In this 2 part series, Rachel Naden (She/her) shared her thoughts around what drove the U24 2025 GBW squad to bronze medal success and how her style of coaching and leadership impacted the team.
The GBW coaching team (minus Emma) alongside the face of UKU, Si Hill, the man that makes UKU admin magic, Chris Bamford, and the U24 Squad manager, Jonny Bolton. Photo: Em Stewart
Bio: playing history and leadership history
I started playing Ultimate in 2011 at the University of Bristol. I have played for several clubs, most notably Bristol Women, Reading and SMOG (World Clubs ‘14, ‘18 and ‘22). I currently play for Deep Space who have just qualified for WUC ‘26. I have represented GB on grass (EUC ‘19, ‘23 and WUC 24) and beach (EBUC ‘19, WBUC ‘25). I've also represented GB at the World Games in 2022.
I captained the GBX beach team in ‘19 and then GBW in the ‘23-24 season. GBu24s was my first experience in any coaching/ non-playing coach capacity.
How did you impact the team in your coaching role?
I'm not very good at championing my own strengths as a coach yet, especially as this was my first foray into coaching. I may have had a little external input in this section after my own personal reflection.
I offered personal mentorship and support to players aiming to help facilitate them to play confidently and get the most out of their season and tournament. I think I led through compassion and my own vulnerability.
The creation of a narrative that the team could rely on and use in key moments. If anything, I think this was probably my favourite impact highlight. Our Italy game was a must win on our path to avoiding the USA in quarters, and they had already beaten Singapore the previous day. We were at a different venue, on a different surface, it was a 9am game, Italy had an aggressive zone and it felt there was apprehension in the air. We'd already done the preparation for their zone, prioritising forming a diamond shape with our offence around the disc.
I normally lead team talks with a lot of passion, however a player had already told me that made them feel more nervous, so I tried a different tactic. I settled on the narrative of medium term financial planning, something along the lines of treasuring the disc, through our diamonds, to see our stocks grow. I think it helped cut the tension and reminded the players they'd done the prep to excel and they sure did with a 15-7 scoreline.
Celebrations after success. Photo: Pablonaya71
Bronze medal trophy, slightly edited... Photo: Emma Chambers
What is your leadership style? What comes natural to you and what did you learn or work on?
My natural leadership style is to lead by example which I think is easier to do as a player/captain. However, I think I lead well when I have shared experience with those who I'm leading. This requires a lot of trust.
I think a key learning was to adapt based on the player-player conversation and scenario needs. An example being the approach to a team talks (early in the article).
We applied a democratic leadership model, gaining lots of valuable input from the captains and players. This has two benefits. We gained strategy thoughts, team needs (e.g. the want to have strategy based team meetings in the evening) and a better sense of team energy as well as gaining greater buy-in from the captains and team for strategy we wanted to deliver.
What did you learn from those around you?
I feel incredibly lucky to have been surrounded by amazing coaches.
From Andy, I learnt that it's really important to be your authentic self when coaching. While there can be a tendency to emulate other good coaches, being yourself yields far better results. Players are more likely to buy into the process and build trust with the coaching team. I also think Andy's personality and delivery was really great for this age group. He's also good at identifying areas for his own coaching improvement and seeking out these opportunities.
From Emma, I definitely learnt to trust and communicate my instincts. I can be a people pleaser and I want all players to enjoy themselves, which isn't my sole responsibility. Decision making in live/ pressured scenarios is a skill and one that needs to be practiced. I definitely didn't get it perfect but she gave me the confidence in decisions I made which allowed me to feel more comfortable to make those decisions quicker. She's also incredibly organised.
From Potter, I learnt that everyone needs a Potter, she's a bit of an enigma. The lessons learnt from the previous cycle were really helpful and her brain works at a million miles an hour so she's constantly throwing out different strategy ideas. Potter and I work in different ways, and it was really helpful for me to learn to work with someone who works differently to me. She's also incredibly proactive and decisive and helped when I started to worry about decisions I'd made on line calls.
From the players, wow, so much! I think the two key takeaways were leaning into your key skills and nailing them. I know we all want to develop and be well-rounded but there's nothing more satisfying than doing your job really well and letting other players shine doing theirs. We had a team who facilitated each other to shine! The second was just being confident and believing in yourself and your team.
Madeleine, Nads and Naomi celebrating together. Photo: Madeleine Leong.
Did you have any doubts along the way?
Largely in myself. The coaches knew how strong the team was, and I felt the pressure to perform to facilitate the team playing their best. I also was conscious of how strong the coaching team was and I hoped that I could still offer something useful to the players.
This was my first experience solely line calling and I know how much line calling can have a negative impact on players. There are so many factors to take onboard (e.g. O/D, match ups, player connections, strategy suitability, player performance). We also tracked the number of points and time played across the tournament, meaning these were also a factor in line calling decisions. We also called players over as and when needed to the other line, requiring input from Potter (who was responsible for calling the other line).
I don't envy player/captains making line calls, so next time you're a bit miffed with the line calling, give them a bit of grace!
What do you think contributed to the success?
Sadly Emma could not join us for the tournament, however I think her (and Conor Hogan's) input from home was vital. Emma and Hogi watched our opponents within our pool and power pool and were able to scout them in detail. This input allowed us to succinctly deliver offensive and defensive strategy in pre-game team meetings and defensive match ups throughout warm-ups and in game. The team said it felt like they had played the team before they started. Emma knew what strategies we had trained and therefore could have a lot of meaningful input into where we could generate success.
We put a lot of work into preparing a team website which covered strategy and key skills. This was useful for players to refer back to throughout the season but also for reinforcing improvements throughout the week.
The team's culture. Mainly based on memes and lightly sassing the coaches for our ineptitude with tech. Jokes aside, once on pitch everyone was incredibly respectful of each other and the skills each individual could bring. I think this resulted in a really low ego team. They bought into what we wanted to do with the team and were also very open and responsive to feedback. The captains and players had avenues to contribute to the teams success and I think this made us a stronger unit with mutual trust.
Finally, justice for Kenny, the man worked tirelessly and kept everyone playing throughout the week.
What does coming third mean to you?
To quote some very wise and experienced players on the team ‘this is a really really special team, everyone has the ability and everyone is contributing’ ‘I’ve just been in love with my team, we've played through everybody and everyone has something that's been so special this week’.
I'm incredibly proud of each and every individual on this team and I am very privileged to have been able to support them excel and deliver such an amazing achievement. Everyone bought into the process, the work and created a team that was so special they not only competed but destroyed their competition on the World stage. Third is a reflection on how amazing these athletes are and the dedication and drive of this group of players. It's a highlight that women's ultimate in the UK is skilled, confident and compassionate. Although I would have been proud of them no matter the result.
Third means a lot to me personally, this is close if not my favourite frisbee moment of all time. I worked against a lot of my own personal self doubt. While a medal was not needed to self validate, I think it's a positive reminder of my personal success.
What needs to be repeated for the next U24 cycle?
The scouting from home was invaluable, so I would recommend having a coach supporting from home.
Also not to toot our own horn but we put an incredible amount of work in and it always felt like we could do more! I think management teams could easily have 4 coaches to spread workload and provide more development opportunities for players.
We were incredibly lucky with our group of players, so we absolutely need to prioritise youth development too!
What's next for you?
I've had 3 big years of involvement with frisbee so it's time to take some time back for me. I'm ever grateful for team managers, coaches and captains, especially those on club teams!
The end of 2025 and 2026 is the year of Nads!
