At the end of the outdoor track and field season last year, it was unknown who would be stepping in to replace 44-year veteran coach Dave Lehman. That question was answered during the summer when Dara Ford was hired as his replacement.
Ford, a three-time academic All-American at the University of Mount Union, has spent the last six seasons coaching cross country at John Carroll University and four coaching track and field.
For Ford, coaching has always been something that she wanted to pursue.
“My degree was in biology and I minored in childhood education and I was a sixth and seventh grade teacher for a year,” Ford said. “During the time I was teaching, I was also an assistant track coach. I began to notice that the part of my day that I was looking forward to the most was the coaching part.”
Ford accepted the role of graduate assistant at John Carroll and became a full-time coach just one season later.
Ford was at John Carroll from 2008 to 2013. While there, she saw a huge amount of success including leading the women’s cross country team to an Ohio Athletic Conference championship in 2013.
But, when she heard about the coaching vacancy at Otterbein, Ford knew she was the perfect fit for the job.
“I think that Otterbein is a diamond in the rough,” Ford said about her choice to come to Otterbein. “It’s the program everyone wants to be at. The location is great, it’s a great school, and I really like the make up of students that end up at Otterbein.”
Ford has found the transition from John Carroll to Otterbein to be extremely smooth.
“I love the transition so far,” Ford said. “The amount of support and how the coaching staff is a team is very unique to Otterbein. The support that comes from the athletic department is unmatched from the other schools I’ve been around. It was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be.”
She also felt that the transition between head coaches with the athletes went even more smooth.
“The athletes on the team bought in right away and they’re seeing a lot of success, which of course makes it a lot more fun,” Ford said. They’re running well and they’re having fun doing it, so it is ideal right now.”
As for the goals this season, Ford finds the women’s cross country and track and field teams to have a lot of potential.
“I stepped into a women’s program that is pretty good and pretty young,” Ford said about the cross country team. “For them, you always want to win the conference and it is a tough conference on the women’s side. The goal is to win the conference, but the broader goal is top three."
“On the track and field side, the women’s track team should be able to challenge for an OAC title this year. We ended up getting some good freshman here at the last minute, so hopefully with what we have returning and all of that is on the women’s side we’ll do some good things there.”
Ford has high expectations for both the men’s cross country and track and field teams this year as well.
“On the men’s side, it is also a tough conference,” Ford said about cross country. “They finished fourth last year. Our goal is to improve upon that while matching that at the very least."
“On the men’s side for track, we’re still trying to figure out what we do have. For them, I think top five in the conference is a reasonable goal.”
However, Ford's ultimate goal for herself and for the cross country and track and field programs is to become OAC champions and national powerhouses.
“On the whole, I basically want to come in here my first year and try to instill a feeling of family on the team and establish what we want to do in a championship culture,” Ford said. “From there we want to be a national powerhouse, but it’s not going to happen overnight. We want to be that perennial powerhouse, first on the conference level then on the national level.”
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