Coaching and a Coach's Athletic Success

An anonymous poster to the blog (called himself "Ralph") questioned if a coach who hasn't won races him/her self is a "good coach."  I put the question to my Facebook friends, many of whom are gold medalists at various competitions, NCAA champions, and hard core, bad ass MFers.

Great coaches - in my opinion - get their people ready for races physically and mentally.  Additionally, they get their folks ready for "the experience".  There are some coaches who are world champions: Dave Scott, Mark Allen, Karen Smyers, Tim DeBoom, Luc van Lierde, Jimmy Riccitello, Siri Lindley and Peter Reid - just to name a few.  So, if that is your benchmark for a "good coach" those folks are out there for you.

Here is what I stated/asked....
Interesting comment from a blog reader asking if someone who isn't in the front of the pack (FOP) should be coaching. By that logic, Lou Holtz never should have coached football at Notre Dame at 5'6" and 130# and I don't see them giving back their national title any time soon. How many of any of us are FOP in our field?


Here are their responses: 
Nate:  The best at anything tend not to make the best coaches, anyway. Sure, some do. But, leading/mentoring/coaching is a 180-degree mindset compared to being the best individual contributor. The majority of the best coaches were categorically not the best players. But they were typically the best students of the game.  


Nate is a multiple time NCAA Div. III Champion, has won the Chicago Triathlon (fastest amateur) and raced as a pro triathlete before turning to pro cycling events.


Mike J:  What a naive thing to say. Being an athlete and being a coach are very different disciplines. Success in one is no predictor of success in the other.


Mike is a successful business owner and finisher of a staged cycling event that was as follows 100km, 200km, 300km, 400km, 500km.


Jay A: The best coaches know how to inspire and get the most out of the talent they are working with and how the competition will perform at the event. Those at the front of pack had a coach, most likely the a high caliber one, not the best at the performing in the sport.


Jay is a successful business person and rapidly improving amateur cyclist. 


Laura D:  To be a coach implies a selfless act: you are putting aside energy that could be spent on your own athletic pursuits, instead you give that energy and direction to others . It is the highest form of athletic achievement.

Bob, I wouldn't have had any success at Ironman had it not been for the coaching expertise I got from Mike McCormack, Gordo Byrne and your swimming and running knowledge. Now, 10 years later, I am struggling with the effects of menopause and age and I realize that impartial guidance will help me achieve modest athletic goals . That requires coaching. Your blogger obviously lacks the ability to see that talent in coaching requires more than a podium place at a random moment in time.

Laura is a multiple Ironman finisher including New Zealand, Lake Placid, Canada and Kona - and I'm sure others that I'm forgetting.  


Omar A: You'd be a great coach, Rob, I hate an idiot that says good athletes should be the only coaches. I hate Internet trolls.


Omar is a professor and former teammate of mine at the Univ. of Missouri.  


Brian M:  ...ask your Blog reader to name one FOP athlete now coach and he will have an answer his question. Of all the Olympic coaches I have met I don't recall one of them being an FOP athlete...above average and even really good some but not one FOP I should say successful coach.


"Brian" is world class swimmer.  His records at the high school he went to stand 30 years later - and are in no danger any time soon.  He was nearly on several Olympic swimming teams, meaning he was one of the best swimmers in the world.


Tamirra S:  Coach Bob became my coach after a pro triathlete, who shall remain nameless, gave up on me. He/She was a pro and yet a very poor coach. Coach Bob, however, coached me right after that when I was right on the edge of giving up on myself. I figured if a pro doesn't believe in me, I must not be any good. BUT through Coach Bob's support, I stayed in triathlon and have since finished three Ironman races. I will say that as many times as I need to. Pros do not necessarily make good coaches.  Oops. Not to toot my own horn but I finished four, not three, Ironman races. I swear I'm not correcting this to be narcissistic; I'm just a copy editor. Going on five in three weeks!! Yikes!! No bike crashes, eh Coach?


