Standing behind the blocks of the biggest meet so far this season, UW Oshkosh swim and dive head coach Christopher Culp is strong and focused with a sharp look on his face, scanning the water like a hawk. He whistles at each swimmer, urging them to go faster.
No one can tell that behind his expressions is a funny, goofy, lighthearted man that everyone around him knows and loves. On deck, he is collected and watches every race closely ready to offer guidance and support.
After swimmer Megan Miles completed her 200-yard backstroke, Culp approached her. His disappointment was obvious.
“At my midseason meet, I completely missed the wall on my 200 backstroke,” she said. Miles could sense Culp’s concern when she emerged from the water, tears streaming down her face after a challenging day that included a poor performance in her 100-yard back as well.
“I told him I was struggling and just couldn’t handle the pressure,” she said, her voice trembling.
Culp immediately switched his demeanor, transforming from stern coach to compassionate mentor. He wrapped his arm around her and slowed her tears. “Megan, I understand that you’re under a lot of stress,” he said. “You’ve never done this before, and it’s going to be okay.”
He encouraged her to take a moment for herself and to step away from the pool, to show he completely understood. “Just go in the locker room, take a minute and cry it out because I get it. Just come see me afterwards.”
An hour later, during dinner at the hotel, Culp sat beside her, a warm smile on his face.
“Megan, I’m very proud of you,” he said, and in that moment, Miles felt an overwhelming wave of relief and gratitude.
“I almost bawled my eyes out,” Miles said. “I’ve never had a coach say that to me before. I was always told to suck it up or toughen it out, but not anymore.”
Culp is a coach who knows his athletes strengths. He knows what they’re capable of and when they need a break. He can sense his swimmer’s needs based on their own circumstances. He knows when they need a kick in the ass and when they just need a hug.
He has spent over two decades coaching children, young adults and college athletes, and has two children of his own. However, he prefers coaching collegiate teams, and it all originated from his own college coach he had in the late ‘90s.
“I will never see an athlete as just an athlete,” Culp said. “I know everyone needs different things at different times, and I am happy to be the person to help them each time.”
Influences Shaping Culp’s Coaching Philosophy
Culp’s journey into coaching was shaped by his own college experience. He initially aimed to become a teacher but found himself drawn back to the pool when a new swim team was established at San Francisco State University.
After a two-and-a-half-year long break from swimming, he decided to walk on to the team. The coach, Bruce Brown initially dismissed Culp due to his long hair and 20-lbs weight gain since high school. Culp persevered, ultimately building a strong relationship with his coach, Bruce Brown.
“He pushed me, but he cared more about me as a person than as an athlete,” Culp said. “I started a relationship with him, and he had a team, and I got back into shape. I did very well, but he was really my inspiration to become a coach. I had a lot of great coaches throughout my swimming career, but he was definitely one that had the biggest impact on me.”
After swimming for Brown, Culp was inspired to work for him as his assistant coach for a few years. When Brown retired, Culp took over the head coach position.
“Throughout my career, I had very high-end coaches,” he said. “I had two different Olympic coaches growing up. They were very well renowned and very successful so that people won gold medals and so on and so forth. But Brown had a different impact on me.”
Brown was a figure to look up to, so Culp said he always was aiming to please him.
“I knew that no matter what I did, whether it be good or bad, he was going to love me,” Culp said.
Culp cares about each one of his athletes the same way that Brown cared for him and his team. Whether after a bad practice or meet, the coaching hat comes off and the real Culp shines through.
“I wanted to do right by a lot of the coaches I used to have for growing up,” he said. “I had a ‘fuck you’ attitude sometimes, but at the same time, they were a dictator type of coach.”
His other coaches were experts in the technical aspects of the sport, but they never emphasized a deeper, more personal connection with their athletes like Brown did.
“These coaches knew how to coach in terms of science and so on and so forth, but I didn’t really care to make them happier the way I did for Brown,” Culp said.
