Do You Need a Running Coach?

Orca Running

Do You Need a Running Coach?

Before diving into the reasons for working with a running coach, let’s do the unthinkable and box runners into totally arbitrary, made-up, overlapping boxes!

Five Broad Categories of Runners:

Working with a running coach helped this runner achieve a PR!
Working with a running coach helped this runner achieve a PR!
  1. Novices: those new to the sport, new to a particular distance, or new to a type of terrain.
  2. Returners: runners returning to the sport after an injury or break.
  3. Chasers: runners who desire to attain the next level of success.
  4. Stagnaters: those trying to break through a plateau or achieve a long-desired goal.
  5. Community Builders: runners who desire more interaction and growth within the sport. 

These categories are not mutually exclusive, and you don’t need to box yourself in. You likely might find yourself resonating with a few. Regardless, these subtypes are useful for the purpose of this article. A runner in any of the preceding categories may benefit from using a running coach to guide them towards their goals. However, finding the best fit for a running coach requires an investment of one’s time and finances. How does one decide if they really need a running coach? Under what circumstances does having a coach provide the most fulfillment and the most benefit to an individual?

Who Needs a Running Coach?

There are many reasons that a runner may be curious about working with a running coach. Let’s break them down using the above categories.

1. Novices

New to Running

The Covid pandemic saw running’s popularity increase (turns out that might happen when you have nothing else to do!) with new runners finding joy in movement and seasoned vets increasing their training frequency. Better yet, the running boom has continued post-pandemic with increasing opportunities to socialize and race. 

For many novice runners, hiring a running coach may sound and feel like overkill. The commonly held belief is that coaches are for the experienced and competitive athlete, not for “runners like me”. How does one know when they may need a running coach, even as a beginner? 

A static training plan may be enough for a runner without any pre-existing health conditions entering the sport with the primary goal of gaining fitness. Additionally, novice runners have the unique opportunity to see a high number of gains in a short amount of time compared to more seasoned athletes due to their lack of training. Runners with an athletic background may be able to appropriately gauge how hard to push themselves as the body is adapting to the new stimulus of continual running or new terrain. However, it can be harder for novice athletes experiencing rapid gains in fitness to determine the right amount of volume and intensity that can be sustained over time.

A coach can identify the appropriate level of training and tailor it specifically to the individual. By helping to mitigate the types of overuse injuries and setbacks that tend to plague newer runners, a coach maximizes individual’s fitness gains. As runners transition to different types of terrain and distance, working with a coach early on can help to establish healthy movement patterns and practices as they are being learned. 

New to Distance and/or Terrain

In addition to road running and racing, trail and ultrarunning are becoming more popular among runners and mainstream media. Recent findings report a 12% increase in trail running annually since 2010, alongside a 345% growth in ultrarunning since 1996! Such remarkable increases in participation indicate that a large proportion of trail and ultrarunners are newer to the distance.

Seasoned road runners transitioning to the trails face a unique set of challenges given the many nuances to environmental conditions, terrain management, and equipment. A marathon runner who jumps into a local 5K trail race is likely to be successful in learning from the experience without the guidance of a coach. However, a marathon runner training in the southern United States has a significant learning curve if attempting an ultra-distance trail race on the west coast with mountainous terrain, different environmental elements, and altitude. Afterall, you don’t know what you don’t know.  A runner with limited time or resources to train and learn the nuances of running a particular distance or terrain would likely benefit from a coach’s wisdom and guidance.

2. Returners

Returning to Sport After Injury or Significant Break

Injured runner holding his knee.
Injured runner holding his knee.

Unfortunately, and probably news to no-one, runners get injured, often. Research suggests up to 70% of competitive and recreational runners get injured yearly, with 50 to 70% being caused by overuse. Running injuries can happen to anyone regardless of experience and/or training level. However, a running coach can help athletes identify any training triggers that might have contributed, hopefully preventing future injuries too!

