(Bolivar, MO) -- A new season of the hit reality TV show 'Survivor' begins Thursday night on KOLR10. And one of the contestants heading for Brazil is from right here in the Ozarks.

    "I love coaching soccer," says Benjamin Wade, a Survivor contestant, and Head Women's Soccer Coach at SBU. "There's that passionate side of me and that leadership side that wants to inspire and motivate people."
    "I believe he's one of the best coaches around, in the United States, believe it or not," says Assistant Coach Atefeh Heivary. But Wade is much more than a soccer coach. "I have scars all over my body from animals," says Wade, showing off his wounds. "That was a shark, I thought I was going to bleed to death." And that's just one part of coach wade. "I'm also a conductor for a symphony in northern California," informs Wade.

    As a former world-class trumpet player, Coach Wade is Conductor Wade for the Susanville, California Symphony. "I've really been blessed to have two careers that I have that simultaneously stimulate both sides of my brain. And make me a very happy man," he says. Soon he may be a very rich man. Wade is one of 16 people competing for the one million dollar prize on Survivor, which begins Thursday night.

    "The mental part of it, the leadership part of it, the adventuresome part of it, it's like the show was made for me," says Wade. And Coach Wade says he was made to change the game. "I was tired of watching the manipulation, the back-stabbing, the lying," he says.

    Going into the game, Coach decided not to go to survivor school, and he certainly didn't pack on the pounds. "You only have one chance to make a first impression," insists Wade, "and my first impression on Survivor was not going to be somebody that was fat, I'm a soccer coach, I gotta look in shape."

    He says he can't wait to show 13 million viewers what kind of shape this soccer coach is in. "Of course I like watching myself, I'm a type A personality! I'm in front of people all the time, I like performing," says Wade. "It sounds trite, and it sounds arrogant, and I'm going to throw fuel to the fire to all of the people who think I'm narcissistic, but I feel like I've always been famous."

    Maybe not always. "And I can tell you some stories of me being in Mexico, homeless, eating out of garbage cans." Years ago, while setting a world record by kayaking 6,000 miles alone, Coach Wade was anything but a TV star. "Sleeping on the streets, Americans wouldn't come up to me, I hadn't taken a bath in a whole month, dirty clothes." "Every day I'm like you got a new story for me?" Recalls Heivary, "he's like Teef, I can't just tell you stories, they've gotta come out at the right time."

    Soon, Coach Wade will tell another story, of trying to change the game, and of faith. "This is who I am," insists Wade.  "I'm grounded on the rock of Jesus Christ. I will not be moved. I will not be shaken, I will not be broken, I am who I am."

    New Life Church in Springfield is hosting a watch party at that time. It's free and open to the public.