Finding the best training plan and coach

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• Will I get along with the coach?
• So much to choose from
• The self coached athlete
• Hiring a coach
• How much feedback will I get from the coach?
• Will the coach produce a session plan that will suit my needs?
• How will the coach deliver the sessions to me?
• how much will it all cost?
• In my opinion, the triathlon industry is currently somewhat saturated with coaches. Some of them have been doing it for decades, others, like myself are relatively new to coaching, with a couple of years coaching experience, but with many more years experience in terms of racing and training not just for triathlon, but all sorts of other events. This diversity of knowledge can be key and may allow the coach to offer a broader spectrum than just purely triathlon specific coaching
• The coach - athlete relationship is absolutely vital if you want to get the best possible results, in my opinion. The role of the coach is far, far more than just someone who writes training plans. They're a mentor, a leader, a confidante, a source of knowledge, a role model, a motivator, a friend, an organiser and much more. So it's key that when choosing a coach, they demonstrate as many of these qualities as possible. If you don't get along well with your coach, I think it is going to be detrimental to your training.
• Different coaches sometimes offer different training plans ie, gold, silver, bronze or similar, with varying amounts of feedback or coach - athlete contact depending on what plan you opt for. Feedback is an incredibly important aspect of any coaching plan, both from the coach to the athlete and vice versa. The coach needs to be able to tell the athlete how they're performing and any areas that they need to focus on, as well as offering praise. Likewise, the athlete needs to be able to discuss with the coach how the sessions are working for them, whether there is anything that they think would suit them better and also how they think they're performing themselves.A great way of getting feedback is to have video analysis done by your coach. This not only allows both of you to review each particular discipline in slow time, but it also gives an opportunity for face to face feedback.
• The type of session plan produced by the coach should follow on from the above points, in that the coach will have discussed the needs of the athlete and they'll have good idea of how they're going to get along. From this the coach can write a training plan that's specific to the athletes needs and time that they've got available to train. 
• Coaches use many different ways of delivering sessions, some use web based apps like Training Peaks, which is a fantastic platform for both delivering the session and also for both the coach and athlete to keep a track on how things are progressing. Others use spreadsheets etc and emails to send session plans to their clients. Any of these mediums are perfectly good and the coach will be able to send plans, session updates and provide feedback using any of them. The way in which the session plan is delivered should, in my opinion, be reflected in the price of the plan. (see point 6)
• Cost is possibly the biggest single determining factor when most people choose a coach. Unfortunately, with coaching it isn't always a case of "you get what you pay for". Some coaches charge quite large sums of money for delivering monthly session, whereas others are comparatively cheap. Some coaches are extremely affordable and offer a great service. As with most things these days, it's all about money and feeling like you're getting great value for money and I think that (for me) is possibly the single biggest factor. If a client is getting the best possible service, without paying a fortune, then both parties are generally happy.

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If you go onto any internet search engine and type in "Triathlon training plan", you'll get a results return of hundreds of different plans, ranging from just a few £'s per month, to literally hundreds of £'s. All of them claiming to be the best. In coaching it's important to remember that one size doesn't fit all, so many clients and club members need their sessions tweaking a little bit, so that they make the most of the needs of the athlete and get the best out of them, with the time that they have available to train. Speaking to a very highly regarded coach and athlete a couple of weeks ago, something that we agreed on was that the main thing that all these session plans had in common was that they will all yield results if they're followed correctly. I often say to people when I'm coaching that there's no secret recipe for achieving success and making big improvements, but the most important thing is consistency, "consistency is key" and if you train well and consistently you literally can't fail to improve.

So, with that, how do you go about choosing the right training plan and coach? Well, one of the first things to think about is what your goals and targets are and whether you can realistically achieve them by training alone, or whether you would benefit from having a coach or training in a group environment?

One of the first things to ask yourself when looking for a training plan is "what are you training for and what are your goals? These are both really important when choosing a training plan. Whilst it's important to have goals and ambitions, if you're new to triathlon and multisport it's important to have a sense of patience and a predetermined knowledge that it can be a long road in getting where you want to, in terms of what you want to achieve. One thing that you'll notice though is that as you improve and get fitter, your goals will constantly change and you'll enjoy pushing your boundaries further and further.

If you decide to go down the route of being a self trained multisport athlete (triathlete/duathlete etc) there are some pitfalls that are associated with self training. The stand out ones for me are; does the athlete have enough knowledge on the principles of training and can they recognise when they're over training and need to back off , or when they need to push harder? How to establish "training zones" and does the athlete possess a training philosophy? Has the athlete training alone got the same mental focus, strength and drive to that of an athlete training in a group or under a coach? These, plus many other areas all need to be taken into consideration when deciding which path to go down.

It can be a bit of a minefield trying to choose the correct training plan, with all sorts of questions that you'll need to ask yourself. A lot of triathlon training plans will be aimed at a particular distance, ie Sprint, Standard, Half Ironman and full Ironman. Whichever one of these categories you're training to race in, the fundamentals are going to be the same, in that you need a training plan that will contain sessions specific to the required distance of race that you're competing in and they need to be structured and progressive sessions too. Plus, the training plan needs to be adaptable to your current level of fitness. It's not good signing up to a training plan that's more suited to an Age Group triathlete, if you're just starting out on your own journey. You also need to consider how flexible the session plan is, in that can you juggle sessions round in order to fulfill work and / or family commitments, which is something that's extremely important in maintaining a healthy balance.

Once all the above has been taken into account, you may feel ready to sign up to a training plan.

If you've decided that you may struggle with a generic training plan and would like to hire a coach there are some things that you may want to think about beforehand.

These are all very important when choosing a coach, so I'll address each one individually; 

Another point worth noting is that in recent years the sport of Triathlon has literally exploded onto the public scene, with names like the Brownlee brothers becoming household names. This has lead to a vast amount of online resource being available and it's worth noting that what one article or coach says is gospel, another will disagree or contradict it. This doesn't mean that one is right and owne is wrong, it's just the differing way that coaches perceive what they're trying to portray and get across. Similarly, if you ask a group of coaches a particular question, you'll get around 7 different answers. This doesn't mean that one coach necessarily knows more than the next, although some are obviously more experienced. It just means that each coach has his or her own philosophy on training, writing and delivering session plans.

I hope the above has been of some use and it helps make the choice of which path to go down a bit easier.

If you'd like to speak more about your goals and ambitions and how I can help you on your triathlon journey, click on the link below which will take you to my coaching Facebook page, where I can be contacted through

Certa Cito Tri Coaching