When injured, a runner often seeks out the help of a primary care doctor, physical therapist, or sports medicine doctor. Many specialize in the treatment of runners and may offer strength training and rehabilitation exercises to heal an injury. However, there is often a gap in return to sport specific recommendations. For example, a runner recovering from a bone issue may be told to cross train. The specifics of how much and when in comparison to the running plan prior to injury may be more vague leading runners into unfamiliar territory. A running coach can work with the guidance of the medical team to more specifically advise a runner on the best ways to maintain fitness during the injury and create a path to return to running post injury. 

Whether planned or not, returning from an extended break in training has its challenges. It’s common for athletes to struggle reconciling with where they were fitness wise prior to the break and currently. A running coach can objectively assess the athlete’s current fitness, then program the correct training at the right time. Importantly, a coach can ensure the athlete progresses from non-training to more consistent training at an appropriate rate that maximizes fitness gains while minimizing their injury risk.  

3. Chasers

Reaching for a Personal Best in Distance, Pace, or Consistency

This runner used the support of a running coach to persist through a tough race.
This runner used the support of a running coach to persist through a tough race.

Once a runner has passed from the beginner stage, improvement can become harder to attain. As general fitness gains start to level out, it requires additional stimulus to see performance increases. Here, a running coach can help fine tune the right amount of stimulus for them to achieve the desired pace and/or distance results. For those striving for big goals, breaking time barriers, achieving a personal best or qualifying time, having the support of a coach to build a plan, push training to the appropriate level, and provide a realistic timeline, could make all the difference in reaching such goals or not.

Runners desiring more consistency with training but are caught in a cycle of injury, life stress, or fluctuating motivation, can turn to a running coach to trouble shoot or align a training schedule that supports their current lifestyle. A coach can alleviate the stress of creating training plans that balance training, recovery, and overall life demands. This can be especially important for runners who have inconsistent schedules due to school, work, or family. Other athletes may benefit from and need a running coach to stay motivated and be a source of accountability.

4. Stagnaters

Assistance in Breaking Through a Plateau

Runners experiencing a plateau in running physically or mentally often benefit from a fresh perspective from someone with running experience. Sometimes, fine-tuning all the dials in a training plan can be hard to accomplish on one’s own. Coaches can also be beneficial in recognizing elements outside of a training plan that may be the cause for plateau. Think fueling, hydration, recovery, etcetera. Although a coach is often not a sports dietician, sports doctor, or psychologist, seasoned coaches can recognize common issues and themes that may be hard for an individual to identify or vocalize to non-running peers. A coach can assist with addressing issues of burnout without athletes abandoning the sport. They help runners avoid injury, and overcome continued fatigue, diminished performance, and decreased enjoyment of running and daily activities.

5. Community Builders

Desire for Connection, Learning, and Growth Within the Sport

Although running has become a popular way to connect and meet others, not every runner has access to running groups. Many runners may also lack the running social networks that allow them to learn from and relate to others. Again, this is where a coach can assist! They will be more than happy to feed your curiosity to learn about the sport. They become your go-to person to talk training nuances, and nerd out on the latest supershoes and tech!

Team Run Run, for example, not only assists athletes in finding a running coach, but works to provide greater opportunities for connection through insights into running events, resources for runners, newsletters, pre-race shakeout runs, discounts, information sharing forums among athletes and coaches, and more!

Proud athlete and coach after a successful race.
Proud athlete and coach after a successful race.

So, Do You Need a Running Coach?

Hopefully, now you can appreciate why the majority of runners who work with a running coach are not elite athletes. They are individuals striving to show up as the best version of themselves that they can be. A running coach is there to create excitement, and provide support and joy throughout a runner’s journey. They’ll help their runners continue to learn, push performance, and explore new boundaries that they desire, were unsure how to reach, and maybe never even thought achievable.

Sold on working with a running coach but not sure where to start? Check out Team RunRun’s coaching directory and browse by budget, goals, location, or level. With over 300 coaches, we have a coach for every runner!

Christina Mather is a coach with Team RunRun based in Fort Worth, TX. She works with athletes running all distances from 5K to 50K on both the roads and the trails. She especially enjoys helping female athletes and those looking to balance training with a busy schedule. 