A Family and Community Oriented Coach
Culp was prepared to be a dad his whole life because coaching is the only life that Culp had ever known. Working with kids every day requires patience. When he and his wife, Ellen Kenny, had their two kids, they became just as invested with the swim team as Culp had.
Pool decks on swim meet days are typically a hectic environment, and when Culp needs to balance coaching with parenting it can be even harder for him to concentrate on what’s going on in the pool. His 5-year-old daughter, Erin, and 9-year-old son, Neil, run around the pool deck chasing their favorite swimmer and babysitter, Grace Fergus. Fergus tries to walk around the pool deck, but with one child clinging to each of her legs, the task becomes difficult. Still, she’s laughing the whole time.
“Erin is the perfect mix of sweet, goofy and sassy,” Fergus said. “She definitely gets the sweetness from her mother, but goofy and sassy has Culp written all over it. Neil is silly, loud, but very protective. The way he cares for his younger sister reminds me of how Culp will goof around with his athletes but always has their backs no matter what.”
Affordable babysitters are hard to come by, so when Culp realized he could trust the team he’s coached for so long with his children, he began pawning them off whenever Fergus or other swimmers were available.
“Culp reached out to me one day sophomore year and asked if I was interested in babysitting,” Fergus said. “He knew I had worked with kids in the past and thought I would be a good fit.”
His children have also grown up around the swim community, learning the values of teamwork and resilience early on, so the swimmers are the first people he goes to for help with babysitting.
“Typically, we eat dinner together and release energy by having a dance party,” Fergus said. “We always end our night bundled up on a couch with blankets and stuffed animals and watching a Disney movie. The only time they would test me is when a bedtime story turned into 10.”
Culp is appreciative of what his athletes do for him outside of the pool, and his kids enjoy spending time with his athletes as much as they like babysitting them.
“It’s great because they love the swimmers,” Culp said. “They think they’re part of that gang. I get asked three times a week, ‘are the swimmers coming over?’ ‘Are we going to go to the swimmers?’”
This involvement has allowed Culp to teach his children the importance of community and support, reinforcing the same values he instills in his athletes.
“When I have the team over and the kids interact with everybody, I watch how some of the athletes interact with my kids,” Culp said. “You could tell which swimmers have babysat before, which ones have siblings and which ones love kids.”
Not only can Culp rely on his swimmers to be there for his kids, he has the same relationship with the UWO community.
“The community that we have in Oshkosh and with the team, everyone knows who my kids are, and I know they are safe,” Culp said. “I never worry about my kids because they have so many eyes on them all the time.”
Whenever his children go missing, Culp has the confidence that the people around him would ensure their safety, which turned out to be true in an amusing way.
“I lost my daughter in a football game and I didn’t panic,” Culp said. “Everyone else was panicking, but I’m like, everybody knows who my kids are here. So someone’s got me. And sure enough, they were in the VIP coaching lounge where I can’t even get into it with employees, but they’re in there eating snacks. I had to beg a security officer to go in there and get my daughter, but it was hilarious because she just walks in and does whatever she wants.”
Culp’s Partner in Crime
Culp’s family life and coaching career are interwoven in ways that enrich both. Kenny often attends meets, supporting not only Culp but also the team.
“She’s been my rock through everything,” he said. “When I was overwhelmed, she reminded me of why I love coaching. It’s a team effort at home and on deck.”
When Culp first met his wife, they were just college sweethearts, both with a passion for swimming. Now that they’re older, they’ve had to make sacrifices for Culp to continue his passion for college swim coaching.
Reflecting on their journey, Kenny said she knows the sacrifices they’ve made for Culp to pursue his coaching career.
“When he got the UWO job, I was his biggest cheerleader,” she said. “We were ready to move anywhere for his dream.”
Kenny said that she knew they would move to wherever he got hired, no questions asked.
“It was hard at first to move away from family and friends with our newborn son because I was a new mom, and now we lived in a place where we didn’t know anyone,” she said. “But I knew we’d be OK because Chris and I have always said our relationship and marriage has been a team and we support one another.”
