Ashley Ellefson is the Chief Operating Officer at the Drone Racing League, the world’s premier, professional drone racing property, where she oversees the event production, technology and media teams. Honored as a Cynopsis Sports Top Women in Sports and Connect Sports Game Changer, she’s helped DRL create a new era of sport through cutting edge technology, world-class media, and event production, bringing high-speed drone racing in real life, in esports and in the metaverse. In the past two years she has led DRL to:
Forge a partnership with the FAA, guiding DRL to become the first and only FAA-accredited UAS event organizer and co-developing the drone racing event safety policyInnovate the first, fully-distributed cloud-based production system to support live broadcast on NBC, which enabled fans to bet on drone racing for the first time
Launch DRL and T-Mobile’s first 5G drone, one of the first drones in the world with an embedded 5G module capable of live streaming video and being flown on T-Mobile’s 5G network
Execute DRL’s largest live event with the 2021-22 DRL Vegas Championship race, which featured carefully-curated sports presentation of a high-speed drone race around T-Mobile Arena, a post-race concert with a Grammy Award-winning artist, and an interactive fan zone with NFT-minting stations, 5G drone demos, and gaming activations
Prior to DRL, Ashley was the first employee at Tough Mudder, the mud-run endurance series, eventually serving as their VP of New Event Development. She created the blueprint for series-success, increased their annual events by 11x to 35+ globally each year and helped expand the company internationally, launching events across Australia, Canada, the UK, Germany, and Ireland.
A fearless risk-taker who is passionate about building new sports from the ground up, Ashley helped create two event series from scratch, built the teams and systems to support ongoing delivery, and helped reimagine the industry through the development of DRL and Tough Mudder. She is meticulous and builds reliable operational strategies to transform visionary ideas (like DRL) into scalable, sustainable, award-winning businesses, which attract millions of next generation fans around the world, drive renowned global partnerships, and deliver dozens of events annually.
