Author Biographies

Unless otherwise noted, all photos provided by individual writers.

Bert Abbott

Bert Abbott, NSCA CSCS, NSPA CSAC, USAW SPC, is a strength & conditioning coach with Strive & Uplift out of Boulder, CO. As a coach, she’s particularly invested in helping teams and individuals move their work in the gym and on the field from simply exercising to sport-specific training. She has captained Seattle Mixtape since 2015 and played mixed club since 2008. You can visit www.striveanduplift.com or tweet at Bert (@359bertle).

Email Address:striveanduplift@gmail.com

Twitter: 359bertle

Instagram: 359bertle

Ben Banyas

Ben has been playing ultimate since 1998 and coaching since 2002. He has played in Nationals and World championship medal games, gotten eliminated by a B-team at sectionals, helped build teams from scratch, & has run & coached ultimate summer camps, youth club teams, and college & club teams. He has learned from his failures as much as his successes. Ben is the Head Coach (2015-present) of the University of Pittsburgh women’s team, Danger, who placed 3rd at the 2018 USA Ultimate College Championships, & the women’s club team, Eliza Furnace.

Email Address: benbanyas@gmail.com

Website: benspiration.com

Twitter: benbanyas

Instagram: benbanyas

Laura Bitterman

Bitterman started her frisbee career while attending the University of Wisconsin – Madison, and then went on to play for 6 years with Boston Brute Squad. She currently works at the Portland VA Medical Center as a Primary Care Provider serving female and transgender Veterans.

Email Address: Lbbitterman@gmail.com

Twitter: bittertwitts

Instagram: Lbbitterman

Tiina Booth

Tiina Booth currently coaches the men’s team at UMass Amherst. She is also the founder and director of the National Ultimate Training Camp. She appreciates all the work that women’s college coaches and captains do behind the scenes in order to build their teams.

Facebook:

Twitter: NUTC_Amherst

Instagram: nutcgram

Lauren Boyle

Lauren has a really cute dog. Oh! And for Ultimate Frisbee coaching, she has coached high school, college, club and Team USA U24 Women’s and Mixed.

Email Address: L.Boyle17@gmail.com

Twitter: LBoyle23

Instagram: lobofosho23

Zara Cadoux

Zara has coached at the college level at UMBC and Towson University, and is one of the co-founders of GUM (Girls Ultimate Movement.) Zara is an educator, trainer, and youth advocate who focuses on working with individuals, organizations, and communities to recognize, resist, and dismantle oppressive systems. In particular, she focuses on working with white women on the intersections of whiteness and patriarchy. Zara has worked as a Program Director in the mentoring field for the last five years, offers training, facilitation, and coaching through her business Cadoux Consulting, and is an adjunct faculty member at the University of Baltimore. She holds a Masters in Intercultural Service, Leadership, and Management from SIT Graduate Institute.

Email Address: cadouxconsulting@gmail.com

Justine Crowley, DO

Justine has been involved with ultimate for 28 years. She is also an orthopaedic surgeon who is now giving back to the sport which has introduced her to many of her friends.

Email Address: jmcrowleydo@gmail.com

Manisha “Slap” Daryani

Slap is a UCSD Psycho alum, and has been playing in the club division for the last 16 years. She has also coached in the college women’s division for the last seven years, as head coach of UC Davis and then UC Berkeley.

Email Address: manisha.daryani@gmail.com

Photo by William Brotman

Holly (Greunke) Denecour

Holly started playing ultimate in 2001 on her high school club recreational team. She went on to play for the University of Wisconsin Bella Donna from 2002-2007. She captained the team to their first semi-finals appearance at College Nationals in 2006, and was the Callahan runner-up in 2007. After college, she moved to Colorado and played for the women’s team Rare Air (pre-dating Molly Brown). She coached Bella Donna in 2008, then moved to Austin, TX in 2009, where she continued her career playing on Texas Showdown. She captained the team to back-to-back semi-finals appearances at the Club Championships in 2012 and 2013. She currently lives in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Email Address: hsdenecour@gmail.com

Tulsa Douglas

Tulsa started playing ultimate at Amherst high school and continued at St. Olaf College. She currently coaches at NUTC and plays for Boston Brute Squad. She’s interested in mental resilience, equity, dogs, and being outside.

