Hear Her Sports

Sophie Shaft is a 2026 USA Weightlifting National Champion and Pan American champion representing Team USA in the 63-kilogram category. A former gymnast and competitive CrossFit athlete, Shaft transitioned to Olympic weightlifting and quickly established herself as one of the country’s rising stars. She is a two-time Senior World Team member, has set eight American records and earned a seventh-place finish at the 2024 Senior World Championships in her first senior international competition. Shaft is also a former contestant on American Ninja Warrior and is now focused on continuing her development as she pursues her goal of representing Team USA at the 2028 Olympic Games.Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletter
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Pat Buchanan, PhD, is a coach specializing in female athlete longevity at the intersection of sports medicine, neuroscience, and performance. She earned her AB at the University of North Carolina while playing basketball. She later earned an MS in Physical Therapy from the University of Indianapolis where she discovered Moshe Feldenkrais’s method of using movement to increase awareness, reshaping her view of brain-body-performance connections. She completed professional training in this approach and, in the process, was introduced to Esther Thelen, whose research in dynamic systems theory and motor development transformed movement science. Pat pursued her PhD in Human Performance under Thelen at Indiana University, who also trained in the Feldenkrais Method during that time. These threads formed Pat’s holistic approach, focused on lifelong neuroplasticity and building awareness to reduce injury risk and unlock untapped performance.Pat's career eventually took her to Beijing, where she worked with Chinese athletes ahead of the 2020 Olympic Games. Today, she coaches high-performing female athletes to stay in play, sustain peak performance, and confidently step into longer, more aligned careers. She is the author of Relieve Your Pain and is based in Boone, North Carolina.Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletterGet involved and support the show directly at https://bit.ly/givetoHHSpodcastFind all episodes at http://www.hearhersports.com/Find Pat Buchanan, PhD at www.linkedin.com/in/patbuchananphd/Follow Pat on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/pat.buchanan.587/

Katie Tolles is the Head Women's Coach for Case Western Reserve University's rowing team and the Director of Communications for the Cleveland Rowing Foundation's Board of Directors. Katie speaks to host Elizabeth Emery about the beauty of teamwork, being on the water, coaching high school and college athletes, travel, fear, and jumping right into things.  Katie's rowing career began as a freshman walk-on at Marietta College. She knew nothing about the sport when she started, but quickly rose through the team, becoming a leader early on in the Women's 1V8+ & 1V4+ for her four years of undergrad. Katie pursued elite rowing at Vesper Boat Club on Boathouse Row in Philadelphia in 2016. That summer she and her teammates went on to win Club Nationals and Canadian Henley. Katie served as a founding coach for Magnificat High School and designed the branding for the rowing programs at Magnificat High School, Cleveland Foundry Juniors and Case Western Reserve University. Today, Katie is a competitive athlete who sculls on the Cuyahoga River. She recently placing 5th at The Head of the Charles. Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletter
 Get involved and support the show directly at https://bit.ly/givetoHHSpodcast
 Find all episodes at http://www.hearhersports.com/
 Learn more about Katie Tolles at https://katietollesdesigns.com/ Find Case Western Rowing at https://casewesternrowing.weebly.com/ Follow Katie on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/kttolles/ Follow Katie on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/katie-tolles-uxmc-355959b8/

Justine Siegal is the Co-Founder and Commissioner of the Women’s Pro Baseball League (WPBL), which will launch its inaugural season on August 1 featuring some of the top players in the world. She made history as the first woman to coach for a Major League Baseball organization (2015) and is the founder of Baseball For All. Her A’s jersey is in the National Baseball Hall of Fame and USA Today named her, "100 Most Powerful People in MLB.” Justine received her PhD from Springfield College (MA). In the episode, Justine talks with host Elizabeth Emery about her own experience fighting to play baseball, her career in coaching, why it’s so important for her that girls have the opportunity to play baseball if they want to, what it was like being the first woman to coach men’s baseball, women’s sports now, and looking forward into the future through her daughter. Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletter Get involved and support the show directly at https://bit.ly/givetoHHSpodcast Find all episodes at http://www.hearhersports.com/ Learn more about Women’s Pro Baseball League at https://www.womensprobaseballleague.com/ Follow WPBL on Instagram at @wpbl_official Follow Justine on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/justine-siegal/