5 Tips for Planning Your Next PR!

And how to build an effective running roadmap to achieve your goals

For many runners, having a race on the calendar provides purpose to their training, adding extra motivation to getting out the door. The prize many seek at the finish line? A shiny new PR (personal record; “PB” or “personal best” in other parts of the world)! While setting a PR is exciting and leads many runners coming back for more, there’s much more that goes into any given PR than just race day. Race day can be seen as the product of all the training days coming together in synchronized harmony to bring out a runner’s best.

After following the 5 tips for planning your next PR, Team RunRunner Mat A. was able to ring the PR bell!
After following the 5 tips for planning your next PR, Team RunRunner Mat A. was able to ring the PR bell!

That said, this article will seek to address the full running roadmap, including building a training cycle and racing season, with considerations for what to train and race for and when to do it. It’ll also address the topic of setting goals and expectations, as life, and by extension training, can often be in flux.

5 Tips for Planning Your Next PR

1. Write Goals in Pencil, Not Permanent Ink

    As hinted at, while setting preseason race goals are great, it is also important to be flexible in your planning. You never know when an injury might come up and sideline you from running, or when life events–be them work related or personal–make it more difficult for you to get your training done as envisioned. In the event of injury, various forms of cross training allow you to maintain fitness as opposed to advancing it like a consistent running program would. This is one of many reasons why it’s important to have a variety of goals beyond solely finish lines and PRs.

    2. Create a Goal Hierarchy

    As a coach, regardless of whether I’m working with one of my high school athletes or Team RunRunners, I always emphasize having multiple tiers of goals (A, B, and C goals). The A goals are for when everything is clicking: it might be a stretch to achieve but is still attainable (after all, part of the SMART goals framework is that they are attainable and reasonable). B goals are the solid middle ground: expect B goals to take significant effort to achieve, but appreciate that there’s a high degree of confidence you’ll get there. Finally, come C goals: still good achievements worth celebrating, but are often benchmarks to fall back on when things don’t go as envisioned. This is all the more reason why no matter how big, training milestones should be celebrated and pride should be taken in a runner’s ability to stay consistent. 

    3. Avoid “In An Ideal World” Goal Setting and Acknowledge Your Constraints

    In order to give yourself a chance at achieving a goal, it’s crucial to understand that different seasons of life add context to your running roadmap. For example, compared to the high schoolers I coach prepping for the mile in track season, an adult long removed from their scholastic running days would have different factors and considerations if they had hopes of returning to the mile for the first time since high school. Even avid club runners who still raced track in college and adulthood have different looking mile training than when they were in school due to the more advanced training age. The point being, even three runners all training for the same thing require different roadmaps and lists of expectations for getting to their final destination.

    Niwot High School cross country team after their "A" race.
    Niwot High School cross country team after their “A” race.

    4. Trust the Process (Goals)

      While we fortunately have the COVID pandemic in the rearview mirror, it was a time where we had to be flexible in expectations and goal setting. The same principles still apply now, though we don’t have to resort to virtual races and solo time trials. In this article, “Setting Running Goals during COVID-times”, I discussed different types of goals. This included the importance of having process-oriented goals alongside your outcome-orientated ones. Afterall, process goals often lead to those results-based goals, such as PRs and distance milestones. Consider both quantitative process goals–ones that you can measure, like covering a certain number of miles–and qualitative goals–those you can’t, such as running a new route each week.

      5. Be Open to Trying Different Events

      Set yourself up for success in your primary event by going after PRs in “off events”. For example, a marathoner might pursue a new mile PR following a marathon training cycle. Or perhaps it’s a road runner taking to the trails and trying to set an FKT (fastest known time). This variety builds a more complete runner and can help address individual weaknesses. Don’t shy away from dedicating a mini training cycle to some lower tiered goals. In the long run, it can prevent you from burnout and becoming stale. 

      How to Build a Running Roadmap

      Team RunRunner Therese M. running a "C" race dressed as a banana!
      Team RunRunner Therese M. running a “C” race dressed as a banana!

