The ABC (Race)'s of The Training Cycle

What is the most important part of the workout, as far as the coach is concerned? My athletes would say, incorrectly, the second set of the workout.

While I call it "the money set," the second set of our workout - where the longest repeats, tempo or acceleration work is focused - is of secondary importance to me. What's the most important is the first and the final twenty minutes of our Tuesday and Thursday evening track workouts. That's the time when I get to pry, subtly, into what the athlete has done in the previous two-to-five days, or what's in their immediate future.

Both Deena and Jim, my marathoners, enjoy jumping into the occasional road race as part of their training. In fact, they both did fairly well at a recent cross-country 5K event. I chuckled as Deena talked about her race; at a late point on the course she was running with a group and one or two suggested putting a surge in to catch a couple of runners just ahead. Deena said she smiled and let the pair (of guys) go on ahead:

"I was out there to enjoy myself, Coach. I had plenty left in me to push the pace but I wasn't in the mood."

...which to me seemed the perfect time to teach the ABC's of racing.

Run and race for long enough and it is certain the personal best performances will not only be smaller in time increments but also harder won. There are runners who choose to race on a near-weekly basis through the season. Most of them do it in the hope of improvement by the end of the season. Many will race every race the same way. Some may be fortunate enough to improve, but most will eventually be a runner most-frustrated.

When they finally describe what they do I have to bit my tongue and not refer them to the quote attributed to Albert Einstein. He might not have been a distance runner, but if he could figure out the theory of relativity then he certainly could figure out the definition of insanity.

Some races are relatively more important than others:

"C" races, to me, are those early-season "rust-busters" a runner uses to help determine fitness. (Jack Daniels, in his Running Formula, uses personal best race performances or time-trial sessions to determine training paces for long runs, easy running, threshold pace workouts, and interval pace work.) Nothing wrong, in my humble opinion, with running a 5K or 10K as part of or in place of a weekend run in the early season. "C" races are the events at which the runner should be able to shrug off a less-than-stellar effort, or smile and say "I'm on the right track" when it's all said and done.

As the runner gets into the middle of their training cycle; closer to the weeks of the season or the event which is their target, it's time to start plugging in the "B" race/races. The "B" races are used to simulate the effort desired for the target race, can be on a portion of the target event course, or resemble the terrain on which the runner intends to eventually race.

Naturally, the "A" race is that target race or races which the runner has circled in pen on the calendar months in advance. Everything in the training cycle, ideally, should lead up to the runner being their sharpest - four or five weeks if racing shorter distances, two or three for longer ones.

The recreational runner's racing schedule doesn't necessarily take an Einstein to plan. All they need to do is know their ABC's.

Calm Down

After months of conjecture, rumor, innuendo, and even a small amount of smack-talk from people who work on the first floor of my office building, the inevitable has happened.

It has absolutely nothing to do with a pay raise, or a change in employment; both of these would be quite cool, if you know what I mean. But it seems to have to do with what is supposed to happen some time down the road. It must have been important enough for my supervisor to "encourage" me to postpone or cancel the study skills seminar I teach each week. And, as we approached this morning the tension seemed a touch more palpable in my little office.

Yesterday morning, my buddy Jon "Dixie" Clark was kind enough to post a photo up on his social networking site wall. I'm not going to give you the entire description, except for this: Every once in a while the judicious use of vulgarity can lighten a situation. To quote a line from the late, great George Carlin: "Laugh? I thought I was going to die." I shot a copy to my printer and posted it on the "I love me wall" section of my work-space, in between a framed photo of Suzanne and me and a CCC 10K "No Parking" sign. Perfect.

The evening before the poster was posted, my friend Tina was wrestling with a choice of going to a bible study on the book of St. James, or staying in because of the lousy weather. I shot her a one-sentence synopsis of the book: "Quit listening. Start doing." If St. James were around right now, he might have said something like the poster caption before asking people to "be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath..." Okay. Maybe not with that one word. The prevailing attitude check from this little marmoset, or lemur...whatever the creature is...has adapted my attitude toward stuff in the past day or so. I sat through a formal review of a training course's documents with a smile on my face.