Email Address: tulsa.douglas22@gmail.com

Twitter: tulsadoug

Instagram: tulsadoug

Kayla Emrick

Kayla started playing ultimate at Oberlin College, where she oversaw her first A/B split in 2012 as a player/coach. She started coaching in 2013 at the University of Wisconsin where she helped form Bella Donna’s current B-team, Atropa. Currently, she plays for Atlanta Ozone and coaches Emory University’s A-team, Luna. Emory split A/B for the first time in program history in 2017.

Email Address: kemrick19@gmail.com

Twitter: kemrick19

Instagram: kemrick19

Jenny Fey

Jenny started playing competitive ultimate in Arlington VA in 2001 as a high school sophomore. She has spent the bulk of her club career with DC Scandal and has represented the US on the U20 Girls (2004), Beach Mixed (2015), and US Women’s National Teams (2016). She teaches psychology and literature to high school students, coaches club youth in the DC area in the summer, and just had her first kid!

Email Address: jennyfey@gmail.com

Twitter: jennyferfey

Melissa Gibbs

Gibbs played for Iowa State University where she was all-region college player from 2004-2009 and captained the 2009 team to college nationals (first in program history!) Gibbs played on the Chad Larson Experience Mixed Club for many years winning a Gold medal at the 2010 World Ultimate Club Championships and a silver medal at the 2009 Club Championships. Gibbs has also played with three women’s teams/ seasons and currently plays for Heist (2016-2018). In 2017 Gibbs earned another Gold medal with Team USA at the 2017 Women’s Masters World Championships of Beach Ultimate.

Email Address: melissajogibbs@gmail.com

Twitter: melissajogibbs

Instagram: melissajogibbs

Sarah “Surge” Griffith

Surge has been playing ultimate since 2004, starting out with University of Michigan’s Flywheel, where she captained for two years. She moved to Seattle in 2008 and played with the Seattle Riot women’s ultimate club for 10 seasons, captained for two, and won two world championships. She has also been a member of three USA National teams, and won gold in Colombia, London, and Poland. She now plays in San Francisco, with Fury.

Email Address: sjgrif@gmail.com

Lien Hoffmann

Lien is currently in her fifth year of playing for Brute Squad (club). She previously played two years of club with Nemesis and five years of college with Northwestern GungHo.

Email Address: lienhoffmann@gmail.com

Twitter: LienHoffmann

Instagram: lhoff99

Megan Ives

Ives really dove into Ultimate at the University of Colorado, Boulder on its women’s team, Kali. She got the amazing opportunity to play at the U24 World Championships for the USA Mixed team, and has played 3 seasons with Molly Brown, her current team. Ives has experience captaining, spirit captaining, and being an unapologetic rookie throughout her ultimate career and has spent some time attending and organizing equity discussions/events.

Email Address:megan.ives65@gmail.com

Twitter: nutmegnchives

Instagram: megan_foshizzle

Rachel “Rojo” Johnson

Rojo started messing around with the frisbee back in high school in Colorado but was shocked upon arrival at the University of Mississippi to find there were rules, strategies, & tournaments involved in this crazy sport. After becoming irrevocably hooked to the sport & graduating from Ole Miss, she attended Elon University for graduate school & helped the Wild Rumpus reach DIII Natties. She spent the next 5 seasons playing with Phoenix Women’s Ultimate & started assistant coaching Elon Wild Rumpus in 2014, heading up the chaos as their head coach since 2016.

Email Address: racheljohns9@gmail.com

Twitter: coloradorachel

Instagram: coloradorachel

Rena Kawabata

Rena is from Vancouver, Canada and identifies as a woman of color. She graduated from the UBC Thunderbirds program and played 7 seasons with Vancouver Traffic. She now lives in Seattle, WA and has been working as an equity trainer for over a year. Lately she has been thinking about doing a PhD in Social Justice Education.

Email Address: rena.kawabata@gmail.com

Twitter: renakawabata

Instagram: renakawabata

Hana Kawai

Hana plays for Seattle Riot, runs All Girl Everything Ultimate Program (AGE UP), once kidnapped a cat and has definitely read more Octavia Butler than you.

Email Address: hana@allgirleverything.org

Twitter: age_up

Instagram: age_up

Courtney Kiesow

Courtney has been playing ultimate since 2002, played in college for the University of Wisconsin 2004-2009, and on multiple club teams since. She currently lives in Minneapolis, MN, plays for Minneapolis Pop, and is a coach for Carleton Syzygy.