My own results: 


For my own results, I feel I should respond to dispel any misinformation.


For the record, (we'll just look at Ironman races for the ease of data) my finishes at Ironman races have been pretty good.  So, I'm not sure if the swipe at MOP finishing coaches is at me or not.  But, if it is... here are some facts... courtesy of Athlinks.com.  #1 = Ironman Canada, #2 = Ironman USA Lake Placid, #3 = Ironman Wisconsin, #4 Ironman Triathlon World Championship

My finishes at Ironman races (the one missing from this graph was Great Floridian where I was 138th overall in a real "learning experience" Ironman.  That graph is below.  I went off course and ran a few extra miles on the marathon.  My fault.  I knew which way to go and didn't question the volunteer when guided onto the 1/2 IM course.) The red represents who I was behind.  The blue - who I "beat".  Ironman #4 here is Kona.  Where I was housed - reader's note - this was my first Ironman and first marathon.  

In triathlon, I qualified for the Inaugural Ironman 70.3 World Championship in Clearwater, FL.


In swimming, I've won open water races of 1 mile, 2 miles, 6 miles and 9.5 miles.  I had the 1 mile record at Lake in the Hills at one time.  (Probably was beaten the following year.) 


Here is a view of just St. Croix 1/2 Ironman (now 70.3) finishes... St. Croix is a race LOADED with Ironman hopefuls from the USA, South America and Europe.  It is a truly difficult race in conditions and 
competition.  How did I do?
 


In cycling, I've never won anything, but I've done pretty well in some time trials and two man time trials against hard core cyclists.  Still...


Hardly MOP. 


Since 2006, I really haven't worked out with any regularity.  I've been coaching and working too much.  Life requires balance.  I haven't had that for at least six years.  Arguably, since 2003.  It's easy to get lazy.


Lastly, I know that some coaches "taper" for every race as they are worried about their "reputation" as a racer.  Personally, I don't give a shit.  I train for my most important race and other races are truly "training races".  I'd rather put it all into one race and have heavy legs in other events.  Winning the local 5k or Olympic distance triathlon isn't that important to me.  


In my opinion, 


#1 is the health of my athlete, 
#2 is that they had a great experience (as well as their family/friends), 
#3 they learned something, 
#4 results.  


I know I'm not the coach for every athlete.  I'm good with that.  My athletes and alumni athletes refer a ton of business to me, so I must be doing something right.  Find the right coach for you.

Chicago Marathon MANIA

This past week the Chicago Marathon filled up in just about one week.  My friend Mike, who writes for Bloomberg news (and is a 10:20 Ironman in his FIRST Ironman) wrote a great article here.

Combine the crazy increases in race entry fees fueled by "bucket listers" and you get a closed race in no time.  This is both good and bad.

Good - races will take more planning to give the value and "customer experience", small, local races will get more entrants boosting grass roots races, you can demand better from races - better courses, better swag bags, better perks.

Bad - race fees will go up with demand, you may get shut out of races.

One (several) thing(s) for sure...

1. I refuse to pay entry fees over what is "reasonable" to run the race.
2. I'll support races that are well put together versus crappy convenient races.
3. I'll avoid (and encourage others to avoid) garbage races that are unsafe.

On a positive note, the fees in New York have kicked a lot of people into action for other races like Chicago and the coaching industry just got a lot busier - I have 25 people as of today in my Chicago Marathon training program.

Triathlon is Changing: The Lance Factor

Unless you live under a rock, by now you've seen Lance Armstrong racing in the Ironman 70.3 Panama.  Lance beat some pretty big names - and beat them like a drum.  To me this is a testament to a few things: 1) Lance's talent - the guy is a gifted athlete who works his ass off.  (That part usually gets left out.) When talent and preparation combine you get great results. 2) Triathlon is changing.  It's getting a shit load (technical term) faster.  If you intend to be in the pointy end of any field (pro or your age group) you had better have some speed behind that endurance. 3) This is very good for the sport of triathlon and cycling. (As well as the debate of who is fastest between all of our comrades in these different sports.)