How many times do we start looking into the somewhat murky crystal ball of future races and end up tying ourselves around the axle? Or, as we're standing in the crowd listening to the strains of the "Star Spangled Banner," we can feel the effects of the endocrine cocktail course through our veins...and know there's not a thing we can do to stop it. The gun goes off and we - as my old coach used to say - take the stupid pill. We blow through the first mile or two at an astounding pace; we're trying to think about how to slow down at the first mile split, we're praying to slow down after the second one. And our prayers get answered not long afterward, usually in a bad way. For someone running a 5K this might be a little painful, anything longer than that is a whole new world of terror.

Planning in the macro sense of a long-term training plan and taper leading into the target race can ease the "oh my gosh, I'm x number of weeks out from the Pig's Knuckle Half Marathon and I'm never going to be ready..." feeling. Lower-priority, shorter-distance races can make some of the dreary training mileage seem less so. There's nothing like a training event where someone else has measured the training loop and provided the refreshments along the way...oh, and no need to worry about all that pesky traffic which drives us all a little goofy. Did I mention no lack of motivation or company?

Micro-planning, especially for the target race, can provide that sense of "I've thought of every possible contingency for the day; bring on the gun." As an example, Marathon Nation's Coach Patrick McCrann asks his athletes to do two plans: A pacing plan for the race itself, with a goal of running a negative split; and a preparation plan, covering nutrition, hydration, clothing, supplementation, physical rest, mental rest and family support, for three days leading into and one day post-race.

The pacing plan McCrann has developed breaks the race into three areas, approximating the first 25 percent, the middle 50, and the last 25 percent of the race distance. Each athlete knows what their goal pace is for that particular race distance, based on the VDOT score which they tested at the beginning of (and re-test on occasion during) their training cycle. The first 25 percent of the race is run at a pace about five-to-ten seconds slower than their target pace; the next 50 percent increases the pace until they've returned to an average pace which equals their target. The last 25 percent is planned by the individual athlete to either maintain target pace or - if they feel good - a little faster than target. From personal experience, I can tell you finishing a race at a faster pace than I started hurts as much as finishing the other way around. But it's a good hurt.

Shorter races, such as the 5K, benefit from a warm-up up to about 15 minutes before the gun. My former Emerald Coast Racing Team mates and I were notorious for running up to nine miles during the course of a race day: Two-to-three miles of easy jogging and some striders at faster than race pace, the race itself, then up to three miles of easy running to cool down. I forgot about how many miles we put in during race day until my friend George reminded me a couple of weeks ago. We were young...younger. And that 10-to-15-minute window meant your heart rate was still a little up before the gun. You took a little edge off, but not too much. And if you ran the course you got a close look at where you needed to be running at a particular point.

So, asking yourself a few questions about what you're going to do leading into the day, how you want to pace yourself, and what you plan to do should things go awry will keep you from going out like one of the Light Brigade...and becoming the next occupant of the Tomb of the Unknown Rabbit.

How Much Time To Run?

If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers. "Gravity's Rainbow," Thomas Pynchon (1973)

Sometimes when an athlete comes asking a question, or makes a comment about something lacking in their training, they tend to present the question in the form of their own desired solution. People who love long runs will frame their question so the answer is more likely to be "long runs." People who like intemediate-to-long distance repeats will frame the question, hoping I will answer with their preference. However, there are more important questions which need to be asked when it comes to training.

I like to start by asking the person about the amount of time they can comfortably set aside for run training without drastically affecting their work, their personal life, the interests of their fellow family members. Available time also affects the body's ability to recover from training stress.

Work is the most obvious limitation when we talk about time constraints. Since our town has several military training bases I occasionally work with semi-accomplished post-college runners. Most of these young men & women don't need me to deal with the small details; just provide a few good workouts while they're in student status. Some are good recreational runners who want to stay fit and train for a few races. I usually remind them the life of a military student is well-filled once they start their course of instruction, but I've always made myself available to their needs. As for civilians, some employers are more willing to flex work hours than others - depending on the workplace, the interest of the boss, and the runner's work ethic. But then, sometimes the person works a specific shift or has to open or close the shop. It is what it is.

