
So maybe that's what it ends updown the line.
But along the way, you know,like this first year, like first
paramount, develop a cultureit's what we need to do.
Like that's the first thing weneed to do is develop a culture.
And the best part is we have aculture from the club program.

(01:02:39):
So we're gonna, you know, sortof take a lot of what we it's
good about the club culture andbring it over to the varsity
team.
So, developing a culture,learning to become more refined
athletes is.
The other is the other goal.
And then another goal is tolike, just learn to go after

(01:03:00):
excellence as well.
So will we achieve excellence?
I don't know, we might.
We might, but not be afraid tofreaking, go after it this year.
So try to achieve excellencethis year.
And it feels that may sound abit weak, but I wanna be
realistic with regards to whatwe have and we don't.
We haven't seen what our teamcould do in these varsity races,
so we wanna I want our athletesto put themselves out there and

(01:03:23):
have some disappointment, butat the same time, I want it to
be okay to not be okay with arace.
I know that we can grow from itand cause I don't ever want my
athletes to, even if we don'twin, to consider it a bad year,
like I want our athletes to likeif we're not winning, we're
learning.
So I wanna continue to do that.

(01:03:44):
See, like and what can we dowith a bad year?
What can we learn from that?
And whether it's whether you'rea senior or whether you're a
plebe, you know what can youlearn from not winning and take
forward as a bit shipment or asa future naval officer.

Karl (01:04:01):
Yeah, and I don't think you can have a better
perspective than that, goinginto this first season competing
at the division one level.
All right, so, coach Edwards,thanks so much for taking the
time to speak with me today.

I appreciate it, Karl.
Thanks man.

Karl (01:04:14):
Yeah, no problem at all, and it looks like the the NCAA
championships are gonna be righthere in 10-B, so we've gotta
figure out a way to get thatcovered also.

Awesome Thanks.
You gotta talk to my athletesdown the line, so I appreciate
it.

Karl (01:04:26):
That sounds good, coach.
Take care.
Okay, coming up next we haveour question of the day.
This is Karl Darden and you'relistening to Navy Sports Central
.
All right, thanks for stayingwith us as we head down the home
stretch.
It is time for our question ofthe day.

(01:04:46):
So, as always, let's check outthe responses to the question.
From our last show, If yourecall, it focused on Navy's
1952 gold medal winning crewknown as the Great Eight, and
we're gonna be talking about theNavy's first ever Navy's first
ever Navy's first ever Navy'sfirst ever Navy's first ever
Navy's first ever is the GreatEight.
And here is the question Navy'sGreat Eight crew won the gold

(01:05:07):
medal in the Helsinki Olympicsin 1952.
How many consecutive races didthey win between 1952 and 1954?
Was it A29, B30, C31, or D32?
In looking at the results, theleading vote-getter was B30,
with 84% of you going with thatchoice.

(01:05:28):
Next was D32 races, and 10% ofyou picked that number.
After that was C31, with 5% ofyou going that route.
The first option, A, which was29 races, didn't get any votes
at all.
It did say 1% there, but Ithink that was just so the math
could work out, because when Ipulled up the names, there was
nobody listed there.
So, believe it or not, thecorrect answer is actually A 29

(01:05:51):
consecutive races, and sincethat time there have been some
pretty awesome crews that comeout of those big programs like
Washington, Cal and Princeton,but nobody's even come close to
matching the dominance of theGrade Eight over that three-year
period.
Okay, now let's get to thisepisode's question.
Earlier in the show I mentionedthat Navy Women's Triathlon
coach, Billy Edwards, is a NavalAcademy graduate from the class

(01:06:11):
of 2000.
How many other sports atAnnapolis have a Navy grad as
part of their coaching staff?
Is it A5, B6, C8, or D9 sports?
You all can take some time tothink about that one and get
back to me with your answers.
I'll have the question up onthe Navy Sports Nation group
Facebook page by the end of theday.
One last note before I sign off.

(01:06:32):
The Navy Sports CentralMidwatch segment will be making
its return next week.
We will be following one maleand one female student athlete
and highlighting theirperformances as the season goes
on.
That's gonna do it for thisedition of Navy Sports Central.
Thank you all so much forjoining us Now if you'd like to
see more of our videos.
Thank you all.
So much for joining us Now.

(01:06:52):
If you'd like what you've heard, please be sure to hit that
follow button wherever you getyour podcasts and remember to
get the word to all the otherNavy fans out there.
Once again, I'd like to thankCoach Billy Edwards of the Navy
Women's Triathlon team for beingwith us today.
We wish him the very best as heleads his triathletes into
their first season as a varsityprogram beginning this weekend.
Our question of the daycontinues to be a show favorite.

(01:07:13):
You can get in on that byjoining the Navy Sports Nation
group Facebook page and givingyour answer to this week's
question.
I will pin it to the top so youdon't miss it.
And just a quick reminder theviews expressed on Navy Sports
Central are my own and do notreflect those of the US Naval
Academy or Navy Athletics.
By the way, the music used inNavy Sports Central comes to you
courtesy of Audio Jungle.
This is a great site forpurchasing the rights to use the

(01:07:34):
music from thousands of artistsaround the world, and those
featured in the podcast will becredited in our show notes.
Talk to you soon, everybody.
Until next time.
This is Karl Darden Go Navybeat Army.

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