United States Air Force Academy Women's Track & Field

National Pole Vault Coach of the Year (2013) Three-Time USTFCCCA Assistant Coach of the Year, Mountain Region Scott Steffan, the 2013 National Pole Vault Coach of the Year and a three-time USTFCCCA Mountain Region Assistant Coach of the Year, is in his fourth season as the head coach of the Air Force track and field program. Steffan, who oversees Air Force’s highly successful vertical jumps squad and multi-event athletes, was promoted to the head coach position in the fall of 2022, after serving as an assistant coach (2008-13) and associate head coach (2014-22) during his time at the Academy. Since his arrival, six members of the men’s pole vault team – Dylan Bell, Nick Frawley, Kyle Pater, Cale Simmons, Joey Uhle, Greg Skage – have combined for 16 All-America awards, while two high jumpers – Taylor Smith, Shelley Spires – have combined for five. Frawley, who claimed a pair of top-three finishes at the NCAA Outdoor Championships (second in 2008, third in 2010) and Spires, who earned first-team status during three of her four national appearances, are two of the program’s most decorated Division I All-Americans, with four overall selections apiece. Steffan has coached the Falcons to 21 Mountain West titles in the pole vault, including the first-ever women’s outdoor title (Kathryn Tomczak, 2019). The men have dominated the top of the podium at the conference meet under his watch, winning 11 of the last 18 indoor titles and nine outdoor titles during that span. Uhle accounted fo

Former Air Force distance runner 1Lt AJ Kedge returned to the Academy staff in 2024 as a recruiting coordinator for the Falcons’ track & field and cross coun...

Dan Stoll is in his first season as an assistant coach with the Air Force track and field team, having joined the program in January 2026. A three-time All-A...

USTFCCCA Assistant Coach of the Year, Mountain Region (2025) Kyle Lillie, the 2025 USTFCCCA Mountain Region Outdoor Assistant Coach of the Year, is in his fourth season as an assistant coach with the Air Force track and field program, after joining the team in November 2022. A former collegiate thrower at Arizona State University, Lillie has revitalized the Falcons’ throwing program over his first three seasons. His impact was immediately felt in 2023, as his athletes swept the throwing titles at the Mountain West Indoor Championships, added another at the outdoor meet, and combined for nine podium finishes to help the men sweep the team titles. His athletes represented the Academy in all four throwing events at the NCAA Outdoor Championships, while rewriting the program’s record book. Backed by Academy Records in the weight throw, hammer throw and discus throw, the men made 14 improvements to the program’s all-time Top 10 and set seven Air Force Class Records, while Hayden Bullock recorded the best discus distance (194’9”) of any service academy thrower. “The Lillie Effect” continued in 2024, as the men’s throwers had a dominant campaign, highlighted by three MW Outdoor titles and 61 total points toward the Falcons’ third-straight team title. Under Lillie’s watch, Texas Tanner had a stellar sophomore season that included two conference titles, four MW medals, three Air Force Records, the Mountain West and Service Academy Record in the hammer throw, appearances in two events

Laura Bowerman was named the head coach of the Air Force cross country team in the fall of 2022, following a successful seven-year stint at the University of New Mexico. Bowerman, who helped the Lobos to several national titles – including a pair of team championships, also oversees training for the women’s distance and middle distance runners during the track season. During her first season with the women’s distance program, Bowerman saw Halle Hamilton claim all-conference and all-region honors, while advancing to her first NCAA Cross Country Championship. The women, who finished sixth at the conference meet and added a top-10 finish at the regional championships during the cross country season, accounted for three of the program’s four all-conference honors during the track and field season. Her athletes made 14 improvements to the Academy’s Top 10, while three qualified to the NCAA Outdoor Championships. The women’s distance success continued in 2023-24. Hamilton repeated her cross country trifecta of all-conference, all-region and NCAA qualification, while a second all-conference outing from Ally Peterson helped the women to a third-place finish at the MW Cross Country Championships. On the track, her runners accounted for four Air Force Top 5 performances during the indoor season and six more during the outdoor season – including a program-record in the 4x800-meter relay at Drake, while three Falcons qualified to the NCAA Outdoor Championships. During the 2024-25 season,

1 National Champion; 34 All-America Honors 8 Teams in the NCAA Cross Country Championships; 8 Individual NCAA Qualifiers 11 Appearances at the NCAA Indoor Championships 113 Bids to the NCAA Outdoor Championships; 22 Appearances at Final Site 47 Mountain West Champions 227 All-Conference Performances 8 Mountain West Team Titles 9 Mountain West Coach of the Year Awards 17 Air Force Distance Records; 112 Air Force Top 10 Distance Marks 10 Selections to the Air Force World Class Athlete Program Ryan Cole, a nine-time conference coach of the year, is in his fourth season as the Director of Air Force Track & Field and Cross Country. After spending the first eight years of his Academy tenure overseeing the Falcons’ highly successful distance program as the head cross country coach, Cole was promoted to Director in August 2022. In addition to overseeing the Falcons’ full program, Cole continues to coach the men’s distance and middle distance runners during the cross country and track seasons. Cole led Air Force to eight-straight team appearances at the NCAA Cross Country Championships, including the women’s first-ever Division I team appearance at the start of the streak in 2016. The men have raced in six of the last eight national meets – headlined by a seventh-place finish in 2022, while the women finished within the top 10 (eighth) in 2019. He has coached nine All-Americans – Kyle Eller (2015), Hannah Everson (2015), Mickey Davey (2017), Jaci Smith (2018), Maria Mettler (2019), Ma