"Life," John Lennon said, "is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans." There are things which are outside of the box of your control; traffic on the commute home from work, weather conditions, just to name two. There are things which you can plan for within reason, like school activities, religious observance (if you are so inclined), time for bonding with the family. And family, in my humble opinion, trumps (nearly) everything else, save for medical conditions. You, ideally, will be a runner for quite some time, but you will always be a parent, spouse, child, sibling. Your family members will be your first line of support in whatever you do, long after your coach or training partners have gone down the road.

Once the athlete can say how many hours they have available during the week to train, I can multiply by seven to give an "optimal" baseline number of miles/week. The optimal baseline, in my humble opinion, lets me recommend the longest distance the athlete should race as their goal event/s. I've been of the opinion runners can target three-to-six 5K races on a training volume of 25-to-30 miles a week. Training volume for two-to-three 10Ks per training cycle would be somewhere between 30-to-45 miles. Half-marathons or marathons would require anywhere "north" of 45 miles a week.

An important caveat: Just because a person has enough time to train for a race as long as a marathon does not mean they will have the physical ability to train for it. This is the dirty little secret many "Couch-to-Finish Line" programs don't enjoy speaking about. A friend of mine once coached a well-known program, and he saw too many first-year, really, just-off-the-couch, runners injure themselves during the program. I personally believe a runner should, if they are coming off the couch, race no longer than 10K during their first year. I wouldn't recommend anything longer than a half marathon until after at least two years of solid, consistent, injury-free training. It takes that long for the body to assimilate the stressors which come with run training.

So, what do I think needs to be part of a typical week of training?

Rest needs to be placed in the weekly training schedule, at least one day. There are some coaches who recommend a day of rest for every decade of life, starting with the 40s. So a guy like me who has been running for 16 years would probably benefit from 1-to-2 days of rest every week. I usually have at least a day or two days worth of cross-training during the week, but I listen to my body & sleep in or take a complete rest day when I'm feeling a little too beat-up.

Once a week, there should be a long run which takes up 20 percent of a runner's training mileage/time. Running coach Jack Daniels' recommends the long run to be no more than 2.5 hours, even as part of his marathon training protocols. I've always done my long run on Sunday morning, but some coaches, like Patrick McCrann of Marathon Nation, schedules his training plan long runs for Saturday, with a 40-minute run which focuses on skill & form for the next day.

I've tried the easy run on Sunday after a hard Saturday run & think it's pretty nice. That "kinder, gentler" run gives me a chance to run with less-experienced runners at a relaxed pace, socialize, & focus on my form.

During the middle of the week I schedule a "semi-long run" if training for half-marathon or marathon, or do a tempo run to work on race-day speed. This workout is usually sandwiched by a once-a-week speed workout which can be anything from fartlek, track repeats of 200, 300 or 400 meters at efforts ranging from just above aerobic to "See God" pace (that's a pace where if you took one more stride at that pace you would probably see God), or tempo run. The last piece I try to add works on strength. These can be hill repeats/bounding of 150, 200, or 300 yards at varied effort levels, or track repeats of 500-to-2400 meters.

There are important pieces of the training puzzle which need to be put into place, but you should first ask yourself honestly how big the puzzle can be before you begin to set the edges.

Recovery Run? No Such Thing.

Yeah. I thought it might be a nice thing to do an "easy peasy," relatively-flat, straight, out-and-back six-miler last night (when I was typing the status this morning on FB I inadvertently missed the "I" and typed a "U". What Would Freud Say?), but my knees gave me a completely different message. I ended up spit-canning the run after a couple of miles and made a command decision to walk the two miles back to the house...which Suzanne enjoyed, also.

There were a lot of factors which I could lay blame on for the bad day, but it stood to reason I should not have tried to do six miles on a warm, humid day after doing three workouts in the preceeding thirty hours. Hm...ever think of the concept of, uh, recovery, coach? Then, I read Pat McCrann's advice and think...'perhaps a walk would have better served me at this point in the game.' So, here's what he has to say, part 16 of 30 from Marathon Nation.As I mentioned in an earlier tip, run recovery needs to be one of your highest priorities. Our sport is an endorphin-filled journey of fun...until something goes wrong. And as the veteran runners/readers will tell you, it's only a matter of time until something happens to you (sorry!). Left to their own devices, however, the running-addicted runner usually comes up with the most suspect of recovery protocols...the recovery run. Only in the world of running would this make sense...if you are tired/beat up/run down from all that...running, there can be only one solution: a short, easy run. Clearly, the majority of us runners are seriously lacking creativity here, so Coach P is going to have to crack the whip...

THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A RECOVERY RUN. Period.Think about it from the perspective of your body for a second. Your legs and back and feet have conspired with your heart and constitution to send a message to your brain that you need a break. Your brain gets that info and settles on this "recovery run" strategy. Sounds good to the brain but man aren't your calves surprised to find they are running again! Didn't your brain get the memo???

My point here is that while your brain knows the nuances of "types" of runs, your body only really speaks in very short sentences. In this case: ON (Running) or OFF (Not Running). In order to really demonstrate that you get what your body is saying, you need to physically not run. That's right...Take a real, bonafide day off. Sleep in. Do a project around the house. Stay late at work (or go in early). Find a new hobby. I care about you, but I don't really care about your days off...make them off.Believe it or not, you are probably addicted to running. On some level. And if not running then perhaps to the concept of an active lifestyle. Trying to force something that isn't working to work...never works. Running is no different. A lot of really unique things have to intersect for you to have a great run session...and sometimes the easiest way to get things to sync up is to stand down for a bit.

You will go crazy...most people do on a day off. But since you know you can't run today, then you have to fill that time. This leads to the importance of planning your day off. Most of us obsess over gear, food, route, etc, for our workouts....but then have zero planned for our down time.Make this time off easier for you by actually planning other activities. Whether it's chilling with the kids, doing chores, or heading out for some errands is up to you. But if you don't plan for it, it won't happen.

At the end of the day, the best type of recovery run is...not running. Do your mind and body a favor and take the day off. A tiny, well-placed break now can really help you over the long haul!

The REAL Priorities

One nice thing about taking a vacation, especially in a place much different than where you live, is the opportunity to look critically at things without having to deal with them immediately.

There you go again, Bowen, failing to make sense.

What I mean is that it gives you a chance to put things into (a more proper) perspective. You realize what is important, what needs to stay unchanged, what cannot be changed, and what must be changed. Oh, and you figure out what isn't so important, too.

While looking at what could be tweaked and what needed to be tossed, I started to read a little more from an Endurance Nation coach. Pat McCrann posted on his blog Five Fit Life Commandments (You don't have to be a tri-geek to appreciate his common-sense approach to training. If you're a time-crunched athlete his ten-hours-a-week approach to endurance sport may save you some grief around the house or the workplace.), which I want to touch on in brief. If you want the details, go to the link I posted above.

#1 — Plan From The Ground Up - Right off the bat, McCrann tells me to toss my copy of Triathlete's Training Bible (at least for calculating annual training hours and trying to divide time over mesocycles) off to the side. There are all those things we are (son, husband, grandfather, worker, friend, coach, race director, course measurer, national organization rep, and so on...) and do outside of the 9-to-12 hours a week (for me, that much; for you, perhaps more...or less) we've set aside for running, cycling, swimming, cross-training. Training for my unsuccessful crack at IM FL last year I found the undivided support of my wife, my friends, and not a small amount of understanding from my boss, to be elemental to me making it to the starting line. I got beat up during the swim and melted down, but I learned what it takes to get to the starting line (and I'll be smarter next time!). Take away the five hours in the emergency department, and I can say it was an enjoyable week with my wife...I believe she would say the same.

#2 — Focus on Fun & Challenging Activities - I had 70.3 NOLA already on the 2010 schedule, and hadn't started the 2009 IM assault. Not the wisest idea looking from the forward, but it was probably the tonic I needed after IM FL. For me, a 70.3 is challenging, and fun; definitely an achievable distance within the constraints of my training and abilities. My wife told me she wanted to start running half-marathons again, and asked whether I would help her prepare for a half in New Orleans. Since the half was six weeks out from the 70.3, I figured it was the perfect training run/trip for me too; we have close friends in the area and it's a two hour-ish drive from our home...close enough for comfort, not so far we have to draw a major itinerary. For giggles, we did a 9K about seven weeks out from the half, also in NOLA. The road and climate conditions were great preparation for the half...and it served as a great excuse to get out of town after the holiday season. We're runners; we like these kind of trips...they beat her business travel.