1) Lance Armstrong is good for triathlon and will bring sponsors, media and positive attention to the sport.  In my opinion, this is excellent.  This is critical for prize purses to grow and television audiences to grow.  Lance as a personality, is good for the sport.  Face it - he is exciting to watch.  Even my mother knew that he was racing the Ironman 70.3 Panama and she asks me to help her "turn on the Internet, but not the world wide web part".  (Love you mom.) 

- with attention to the sport - it brings fans - fans bring money - money brings sponsors and ultimately live television.  Imagine watching Kona live... all day, from anywhere in the world.

- the sport of triathlon gets better whenever a great athlete enters.  Even a not so famous one.

- prize money will continue to grow.  Extremely important if the game of triathlon is going to come out of the "fringe sport" view of the popular media and into the main stream.  This had been starting to change a few years ago, but now is building into a tsunami.  

- Kona, post Ironman, went back to being a fishing village known for marlin fishing.  Now, it is a training destination where triathletes are showing up on a regular basis from all over the world.  Post race "after parties" are big events.  Even the "TGINR" party is huge - (Thank God I'm Not Racing).  Face it - Kona is evolving.

2) Last October in Kona we saw the pros set new levels of competitiveness.  What I noticed is the age group races now require an athlete to be well balanced and fast.  For example, if your goal is to be on the "podium" of the Kona stage - hope you can run a Boston Marathon qualifying time after swimming 2.4 and cycling 112 miles in 137 F temperatures.  

Fast is redefined.

3) Training must change.  Pro or age group you'll need to change "what always worked".  This is the really cool part about sport.  Don't change?  Become irrelevant.  Stay on the cutting edge and keep pushing the envelope?  Keep winning.

As an athlete, marshal and local race director - I think Lance racing is great.  The marshal in me doesn't give a shit (technical term) who is racing.  When I have the marshal stripes on - I only see bodies and actions.  Ask my friend Jeremy who got a penalty in Kona from me.  (It was legit.  Left side riding until we caught him while he passed nobody.  That is a text book position foul.  Gotta call what I see mate.)  Even Jeremy admitted he had no idea what the hell he was doing at that moment.

This begs my final question for you: 

How have you changed as triathlon has evolved?

Perception of Training Performance

Something seldom talked about is the perception of "good training" versus actual "good training".

What I noticed is that I feel good if I do a little more than half of my scheduled workouts (53-65%), but I'm not getting the complete training stimulus that I need to make measurable jumps in progress.

I'm a metrics guy.  (Data to most.)  The data never lies.  It's raw and emotion less.  An objective eye combined with data- watts, heart rate, miles, times and things like weight, own index and body fat tell me right where you are (or where I am).  When I take all the data and objectively look at them together (along with consistency of training sessions) it give me an accurate view of what's going on.

During winter, you have to look for every marker to adjust your workouts and this is best done by a coach, advisor or someone who won't believe your BS that you are "hitting all my sessions".  If you are hitting them all, you'll start to see progress very quickly.

I love hearing from athletes who aren't consistent and then tell me about what a great training session they had. (not really)  They had a great session because they have been resting.  I like the kind of call I got this morning.  A female athlete of mine who works a ton and is coming off some stomach flu called.  She had a "breakthrough session" where her sets just "felt easy".  Now, her data has been consistent (even with bathroom breaks during training sessions)  - not endorsed by the way.  Her data had a bit of a dip during her illness, however, not my more than 1-3% in all three sports.  That's exciting.

That said, none of this is "easy".  Make sure you don't miss a critical marker in your training.

If you have the right coach or advisor and you pay attention you can be the next big thing.  Don't take 2-4 days off and then tell your coach how great you are doing.  It's a false "reading" of performance.

Expectations

A friend of mine recently blogged that she was struggling with her expectations.  Her own expectations of herself as well as other people's expectations of her and her expectations of others.