Kenny has seen Culp on his best days, but she’s also seen the challenges he faces in the pool.
“I remember him coming home after a tough season, feeling defeated,” she said. “It was hard for me to watch him struggle, but he never lost his passion for the sport or his love for his team. That’s what makes him a great coach. He genuinely cares.”
Their partnership is built on a foundation of teamwork, with both recognizing the need to support each other’s aspirations, he said.
“Having kids, we’ve kept that same approach. I think everyone changes when they have kids because it’s impossible not to,” Culp said.
Culp often jokes about how life without his wife would be a disaster.
“I can barely keep myself alive,” he said. “Thank God for Ellen.”
Challenges of Being a Coach
Culp said he didn’t go into the field of coaching to become rich with money. He did it for the richness that comes with the relationships he’s made over the years. So when San Francisco State disbanded its swim team, he lost his first coaching job and he didn’t know what to do next with his life.
“I panicked when my old swim team didn’t have the money to stay afloat,” Culp said. “That’s who I am. It’s not just what I do, it’s who I am. I didn’t want to stop coaching, and my wife didn’t want me to either. She knew it was meant for me, so we needed to look at jobs outside of California.”
Despite understanding the financial challenges ahead, Culp said he realized that following his passion would require sacrifice. Even though his job wouldn’t give him everything he wanted for his family, he found clarity in knowing that doing what they love was worth the hardships.
“I knew that my job wasn’t going to provide the best for our children, but it was a high opening moment for me because I knew we were going to have to struggle to make it work,” Culp said. “But this is what I love to do. There’s a certain amount of pride that comes with it.”
Kenny is a successful registered nurse in Oshkosh and is the breadwinner of the family, which allows Culp to have a job he loves.
“Returning to my high school reunion was an eye-opening experience, seeing classmates who had become doctors, lawyers and high achievers, while I was coaching a college team,” he said. “Though I didn’t make as much money, there was a certain prestige in what I did, and I couldn’t help but feel flattered knowing that my wife’s career supported us while I pursued my passion.”
Coaching as a team
Culp has been the head coach at UWO for a decade now, and until three years ago, he was running the gig solo. In 2021, he was able to hire an assistant coach. When the opportunity came, Culp invited a friend to apply that he made back from his old job, Charles Sommer.
Sommer and Culp met in Dallas back in September 2019. They were at the American Swim Coaches Association World clinic, where they met each other through mutual friends.
Sommer and Culp got to know each other a little bit, but never thought they would ever see each other again after that. After all, Culp was coaching in Wisconsin, and Sommer was coaching in California. Now, Sommer says he is happy to be working with Culp at UWO.
“I am proud to say this, and I will continue to say this until something changes, but I am in the best working relationship I’ve ever been in my life…” he said. “I used to think Culp was far more knowledgeable than I was, simply because he’s a college coach and I was just a club coach — and that’s true, he is more experienced. But what struck me is that he never makes me feel inferior or less capable.”
Their collaborative relationship goes far beyond just professional obligations, creating a vibrant and supportive atmosphere. From their connection with fellow coaches to the strong sense of unity with the entire staff, the work culture feels like one big, connected family.
“I can’t imagine working with anyone else again,” Sommer said. “The experience of working together toward building a successful team has been incredibly enjoyable.”
“Our team dynamic, including our relationship with the other coaches, creates a fantastic work environment,” he said. “From the athletic director to the assistant coach, there’s a strong bond that makes it all come together.”
The UWO athletic director, Darryl Sims, said that working with Culp has been a rewarding experience, and that Culp’s coaching techniques are valuable to the UWO athletic department.
“He is dedicated and passionate about swimming and constantly brings a positive energy to the team,” he said. “His commitment to the athletes and their development is evident in every interaction.”
Culp said he is happy coaching at UWO and wouldn’t trade his job for any other.
“I can’t see myself working anywhere else now,” he said. “I know in my heart that this team and Oshkosh is it for me.”