Email Address: ckiesow@gmail.com

Twitter: ckiesow

Instagram: courtneykiesow

Angela Lin

Angela has played ultimate since 1996 – in the College division with Georgia Tech and University of Georgia, Club division with Ozone (Atlanta) and LOL (Bay Area). She’s also played in the Master’s division with BKFT (Bay Area). Angela was an alternate for the US World Games team in 2005 and has represented USA in the Master’s division at WCBU (2015, 2017) and WUGC (2016). At the 50th Anniversary Event at Nationals, Angela will be inducted into the Ultimate Hall of Fame, Class of 2018.

Email Address: angeladotlin@gmail.com

Twitter: jeela71

Grant Lindsley

Grant played at Paideia High School and Carleton College. He also played with San Francisco Revolver, Minneapolis Sub Zero, and Atlanta Chain Lightning and was a member of US National teams in ‘06 and ‘08 (Jr) and ‘17.

Kyle “Rex” McBard

Rex is from Berkeley, CA, and loves facilitating improvement, talking about talking, being outside, and doing any sort of puzzle. She is currently in her 12th year of playing ultimate (spanning high school, college, and club) and her 7th year of coaching (Berkeley High School and then UCB Tarts). Ultimate has been the backdrop for many personal growth moments, and she loves it as an encouraging environment to work on so many areas of life (communication, grit, love, trust, physical effort, mental effort, silly-string fun, and more!).

Twitter: kayemb13

Chelsea Murphy

Chelsea Murphy hails from Amherst, MA and has been playing ultimate for way too many years to share. A highschool eastern champion, a jr. worlds gold medalist, and a two-time club national champion, she’s played frisbee from middle school through high school, college and club (both mixed and women’s). She currently plays for Brute Squad and fun fact, is left handed.

Email Address: murphy.chelsea@gmail.com

Twitter: chelsmurph

Instagram: chemur

Anna Nazarov

Anna has been playing ultimate since the fall of 2003 when she found this sport at UCLA. These days she plays for Fury and coaches the UC Berkeley women’s B team.

Email Address: anna.nazarov@gmail.com

Twitter: onesevenfive

Instagram: 4dogs4dogs

Carolyn Normile

Carolyn Normile is originally from the Philadelphia area and now works as a mechanical engineer in Pittsburgh. She played Ultimate at Lower Merion High School from 2009-13, and then at the University of Pittsburgh from 2013-18, serving as captain for three years. Carolyn was a two-time member of the women’s U24 National Ultimate Team in 2015 and 2018. She traveled with the first All-Star Ultimate Tour of top women college players across the US in the summer of 2015. This is her fourth year on the nationally-ranked club team AMP from Philadelphia. In 2018, she was a finalist for the Callahan and was named D1 Women’s Player of the Year.

Email Address: carolynnormile@gmail.com

Twitter: thisNormilegirl

Instagram: carolynnormile

Anraya Palmer

Anraya has been playing ultimate for about 8 years. Anraya played college ultimate at the University of Georgia (UGA). After college she played 2 years of club with Atlanta Outbreak and currently plays for Atlanta Ozone. She also coaches the varsity women’s ultimate team at Paideia. She believes in the growth of our sport through visibility and opportunities for women, minorities and youth.

Email Address: apalm1990@gmail.com

Twitter: apalm_is_napalm

Instagram: apalm_is_napalm

Shereen Rabie

Shereen played 5 years of college Ultimate for the University of Texas Melee. She captained Melee her 4th year & assistant coached her 5th due to an ACL injury. Shereen played club on Texas Showdown and captained the team during the 2014 club season, where they placed 4th at WUCC in Lecco, Italy. Shereen attended UCLA for law school and played on the LA-based mixed team, 7 Figures, and assistant coached UCLA BLU (2016-2017). Upon graduating, Shereen returned to Austin and is currently in her second year of coaching Melee. Shereen coaches Melee alongside Kayla Ramirez, her teammate and former Melee co-captain. Shereen also coached at the club-level for the first time, returning to Showdown during the 2018 club season. Yeehaw!

Email Address: shereen891@gmail.com

Gail Reich

Gail Reich is a private practice psychotherapist and freelance photographer living in Chicago. She has played at the collegiate, club and masters level over the last 10 years. She has played many fun tournaments (her favorite is Paganello) and has coached at Ultimate Peace. Gail was formerly active on the board of Ultimate Chicago for 6 years and now spends her organizational energies tournament directing for USA Ultimate events and is the Girls’ National Outreach Director (GUM).

Email Address: captaingail@gmail.com

Instagram: greichphoto, greichpsych

Miranda Roth Knowles

Miranda Roth Knowles has coached and played ultimate frisbee all over the world since 1998. She currently coaches Paideia Groove, Atlanta Hustle and Atlanta Chain Lightning.