#3 — Create A Basic Training Week - There are certain things etched in stone; work schedule, runs with other groups, swim practices. Oh, then you have real life, too. After a couple of years, and a year of experimenting with some other activities, I finally have a week laid out that I can accomplish, training-wise, consistently across a year regardless of seasonal and external commitments. McCrann mentioned that this is a baseline - something which seemed obvious. However, he mentions the idea of personal/social/professional capital stored since training has not been a constant drain on other areas of life. Deja vu Stephen McCovey's emotional bank account.

#4 — Integrated Nutrition & Recovery - something I've had a difficult time in learning, but getting better as I age...and recovery takes longer and is more necessary. I might love beer, but I also realize the alcohol in it hampers the development of human growth hormone, and makes me feel like I've been beaten about the head, shoulders, and upper torso with a big stick the next morning. Funny, I did not put this calculation together until the other morning; awakening on a Saturday after Friday night's (beer-free!) dinner with the daughter-in-law and grandkids...and feeling good. Changing my training schedule to place the lower impact activities in the morning and the running in the afternoon also lets me balance work with recovery.

#5 — Well-Organized External Commitments - Changing the workout a couple of mornings a week allows me to shower at home, rather than dragging my work clothes and shower items to work, worrying about where to store the wet, smelly shoes, and - worst of all - forgetting the shoes/socks/belt/skivvies/brush and feeling miserable about my appearance the remainder of the work day. Usually, the first 60 minutes of the day is taken up with e-mail and electronic posting of stuff which lands in my personal in-box and is forwarded; I'm already checking e-mail for work so this is giving me a second read. I spend less time punching up stuff on the computer on my time.

Of course, when you leave vacation world and come back to the real world, you have to execute the plan of action you drafted in your mind, or scribbled on a napkin at Cheeseburger Waikiki, or typed up on your laptop during that (seemingly) endless flight from Honolulu to Atlanta. There's where the trial/error/trust thing comes in. Give it a try...make certain to give enough time to see if things are really working...and adapt accordingly.

Get Up And Do It Again, Amen...

(PROBABLY SOMEWHERE NEAR FIRST YELLOW MARKER BUOY, UPPER CENTER)

I received an e-mail (one of many from friends and family, wondering what the hell happened and whether I was all right) the day after IM Florida from a friend of mine, Mark Sortino. Mark's an experienced triathlete; he's finished multiple IM events & qualified for his first trip to Kona at IM Louisville last August. He's one of the smarter tri-geeks I've met in the past few years. He has never hesitated to provide advice, counsel, a pat on the back or a dusting off of the bike shorts to less-experienced wanna-be tri-geeks like me. He's a F.I.S.T.-certified fitter who does bike fitting on the weekends at the local running emporium; our initial 90-minute fit session turned into a two-plus-hour discussion on nutrition, technique & the mental side of triathlon.

Mark's blog is always insightful & a lot of fun to read, because he's not talking about the nuts & bolts of training & racing all the time. He likes to look at the lifestyle part of being a tri-geek, too. When I say lifestyle I mean the balance of work, family, training & competition. He's got it fairly down pat from what I can tell, & has no problem putting things into proper perspective. The video clips taken by his wife Andi after he finished Kona said much more than thousands of words of written commentary; the mix of joy in achieving something that very few people do (complete IM Hawaii) & disappointment in not being able to give the performance he really wanted to on the day (because you never know if you'll make it there again) was palpable.

So when Mark's e-mail came into my inbox I took the time to really read through it. Not only did he knock the dust off my bike shorts but provided a little nudge (in the direction of my swim gear, mind you!) to get back on the horse that threw me.

It's hard to think about the existential 'now what?' when you're five or six hours out from sitting on the tailgate of an EMS truck on the beach with a tech worrying over you with a heart rate monitor, pulse oximeter & stethoscope. The perspective doesn't exist there...add a few more hours of hearing Mike Reilly welcome someone else into the IM family as you're going to pick up your crap in transition. That's something which hurts like a punch in the ribs. Even then the perspective is still far down the road.