Jean Fruth is an internationally recognized photographer, filmmaker and visual storyteller whose work harnesses the power of images to inspire change. She is the co-founder of two nonprofit organizations, Grassroots Baseball and SEE HER BE HER, which uses sports to empower youth, underserved communities, and women globally. Jean made her film debut in 2024 as Director and Producer of SEE HER BE HER and is the Author/Photographer of three books in the Grassroots Baseball Series: Where Legends Begin (2019), Route 66 (2022) and See Her Be Her (2024). Jean is honored to be designated by Sony as one of its select Sony Artisans of Imagery.  In recognition of her impact as a visual storyteller and changemaker, she was honored with the 2025 United Nations International Photographic Council Achievement Award. Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletter Get involved and support the show directly at https://bit.ly/givetoHHSpodcast Find all episodes at http://www.hearhersports.com/ Learn more about SEE HER BE HER at www.SeeHerBeHer.org Find SEE HER BE HER on Instagram at @SeeHerBeHer_  Find SEE HER BE HER on LinkedIn at @SeeHerBeHer

Deena Blacking and Christine O’Connell talk to host Elizabeth Emery about The Cyclists’ Alliance Go Fund Me, sponsorship, the growth of women’s cycling, worries about the development pathway to the top level of the sport, media coverage, TCA’s role is in the world of women’s cycling, sponsorship, and how to be a superfan. Christine spent over 20 years working in strategy and corporate development, including senior roles at Thomson Reuters and in strategy consulting. She now focuses on her cycling based charity campaign, One More City, a global charity initiative built around long distance cycling challenges, raising funds for research into secondary, or metastatic, breast cancer. Christine has been living with secondary breast cancer since 2018, and cycling is an important part of how she manages the disease and continues to live a full life.  Christine is Vice President of The Cyclists’ Alliance, the organization representing female professional cyclists, and Vice Chairman of the Queen’s Institute of Community Nursing.  Deena  is a cycling coach and consultant in sport. She has worked with national and international sports organizations for the last ten years. Prior to this, she worked as a lawyer in human rights law in the UK.  Deena has been involved with The Cyclists' Alliance since 2020. She initially supported the work of The Cyclists' Alliance using her legal skills to support riders, and later took on responsibility for the annual survey, then the mentor program, and now the overall day to day of the organization in her role as Interim Managing Director. Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletter Get involved and support the show directly at https://bit.ly/givetoHHSpodcast Find all episodes at http://www.hearhersports.com/Learn about The Cyclists’ Alliance at https://cyclistsalliance.org/

Teresa Mullen, now 75 years old, is a long time athlete with a passion for playing, coaching, officiating, and watching women’s sports. Teresa started playing softball with her cousins at a very young age in a farm field with a wooden bat and 12 inch mush ball. When she was growing up there were very few opportunities for females to participate in any sports. For example, at her small high school only basketball and track were offered for girls. After going to a two-year college, she played on a competitive, company softball league and later played in volleyball leagues. Soon she knew she also wanted to coach in order to pass on all her technical and training knowledge to young ladies eager to learn. She began by coaching softball, then added basketball and volleyball. Next Teresa passed her officiating exams for basketball, softball, and volleyball at the high school level.  Teresa still coaches, officiates, and still plays softball and volleyball in the National Senior Games held every two years. She finally won the elusive gold medal several years ago in both softball and volleyball! In the episode Teresa and host Elizabeth Emery talk about her history as a long-time athlete, Title IX, coaching and officiating, why she prefers to play on women’s teams, changes she has seen in women’s sports, flag football, half-court basketball, managing the limitations of getting older, and the joy of watching young female athletes take advantages of all the opportunities now available. Teresa loves watching her daughter (a former college softball player) coach her twins in basketball and softball. Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletter Get involved and support the show directly at https://bit.ly/givetoHHSpodcast Find all episodes http://www.hearhersports.com/Learn about National Senior Games Association here: https://nsga.com