Email Address: mirandakayknowles@gmail.com

Twitter: mirdiggity

Instagram: mirdiggity

Samantha Salvia

Sam stumbled upon ultimate frisbee as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University. She captained Stanford Superfly to a national championship in 1999 and found a home on Fury for over a decade. Since “retiring” from Fury in 2010, she has coached and consulted with multiple teams, captained the 2016 USA Womens Masters Team to a gold medal in London, is a founding board member of the non profit Ultimate Impact, leads workshops for Positive Coaching Alliance, works as a water resources engineer, and is a mother of two.

Email Address: samantha.salvia@gmail.com

Twitter: samsalvia

Erynn Schroeder

Erynn currently lives in Charleston, SC and is playing with Atlanta Ozone. She grew up in Minnesota and attended the College of St. Benedict/St. John’s University. She has played on two national teams and was a part of the 2015 All-Star Ultimate Tour.

Email Address: erynnschrade@gmail.com

Twitter: erynnschrade

Instagram: erynnschrade

Alisha Stoun

Alisha has been involved in competitive Ultimate since 2007. She played Womens at the University of Florida, she has played Mixed Club in SoCal for the last 7 years, and she has coached the UC-San Diego Women’s team since 2013.

Email Address: alishastoun@gmail.com

Instagram: alishastoun

Cassie Swafford

Cassie grew up an avid basketball and soccer player in Columbus, OH and began playing ultimate during her junior year of high school. She captained Ohio State Fever for four years and helped them win the program’s first national title in 2014. She currently resides in Washington state where she spends her time playing with Seattle Riot and loving on her animals in the beautiful PNW!

Email Address: cswafford14@gmail.com

Twitter: cassieswafford

Rohre Titcomb

Rohre has had 2 shoulder surgeries, 3 (R, L, L) ACL surgeries (hamstring graft, hamstring graft, patellar graft). Rohre played for Dartmouth Princess Layout throughout college (one season left-handed due to shoulder surgery), handled for Riot 2010-2016, served in Riot leadership 2011- 2016, and now coaches Seattle Riot and the Whitman Sweets. She is a 2x beach world champion, 2x WUCC world champion with Riot, 1-time WUGC world champion, and World Games Alternate 2013. Owner of Five Ultimate, Seattle Cascades, Aria Discs.

Twitter: rohresheadband

Instagram: rohresheadband

Katelyn Travaglini

Katelyn started playing ultimate in 2007 at the University of Florida with the women’s team FUEL. Playing her first club season in 2008 with Florida’s LaYuma, followed by playing with other women’s and mixed teams including Raleigh’s Phoenix. Her current team is Atlanta’s Ozone. Katelyn has coached the University of Florida’s women’s team since the fall of 2016.

Email Address: k.cobelens24@gmail.com

Twitter: katecobelens

Instagram:k.travaglini

Russell Wallack

Russell began playing ultimate at Tiina Booth’s day camp as a 10 year-old in 1999. His playing career has included playing opportunities at Amherst High School and Kenyon College, on the US U-20 open team, and on Bodhi (‘08), Machine (‘10), and Ironside (‘11-’16). Russell is a coach at NUTC, has organized and run clinics in Denmark, the Czech Republic, and Germany, and now co-coaches The University of Massachusetts men’s ultimate programs with Tiina Booth.

Email Address: wallack.russell@gmail.com

Twitter: Russell_Wallack

Medium: Russell_Wallack

Instagram: rwallack

Alyssa Weatherford

Alyssa played five years of college at Western Washington University and then started coaching in 2011. She made Seattle Riot in 2007, and continues to compete. White, LGBT, not a steady class, female, nonreligious, able bodied.

Email Address: a.weatherford@gmail.com

Twitter: CoachLys

Jenna Weiner

Jenna started playing ultimate on a marching band intramural team in undergrad at UC Berkeley before playing with the Cal Men’s B team her junior and senior years. She continued to play ultimate in graduate school at the University of Nevada, Reno, where she played a year with the UNR Women’s team. She also plays with Reno Cutthroat, a mixed club team out of Reno.

Email Address: weiner2010@gmail.com

Twitter: jennaweiner6

Alaine “Shakes” Wetli

Shakes played for Fever from 2013 to 2017. She recently graduated from Ohio State in 2017 with her Masters in Mechanical Engineering. She played club with Santa Maria, Rival, and recently plays with Columbus Cocktails.

Email Address: awetli1743@gmail.com

Instagram: alainewetli17