Private coach and Tri-club

iAcesHigh

I've been thinking about this combination for quite some time. In short, after I finished my little challenge I decided to get myself a coach and have been with him for almost 2 years now. He's from Croatia and we do all planning and talks online (wrote about it not so long ago on http://goranmarkus.com/en/tri-coach/). Whenever I visit HR we meet-up at least once for nice food, chat, training etc. We're like buddies at this point and I'm really satisfied with him, his methods, my planning schedule, his instructions, our communication and similar (you get the point).

But, lately I've been giving a thought about joining a tri-club too. Please note, I was never part of Tri-club so these questions might sound stupid to some of you, but are really torturing me I wanted to join a club just to meet a bit more triathletes, maybe help out at a local race, get some inside on how others train/coach (I'm doing running plans for few of my friends so different point of view on trainings is always welcome), see if group trainings would be out of interest etc., but since I have my planning done for me specifically is there any point in this?

Like, if I have my swim training wrote down is there any sense in joining a club swim and do my own training. Same goes for run where I would think this wouldn't really make any sense (me doing recovery run while others do speed work) - would others do that? Is there anybody here that is in this situation (private coach & part of club) and could shed some light on how this is going on, what are the benefits and minuses to it? The only real benefit, other than hanging out with other weirdos like myself, is joining the club for long spins (since I mostly have it done for weekends which is something clubs prefer probably too and the pace isn't so important) and longer open-water swims, but I'm quite sure I don't have the full picture here since, I repeat, was never a part of a club before...

P.s. what is the cost of being a club member - don't need the exact number, just some kind of rough estimate since I wouldn't have a clue, obviously

joey100

On the cost, different clubs cost different amounts. Some clubs charge relatively little, others charge more but can offer more for the money too. For example, Activ Multisport is 50 euro for the year, this covers run training and cycling. Swim training costs extra and some events through the year like the club TT league, normally 2 euro a race. Generally 2 run sessions and 1 bike session per week. Piranha charge (I think) around 25 euro a month but you get up to 3 coached swims a week for this included along with more run and bike sessions.

On the coach and club thing, I'm similar enough situation to you, have a coach and am a member of the club. I don't really train with the club but it's a relatively small costing club for the year and I like the people in it so for me it's worth it. Something like Piranha probably wouldn't suit me as the cost of their club includes coached swim sessions and I get my swim sessions sent to me. I would like to do more with my club but with the different abilities and my timetable versus the clubs means I don't do a whole lot really. Generally I might do a long spin on the bike with them on a recovery week and go to some of the run sessions but treat them as recovery runs, it's more for the company I go.

I'd check the websites of the clubs to see what is on offer, I think your based in Dublin so some of the clubs would be Piranha, Pulse, 3D, Activ Multisport, Fingal, T3, Belpark and probably one or two more I've forgotten. You would need to weigh up the cost of the club versus how much you could do with them. Also see if they match what your looking for in a club, different clubs have different approaches and operate in different ways. Most clubs would let you try a session or two to see if it suits before looking for you to join.

Kurt_Godel

Have an online coach too, am a member of a Tri club, and also a Masters swim club. Training with the Tri club doesn't often suit my schedule, but meeting up for long spins, and camaraderie at races etc, make it very worthwhile. Swim sessions in particular are most useful when done with a group of peers, thats an immediate advantage to joining a club. Any decent coach will work your planned club sessions into your weekly online/monthly schedule.

peter kern

there is so many ways to skin a cat and it depends very much on your character if it would work.
you could do one or two sessions a week with a club and the rest alone.
At the end of the day the only way you would know is to try it.
your coach can also adapt the sessions, in a way that they work for you as long as you have an rough idea what the session will be you have so many parameters to play with in tri that you dodnt have to worry doing a few sessions in a cub as long as you rogughly stiick to the plan and give solid feedback to your coach.
ie if you have a coach it will work if you have a session prescriber ( which dostn seem to be the case ) it wont work .

iAcesHigh wrote: »

I've been thinking about this combination for quite some time. In short, after I finished my little challenge I decided to get myself a coach and have been with him for almost 2 years now. He's from Croatia and we do all planning and talks online (wrote about it not so long ago on http://goranmarkus.com/en/tri-coach/). Whenever I visit HR we meet-up at least once for nice food, chat, training etc. We're like buddies at this point and I'm really satisfied with him, his methods, my planning schedule, his instructions, our communication and similar (you get the point).