My opinion on this has changed as I've gotten older.  

Expectations of Self 

This relates back to your goals and if you truly buy into your goals and 'dreams'.  You can say you "are all in", but the true measure of if you are in with all your heart comes at 4:15 am on a cold morning when you are extremely tired.  Do you hit the snooze?  Do you get up and go? It's that simple.  If you believe in your dreams and goals - you go with no hesitation.

Expectations of Others

As a coach and consultant, I cannot truly know your expectations of self until we get to that point when you have every legitimate reason to say, "Not today."  It's on those days that your workouts happen at 3 am or 11:30 pm that tell me if you have bought in to the statements you've made regarding your goals and dreams.  You can discuss this and be and shoved in the right direction, however, ultimately, my client decides.  My expectations must be based on the data that is returned to me.  From here, I make expectations of my client's season and results.  This is somewhere a coach and consultant can only hope to influence the client.  I cannot do the work for you.  It's moments when I tell a client to meet me for hill repeats at 5 am and I arrive at 4:45 am and they are already warming up that puts a smile on my face.  This "no excuses" attitude is what gets you to your goals.

My expectations are that people show up and try their hardest.  

It's that simple.  Don't use 'time predictor' apps or any bullshit like that.  Just show up and do the session to the best of your ability in the here and now.  When we race, you do the same thing.  What you've got, here and now.  Let me (your coach, advisor, consultant) figure out the rest.  You might just shock your own "best possible" prediction.  Don't put a cap on your ability.  Especially when you believe in yourself.  

There is a story that my club swim coach Ed Richardson used to tell us LONG before Senior Championships or Nationals.  He'd say, "Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like you to consider the possible.  Someone at this championship is going to be the talk of the meet.  Someone is going to swim so fast, that nobody saw it coming.  Someone is going to swim so fast, that they practically swim out of their suit.  Will you be that person who everyone will be talking about?"  I've had several times when that was me.  I remember one particular meet where I swam the 100m breaststroke championship in 1:06 something and got a very respectable 5th or 6th in state.  The next day in the prelims of the 200m breaststroke I took it out in 1:05.5.  I only remember it because we have video and Ed was ready to kill me.  ONE - for not going 1:05 in the 100 the night before, and TWO - for making him stress that I was taking out the 200 too fast.  I didn't.  I won that prelim heat by about 65 meters and set the fastest time that would last all the way until the final heat in the prelim.  That night in the finals, I went a little faster and wound up on the podium - top three.  The top four guys all broke the long standing state record.  I heard that Ed told the story of how hard I worked and how I believed I could do well to every team he coached from that point on.  I wasn't one of the most physically talented guys on that team.  No doubt about that.  I was certainly just one of the guys who was working to get better.  This is why a coach like Ed was perfect for me.  All Ed every asked was that you give your best.  He treated the state champions just as well as the guy or gal who was last on our team.  The common denominator - we all gave our best.  To Ed, we already were a champion regardless of the race results.  I feel the same way about my athletes.

NEVER put a cap on what is possible.  

Other's Expectations of Me

To be honest, I really don't care what your expectations are of my athletic performance.  I do what I feel is important for my family right now, and I don't expect you to understand.  I would never share my athletic goals on a blog or otherwise.  This is learned behavior from my swimming days.  You don't talk about it, you do the best you can and see how fast you can get.

Time waits for no one.  

Time never stops.  

Time is arguably the most precious thing we have.  

Spend it wisely.  

I will compete at certain events, but not at the expense of my family's happiness.  We plan the race season together.  I even plan annual vacations when we don't workout or race.  I know... shocking.  While I workout more than the average Joe, I understand the things that need to change and I work on them.  I don't use words like "limiter" or "weakness"; they let the negative creep into your thoughts.  I believe there are things you do well, and things that need to change.