I stood out on the run course outside the Mellow Mushroom, after my beer & salad, watching the athletes come through on the first - some on their second - loop. I had the privilege to see my friend & (part-time) business/training partner come through the first loop:

Steve - 'What are you doing here? What happened?'

MB - 'Bad day, dude. Now, go finish this thing!'

The perspective usually comes as a result of the same cycle a'la Elisabeth Kubler-Ross' death/dying/grief cycle: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance. Kubler-Ross' stages don't progress in any particular sequence, which is a good thing...'cause I think I shot right past Bargaining. IM doesn't allow you to bargain after you are on the shore, the side of the road, or in a medical tent/emergency room.

No. There is Bargaining: 'Get me out of this alive & I'll do it right next time.'

Denial: 'I cannot believe I busted my chops for all these months & still got my butt kicked.'

Anger: 'I hate myself for not putting in more open water time. I still can't swim!'

Depression: 'I don't want to be near anyone; I'm ashamed of my failure.'

Acceptance: 'IM is not easy. If it were everyone would do it. This year wasn't your time.'

The beginning of the closure from my bad day came as Steven finished. His family, my wife & I were standing at the beginning of the finish chute & cheered like crazy people. Hey, the company had a fifty-percent success rate on the day.

I had a brief thirty-minute temper tantrum the next morning as I saw all the finisher shirts/hats/acoutrement & thought to myself: 'dude, that should have been you.' But it was balanced with the ER physician's comment: 'you probably made the right decision today.'

Today. It all boils down to today. And today. And today. And today.

So, I feel much better today. I've got a few hundred more of those on the way to the next stop on the journey.

And maybe I'll have a better today in the Gulf of Mexico on a November morning two years from today.

Thanks, Mark. Thanks also to my long-suffering wife, Suzanne...you didn't panic or freak out through the whole ordeal. We'll do it right this next time.

Adapt or Die

Lately, my wife has been looking into business plans; big picture strategic stuff which (in the past) used to make my head hurt. Hurt. Bad. Worse than any workout I ever ran under my old coach, or as part of my own training. Bad enough to drive me to that high-end coffee emporium you can find on nearly every corner in a good-sized city. At that point, my business plan was to go in, grab a four-dollar latte, & think pleasant thoughts about long, easy runs on shady, tree-lined lanes with no automobiles, no dogs, & toilet facilities at each mile marker. Silly to think I'd have to resort to fantasy to ease the pain of reality, right? Then I began to think about how they expanded from a few stores in one city to this big, honking, megalithic corporation with stores everywhere...all part of a big, honking, audacious business plan a bunch of smart business-types sat down over their lattes and drafted out years ago.

So, my wife was talking to me in between my workout and my hurried rush to be late for work...again...about things like micropayment & free-riding... I vaguely remembered from my college economics course about free-riding; it's like banditing a road race. For the uninitiated, bandits are unregistered, unofficial race participants. They don't have a bib number so their performances aren't officially recorded. Most of the time, these bandits won't grab drinks at the aid stations or run through the finish chute; the occasional cup of water taken by a bandit might not adversely affect a race promoter's profit margin, but when they run through the chute it causes headaches for the timing crew...especially if their timing system is antiquated.
Of course, the bandit is of the opinion 'hey, the police coverage is going to be out there for everyone else, what's so wrong with me using the race as a fast training event? I'm not drinking the beer or eating the bagels, am I?' Most race directors, at least here, turn a (semi-)blind eye on the banditry because it usually doesn't screw up their event as a whole. However, if the individual participant looked at it as 'dude, someone isn't paying their fair share...' perhaps race directors would be a little less benign about the whole thing. The difference between 300 persons paying for a 350-participant race and 350 persons paying for a 350-participant race, if we're talking a 5,000-meter run with a $20 entry fee is (before the expenses are taken away) $1,000, right on the edge of 15 percent potential additional income. Or, the race director can do something really cool, like keep the registration closer to $18. Imagine what the average, run-of-the-mill race participant would think about a $2 decrease in entry fee?