Helena Gilbert-Snyder is a former professional cyclist and founder of Monarch Racing: an elite women's road team & a junior girls' development road team. Her experiences and perspectives on sports, gender, and society are reflected in the goal of her team, which stretches far beyond cycling, towards a mission of creating powerful, kind, and confident individuals who will become leaders in their communities and the world. Helena & host Elizabeth Emery discuss confidence, body image, nutrition, eating disorders, privilege, speaking up, team dynamics, being perfect and never enough, aggression, and being mean.  Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletter Get involved and support the show directly at https://bit.ly/givetoHHSpodcast Find all episodes http://www.hearhersports.com/ Find Helena Gilbert-Snyder’s website at https://www.helenagilbertsnyder.com/Learn more about Monarch Racing at https://www.monarch-racing.com/

Joyce Scoglietti played slow pitch softball for most of her life. She started at 2nd base in a church league when she was 8 years old and now plays with the Northcoast Vintage Players, a league for 45+.  Joyce was born in 1957, so most of her young athletic career happened before Title IX passed. There were no school sports programs available to her until the 10th grade when she joined competitive volleyball, basketball, and softball teams. She speaks of finally having a uniform, coaches, and referees! Joyce was the recipient of the first award for athlete of the year from Billie Jean King.  Joyce also refereed high school volleyball for 36 years and was the president of the Cleveland Volleyball Officials Association for 15 of those years. During that time she witnessed the level of play rise exceptionally. She tells us what that looked like and how it impacted the reffing.   Joyce and Hear Her Sports host Elizabeth Emery also talk about playing with the boys until puberty, weird gym suits, feeling at home and truly like herself in the gym, the importance of her coaches, and still playing softball for the love of the game. Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletter Get involved and support the show directly at https://bit.ly/givetoHHSpodcast Find all episodes http://www.hearhersports.com/Learn about Northcoast Vintage Players here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/113308895463923/

Wanda Ford is a basketball standout. She is the first woman in NCAA history to amass 1500 basketball rebounds and she set the NCAA career record with 1,887 rebounds. She had 102 career double-doubles. Wanda was also one of the leading scorers in the game. She set the NCAA single-season scoring record with 919 points in 1986 (now eighth all time). Her average of 30.6 points per game in 1986 was the second highest at that time (now fifth all time). She also scored 54 points in a February 22, 1986 game against Missouri State, which was the second highest single-game scoring total up to that time (now tied for seventh all time). In this episode Wanda tells stories of her basketball in the early days of girls sports, what drew her to Drake University, her education there, traveling and living all over the place through basketball, and her late-night (until 2am!) basketball program. Wanda was a Women’s Sports Foundation Player of the Year, a Kodak All-American, a three time Women’s Basketball Yearbook All-America team selection, a two time MVP player of the year, a four-time first-team all-conference choice, ten times a league player of the week, a two time finalist for the Wade Trophy, and was named Coach of the Year in youth basketball by the City of Parma, where she is now a Phys Ed teacher. After graduating from Drake in 1986, Wanda played professional basketball for 16 years in Italy, Brazil, Sweden and Israel. She was part of seven league championship teams, and won such personal awards as Most Valuable Player and Newcomer of the Year, both in Israel. Wanda’s number has been retired at both East Tech High School and Drake University. She was inducted into the Sports Legends of Cleveland Public Schools Senate League in 2022 for her high school career at East Tech High School. And in 2025 Wanda was inducted into the Greater Cleveland Sports Hall of Fame, which is how I learned about her outstanding career.   Sign up for Hear Her Sports newsletter at https://bit.ly/HHSnewsletter Get involved and support the show directly at https://bit.ly/givetoHHSpodcast Find all episodes http://www.hearhersports.com/Check out Wanda’s Wikipedia page here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wanda_Ford