Tomorrow is promised to no one.  Spend your time as YOU see fit.  (Kinda like voting.  Who do YOU like?  You don't need to tell me.  I just want you to vote YOUR conscious without any influence.) Live your life the best that you can and tell anyone who doesn't like what you do to go to hell.  Only YOU know what is right for you at this time in your life. 

Whatever you choose, it will be right for you and your ethics, morals and values.

Now, get after it.

Show Up Every Day and Give it All You've Got

I tell my athletes to do one thing: consistently show up to workouts and try their best.  Training for any athletic event is never all rainbows, ponies, ice cream, cake and balloons.  It requires effort.  It's why most people choose to sit on their couches for hours and WATCH someone else play a game / do an event than EXPERIENCE their own life and do it themselves.  The later is much more challenging, but amazingly rewarding regardless of any result in any competition.

I remember the first time my buddy Ross and I watched EcoChallenge.  On a couch.  Eating Doritos out of the bag and drinking Miller Lite.  My wake up came when Ross was yelling at a guy who just punctured his lung with a tree branch on a single track, high speed descent with three hours sleep over the course of four days. (His team was winning until that point.)  Something snapped me back to being an athlete that I am at my core when I watched this guy from Team Nokia (a team I would later become a part of - the "E" team anyway.  These guys and gals make the best Ironman athletes look like rank amateurs. A quote from training camp, "3:18 marathon? Not bad.  What do you think you'd do with a 60 pound pack on your back?" Yes, he was serious) trim the branch that stuck THROUGH his ribs and in his lung with a bike multi-tool.  He then told his team.  "It hurts and I cannot really breathe, but I'll be alright."  Thankfully, the nurse on his team told him to park it and he got helicoptered to the nearest hospital.  He was there and going to give everything he had until he passed out from blood loss. 

The military calls this "putting out".  The mind will want to quit before the body will.  Think about it.  When was the last time you went to the gym or a workout and felt awful.  You showed up.  You applied yourself the very best you could.  Then you left feeling awesome and you just MIGHT have put in some pretty solid efforts.  Interesting.  So, if you get your mind into the right state before training... it matters. 

It's as simple as that... show up every day (and sometimes, twice a day) and give it all you've got.

A great example is this morning (for me).  I am dog tired.  It's one of those weeks.  Had a funeral to put a cherry on top of everything going on as well.  ZERO workouts missed.  ZERO dog walks missed.  You know what?  The fatigue isn't that bad.  I'm kind of enjoying the soreness and "fog" of fatigue.  Funny thing... this morning I also had an outstanding swim coming off of a run.  That is a rare occasion by itself, let alone considering the conditions of the week.  The "main set" was 1500 yards.  I can only hope to swim that strong (or better) at my next half Ironman.  The workout finished with 3x 50 sprints.  I was going to do IM (individual medley) order (fly, back, breast) when I thought about the butterflier next to me.  One look and "it was on".  Then I swam some respectable times (if I was a sophomore in HS) 33.0, 32.6, 31.8 for three 50s.  While the times may not be very good, this is what I had today.  The heart rates I finished these 50s at was appropriately high for a strong effort.  I still have a long way to go, but I'm getting there.  Generally, I don't put times in the blog entry, but these were "noteworthy swims" and proove my point.

Show up every day and give it all you've got.

To all of you who are LIVING your life instead of WATCHING images of others live their life on a box in your house (maybe while eating Doritos and drinking beer) I give you this as we close out January of 2012. 

The road to the podium is longer than the rest, and there is only one route. One lap of the pool, track or cycling route/routine at a time, over and over and over until you’ve done so many, you’ve lost all track of time and distance. And still you’re not there. There are more laps and endless kicks and strokes and breaths and turns and pedal strokes, and footfalls. So you keep training, and training, training, because you know that one day you will arrive at your big race, and you will climb the podium.

Welcome XTERRA Wetsuits!

Today, Kokua Multisports and XTERRA Wetsuits agreed to a sponsorship deal for all my athletes in 2012.  We are extremely excited to welcome XTERRA Wetsuits to the Kokua family.