It's hyperbole, but it's easier to think about the difference when you start tossing big numbers.

Is it crazy to provide content, services, or goods for free? It depends on the provider's intent; if the hope is the (potential) customer will reach for value-added items, available for a small fee, then providing content for free is acceptable. If the seats in the auditorium (to borrow a theater analogy) are filled with non-paying customers, in order to keep up the appearance of a successful business, then you know eventually the business is going to do one of two things in order to survive:

1. Change or discontinue certain content.
2. Charge for content.

Adapt or die, say the business theorists, who borrow from theories of natural selection.

And it appears many on-line coaching services cannot help but agree. You might be able to find cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-most training plans - or parts of them - on the web sites of coaching content providers, but a modicum of your paycheck is going to have to be parted with if you want the entire picture, which may or may not include a coach to answer questions, provide guidance & counsel, & help you to figure out what you need to reach your own athletic performance goals.

And books with coaching advice & training plans? Well, you have to purchase those, too, so you're putting the money out one way or another. A coach who I know performs his craft strictly for love of the sport has written, & sells, a training manual - so a dichotomy can exist in athletic training consisting of altruism & venality...better yet, let's say altruism & capitalism. :)

Any coach who doesn't consider charging a reasonable price for the service they provide:

1. Does not want to place their reputation behind their product (perceived worth), or

2. Is independently wealthy (altruism), or

3. Has no need to make a living from their craft (libertarian ideals), or

3. Does not care enough about developing potential clientele (selectivity).

Simply put, gains in athletic performance, & striving for athletic/fitness goals, costs you in time, in personal committment, & in finances. A good coach can help you get there - better than you can do it on your own - because they've seen the pitfalls from their perspective, & many have made the common mistakes in their own experience. A good coach is like a Sherpa; you pay them to guide you up the mountain, they work hard so you don't have to expend as much effort or risk the chance of dying on the journey.

(POSTSCRIPT - My coach reminded me last night there are coaches who do what they do solely for love of the sport. The statements above sound mercenary, but they are theories, much like the theory of natural selection. Day-to-day practice may or may not align with the above-mentioned theory.)

Swiss Army Coach

“The truth is that running hurts. No one gets faster without meeting their personal pain barrier straight on. No amount of junk miles, fun runs or affirmations are going to get you over the hill at the five-mile mark in a 10k. However, what will pull you through is solid prep...”- ManciataNot everyone who calls me Coach sees me at the track two-to-three times a week. There are some runners who believe enough in my approach to training, my research and my work ethic to consult with me on a near-daily, weekly or monthly basis. It is in those relationships I probably receive the greatest level of reward; they are the ones who most consistently laud my role to friends, fellow competitors and colleagues. They are the ones who make me a more cautious training planner.
What makes the distance coaching relationship such a challenge? Communication. While I can scribble up a six-month half-marathon training plan for a friend in Canada I also have to take into account their life barriers; the obvious limitation of family, sleep, work, & realistic (performance, training) expectations. Not everyone is going to rearrange their life schedule to meet a training plan. Then, I have to teach them the language of my training, which my local 2-3x/week athletes learn in the first months.

Others don't necessarily need or want a plan drafted out for them, but desire a sounding board, a sniff test, if you like, of what they're going to do or how they're going to do it. Once again, we're talking about busy persons who have little time to spend dealing with the trial and error side of training. Since I have more time than most to surf the internet, read articles, research & occasionally try out stuff...yep, sometimes I'm little more than an athletic crash test dummy...my opinions occasionally count for a little more than the average bear.

The other sounding board aspect is the facet I most enjoy; working with the mental state of otherwise gifted, decent, humble athletes. I love nothing more than to be the guy out on the Sunday morning long run, dissecting, re-wiring & re-attaching the mind of people who need no major training revelations...but just a little bit of 'hey, remember you've done this, this & this...' perspective. I think my wife would call me the memory tank...because I can refer back to some race performance or some past conversation or injury episode & explain the possible outcomes or the root causes.

So, not every athlete needs the same thing from their coach...much like not every coach will have the same kind of athlete.