      Now this just leaves the question of how to build a training cycle and racing season. The fall and spring are commonly seen as the marathon seasons, but don’t forget that there are plenty of great marathons year-round. Similarly, depending on where you are in the world, the seasons in the Northern and Southern hemisphere don’t align: fall cross country in one region might be spring track season for the other. Even just in the United States, the Midwest and East Coast puts much more emphasis on indoor track in the winter than the West Coast does. 

      Periodization and Race Planning

      Linking back to the aforementioned marathoner who lacks footspeed, they may want to hone in on shorter distances for all or part of a cycle to improve this area of weakness. Great! Thanks to the concept of periodization, it can, and should, be done together with the above 5 tips for planning your next PR. According to Runner’s World, “periodized training is structuring your training for a goal race so that on race day you’re at optimal fitness for the demands of that race.” Periodizing your training takes the concept of having multi-tiered goals and applying it to a training cycle, with the goal race representing your “A” race and tune-up races consisting of your “B” and “C” races. Often periodized training breaks the season into different cycles, each with one or two key objectives being focused on that build on each other towards accomplishing your primary goal.

      This might look like running an “off-event” as an early season “C” race to remember what racing feels like. Consider “B” races more like a tune-up, racing something more similar to the goal “A” race. You might take these opportunities to implore different racing strategies, approaches to nutrition, and other considerations as a way to test and see what works and what doesn’t before the big day. Then it’s the goal “A” race: you’ve tapered, dotted your I’s and crossed your T’s, and are ready to lay it all out there before ending your season with a break and/or base building phase. 

      Final Thoughts

      In this article, we have highlighted 5 tips for planning your next PR, alongside building a comprehensive running roadmap that will hopefully lead you to achieve your goals. Like any good travel itinerary, it factors in all the stops along the way. From periodization and varying your training and race calendar, to setting realistic expectations when injury or life happens. This extends to the setting of expectations when taking on something new, whether that be distance or terrain.. While this article not only seeks to inform, hopefully you feel enlightened, dare I say enchanted, to tackle something new with a holistic approach not only to training but to goal setting as well. 

      Brian Comer is a coach with Team RunRun based out of Portland, Oregon. His goal is to help you grow as a runner and a person through consistent training.

      Prepare for the Orca Half Marathon

      Here is a cheat sheet on how to prepare for the Orca Half Marathon held every September by Orca Running. This is their flagship race. It’s flat and fast. It provides great views. And it is so popular that they now run the race on both Saturday and Sunday to accommodate everyone wanting to do this event. This guide provides an in-depth look at how to train, and how to pace yourself so that you can be your best on race day, be that setting a new PR or simply crossing the finish line. 

      Preparing for the half marathon

      Time to train: A half marathon training plan is a bit dependent on your current level of fitness and running experience. Most plans will run 12 to 16 weeks and have you running anywhere from four to six days per week. One benefit of having a coach versus just following a plan is that you can adapt and adjust your training based on your schedule and needs versus following a rigid plan. But regardless of if you have a coach or not, you need to recognize that preparing to be your best on race day requires time, and consistently showing up to prepare! 

      Here are the key pieces to the training puzzle, and while each runner likely requires a different recipe for training, these are the key ingredients in nearly every successful half marathon training plan. 

      Easy Efforts: Though half the distance of a marathon, the half marathon is still a long-distance event. The foundation for running long distances is building aerobic endurance. “Easy” or “conversational pace” runs are the bread and butter of building endurance. If you’re following heart rate zones, we’re talking about z1 and z2 here. There are a variety of ways to assess how much training volume one can sustain and benefit from during any season – the key is to avoid overdoing it so that you can reduce injury risk. Conversation pace running is 70-80% of your overall running volume. A coach can help find the ideal total training load for you, and balance the easy efforts with the more challenging training sessions. 

      Half-Marathon-Paced Long Runs: Whether you’ve raced several half marathons or you’re running your first one, a critical component of your training is running at the pace you plan to run in the race. There are numerous methods to determine your race pace, but most all deal with the concept of zones. Some of the most common zones are aerobic recovery, aerobic training, lactate threshold, critical zone or “race pace”, V02 Max, and anaerobic. Each individual will have unique needs and limits, but generally for the half marathon distance your race pace zone usually sits at an effort above aerobic and below lactate threshold. Determining race pace is dependent on current fitness levels and your experience with running. Race pace workouts usually comprise 1-2 days per week or 10-15% of weekly volume. They can be standalone workouts or folded into your weekly long run. Typically, in the first part of your training you will run 5-10 seconds slower than your goal race pace, working your way up to sustained race pace runs, and some workouts 5-10 seconds faster than goal race pace as you approach tapering. This specificity of repeated bouts of training will help your body adapt to the stresses of running faster and longer.