But, lately I've been giving a thought about joining a tri-club too. Please note, I was never part of Tri-club so these questions might sound stupid to some of you, but are really torturing me I wanted to join a club just to meet a bit more triathletes, maybe help out at a local race, get some inside on how others train/coach (I'm doing running plans for few of my friends so different point of view on trainings is always welcome), see if group trainings would be out of interest etc., but since I have my planning done for me specifically is there any point in this?

Like, if I have my swim training wrote down is there any sense in joining a club swim and do my own training. Same goes for run where I would think this wouldn't really make any sense (me doing recovery run while others do speed work) - would others do that? Is there anybody here that is in this situation (private coach & part of club) and could shed some light on how this is going on, what are the benefits and minuses to it? The only real benefit, other than hanging out with other weirdos like myself, is joining the club for long spins (since I mostly have it done for weekends which is something clubs prefer probably too and the pace isn't so important) and longer open-water swims, but I'm quite sure I don't have the full picture here since, I repeat, was never a part of a club before...

P.s. what is the cost of being a club member - don't need the exact number, just some kind of rough estimate since I wouldn't have a clue, obviously

Steroo

How much is an online coach? Not that' I'll be needing one anytime soon.... curious for the future

Mr Tango

Similar in our club (Phoenix). We are all on different schedules (only about 10 of us so more of a training group).

We meet up in a Sunday early for a spin. Last week for example it was an hour easy/steady and then we did intervals of 4x30 min at iron or half iron pace. So everyone was at diff pace. We met back up for the 10 min recovery and then same again. Last hour home was again as a group of 4 and steady.

That is how we manage it.

Our other session is a Monday swim. We have one lane but it is coached so there is normally 5 or 6 and everyone does the same set but it is good to meet up and get a hard session with a bit of being pushed as we train on our own the rest of the week

We then meet up on an ad hoc basis for bike or runs at other times.

So sounds like something u are looking for. A bit of structure but not too much, u get to meet some other like minded triathletes and add a bit of socialising to the training. U are ultimately driving ur own training for the majority of each week.

tunney

Steroo wrote: »

How much is an online coach? Not that' I'll be needing one anytime soon.... curious for the future

Depends, from 50 euro to 600 euro.

Someone like the Germinator (peter kerns) or Rich Brady (https://tri-monkey.co.uk) would be my recommendations

Peter can be irritating but he knows his stuff.
Rich knows his stuff and has coached people to the olympics and has been the High performance coach for Tri Wales the last few years.

Steroo

tunney wrote: »

Depends, from 50 euro to 600 euro.

Someone like the Germinator (peter kerns) or Rich Brady (https://tri-monkey.co.uk) would be my recommendations

Peter can be irritating but he knows his stuff.
Rich knows his stuff and has coached people to the olympics and has been the High performance coach for Tri Wales the last few years.

Excellent - Thanks

peter kern

you forgot joe friels 1400 a month value pack but i think you have to be at least 25 pounds overweight for that.

tunney wrote: »

Depends, from 50 euro to 600 euro.

Someone like the Germinator (peter kerns) or Rich Brady (https://tri-monkey.co.uk) would be my recommendations

Peter can be irritating but he knows his stuff.
Rich knows his stuff and has coached people to the olympics and has been the High performance coach for Tri Wales the last few years.

iAcesHigh

Thank you all for your help. I'll probably search around what's on offer in South Dublin and sign-up for one to see how that feels like (might wait for racing season to finish since I have a lot of catching up to-do so not too much free time as it is)...

tunney

iAcesHigh wrote: »

Thank you all for your help. I'll probably search around what's on offer in South Dublin and sign-up for one to see how that feels like (might wait for racing season to finish since I have a lot of catching up to-do so not too much free time as it is)...

One thing to be aware of - Triathlon Ireland do not offer any coaching qualificatons past L1 (I can carry bags) and L2 (I can do a squad session thats not hard).

If someone holds up a TI coaching licence as a sign of their competency - run like fvck.

iAcesHigh

tunney wrote: »

One thing to be aware of - Triathlon Ireland do not offer any coaching qualificatons past L1 (I can carry bags) and L2 (I can do a squad session thats not hard).

If someone holds up a TI coaching licence as a sign of their competency - run like fvck.

have coach, looking for company from club I join and don't expect qualifications from those other than sharing funny stories on the bike and kicking my leg in the pool to push a bit more

mossym

the one benefit of mixing club and coach is that with a club, it usually pretty obvious (to the point they may share the details in advance) what the sessions will be. much easier then for a coach to work it into the plan.

it's almost more troublesome to try and train with a bunch of friends, cause there is no structure, they could hammer easy rides and stop for coffee when should be going hard. Almost impossible for a coach to plan around variances like that.