Coaching

Bill Bowerman, famous University of Oregon coach and founder of Nike

I have met a lot of people in South Africa that train for goals like Ironman without coaching or with partial coaching.

For me this is scary. Any endurance sport is so demanding and particular, each athlete is so unique and sport science has advanced so much that hiring a coach should be the first thing anyone does when they even think about triathlon.

First thing I did before buying a bike or running shoes or a heart rate monitor was to hire a coach and pay him well from the start. And it paid off. Here are some reasons why you should hire a full time personal triathlon coach:

1) Almost for 100 years endurance training have been a science just as physics and medicine are. Would you build a bridge or do an operation without a officially trained and qualified individual?

2) Coaching will make your time investment most efficient. This is especially important if you have an 8+ hour job and a family. You will use your limited time resources much more efficiently.

3) The best training plans are those done week after week (or even shorter periods), made specially for you, based on your constant feedback. Using generalized plans for longer periods or plans from software or magazines is very far from efficient. Athletes are too unique to be generalized.

4) Minimize the injuries. It is not possible to avoid injuries especially if you move to longer distances. At some point you will always have some kind of an injury (keep in mind that muscule soreness (Delayed onset muscule soreness) is also an injury).

5) Get the scientific point of view. People that are not coached tend to get information from all kinds of unreliable resources like magazines, internet, books, unqualified individuals or organizations… Laws do not ban people from saying or publishing so they can say pretty much anything they want (just like me on this blog). You need use a scientifically trained and certified coach as the main authority for objective information.

6) A coach will push you much beyond your initial goals. She or he will help you see the big picture. Coaches can see how far you can go and they will know it immediatelly. Even though your goals are short-term a coach will see long-term potential and can help you realize your long-term goals. Key to success in endurance sports are long-term goals. I am talking about 3+ maybe even 5+ years.

7) Coaches objectivity will help you make the right choices. For example you think your bike will look great if you buy those new 20.000 Rand wheels but your coach can tell you that you really do not need them if you will ride 6h 180k. Coaches point of view should be always much more objective than yours. Even coaches need coaching.

I can not think of any other reasons right now… If you come up with any please post in comments.

I know many people say that it is too expensive to pay a coach 300-1000 Rand per month. I also see these people spending much more money on lattes, bikes, racing, clothes… It is just a matter of priorities. Keep in mind it is also possible to share a coach through a team. Also you can work with a coach from anywhere, most coaching is virtual anyway, only technique work (mostly for swimming) requires the coach to be with you.

I would like to make a list of South African triathlon coaches. If you are a coach please send me your details (name, contacts, service description, philosophy and fees) and I will publish them on this website.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 19th, 2007 at 6:59 am and is filed under Ironman, South Africa, coach, coaching, training, triathlon, triathon. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.