      Tempo Runs: Running at a pace positioned above half-marathon pace combined with bouts of running at easier paces will prepare your body for the stress of race day, and boost your overall aerobic capacity for longer, sustained efforts. Tempo runs (aka threshold, steady-state, fast pace) are done at a swift, sustained pace, generally for 20-30 minutes and sometimes as long as an hour or more. Your coach can help you determine a “comfortably hard” pace for these types of workouts. Novices sometimes find this difficult, but tempo runs are the bread and butter for experienced runners. Tempo runs train the cardiorespiratory system and muscular systems to efficiently absorb, deliver, and utilize oxygen. They improve endurance, promote more efficient running form, and teach runners how to deal with low-grade physical discomfort. Distances, paces, and times will vary depending on the runner’s goals, but most tempo runs start at a comfortable pace with increasingly faster running to stimulate the race effort. Individual needs and limits apply, but a common approach is to have one day per week or 10-15% of your weekly volume devoted to a harder, faster than goal pace effort. 

      Race strategies for the half marathon

      Yes, the course is shorter than a full marathon, but that doesn’t mean you want to hammer the pace from start to finish. A common mistake in races of all distances is going out too fast too early, and the half marathon is no exception. You may feel great for the first part of the race, but you will pay the price for it later if you’re running beyond your current fitness. To help you reach your potential on race day and avoid the common mistake of pushing too hard too soon, I’ve provided this framework for you. I like to think of the race as a few different phases of racing, each with their own strategy.

      Race start: From the start line to about four miles in it makes sense to run a bit slower (about 5-15 seconds/mile slower) than your goal half marathon pace. You are feeling your way into the race and tamping down some adrenaline at the same time so this phase will be slightly more mentally taxing than later phases. You will be tempted to run faster. Don’t.

      Race middle: From miles five through 10 you will start to settle into your goal race pace. Gradually start running faster until you hit your goal pace. Earlier in this phase running at your race pace will feel comfortably challenging, but be prepared for it to take progressively more effort as the miles click by. Appreciate the flow and wait to start pushing the pace.

      Race end: From miles 11 to the finish line. You went out slower and gradually worked up to your goal race pace for a reason. Now is the time to push the pace (about 5-10 seconds/mile faster) and see what you have left in the tank. Use that conserved energy you banked earlier to lean into any challenges you might feel. With one mile to go now is the time to throw the hammer down and give it all you’ve got left.

      Racing this method is what’s commonly known as a negative split, meaning you run the second half of the race faster than the first. It takes practice and discipline to nail this strategy, but it’s a common approach in part because the proof is in the pudding. Races are inherently unpredictable, but if you can focus on what you can control – pace, effort, nutrition, gear, and your training – you might just find your reward is a PR.

      While half the distance of a full marathon, preparing for a half marathon still requires dedication, consistency, and a well-structured training plan. By focusing on building aerobic endurance through easy efforts, practicing at half-marathon pace during long runs, and incorporating tempo runs to boost aerobic capacity, runners can set themselves up for success on race day. Additionally, understanding race strategies like pacing yourself throughout different phases of the race can make a significant difference in achieving your goals. Remember, training for a half marathon is not just about physical preparation but also mental discipline and strategic execution. By following a tailored training plan, staying committed to your goals, and executing smart race strategies, you can maximize your performance and potentially achieve a new personal record. So lace up those shoes, hit the pavement with purpose, and enjoy the journey towards conquering your next half marathon challenge! And if you’re in the Seattle area, I hope to see you at the Orca Half Marathon in September! 

      Jon Phillips is a coach with Team RunRun. To learn more about him or to work with him, check out his coach profile.