Written by: Colin Batchelor

One of the best decision I ever made about bike racing was to stop racing and start coaching. It was also one of the easiest. My thought process went like this ‘Oh shit I’m not fit enough to race over THAT’ followed swiftly by ‘It’s about time I helped someone else suffer as much as I have’.
There is then some boring stuff about courses, qualifications and awards and we then get to this point.

And the point is there are some very strange people in the world of bike racing. Well I say strange, that is perhaps putting it too mildly, look at it this way, there are crazy folks out there and they all want me to help them ride their bikes faster.

Over the winter I took a phone call from someone I’d not met asking if their son could ride one of my regular track sessions. Now, my track session are for senior riders that have reached a certain standard and are training or racing on the track. When I asked the caller how old his son was I was told ’8, but he’s very fast for his age’. I pointed out that the session was designed to seniors most of whom raced I was told ‘Well he’d have no problem in keeping up with them, he’s fast you know’, so I said the sessions were two hours long and aimed at building track endurance I was told ‘he’s fast, you know’, feeling I was fighting a losing battle I brought up the question of insurance and safety of other riders, only to be told to ‘don’t worry about insurance, I won’t say anything if you won’t', I then mentioned that my insurance from British Cycling might be an issue and was told ‘get them to change their policies then’. I gave him the number of a junior club that worked out of the track only to be told ‘I’ve tried them and they didn’t seem to want to help’, I wonder why.

The there was the guy who wanted to be an Olympian, a noble ambition, this guy was a triathlete and tri is an Olympic sport. So far so good, I mentioned that if he was aiming that high maybe he should be talking to the national tri coaches. ‘Oh no’ He said, ‘I’ve got a unique project and they didn’t seem interested’ , er go on, I said, whilst frantically trying to get my mobile to ring ‘I want to compete in three different events at the Olympics, cycling, marathon and swimming’. There was a silence as I attempted to teleport myself to another country, it didn’t work, so I talked about conflicting demands of training, and the clashes of events on the day. ‘Oh don’t worry about clashing events’, I was told, ‘I’ve written to the IOC asking them to change the schedule for me.’.

Moving on from the wide and wonderful world of the crazy, there are riders that have a general aim of ‘riding faster’ and want me to help them.
So, I say, what do you mean by faster? ‘Well just faster’ I often hear.
OK, so faster over a set distance like a pursuit or time trial? Faster in a sprint? Faster up a hill? Faster on a Sportive? Faster on your ride to work?
‘All of them, I want to win races’, ah now we’re getting somewhere, which races I ask, needing to start setting goals, ‘All of them, from March to September, I race every week and want to win them all’ When I point out that it is physically impossible to be competitive for that long I see sad faces, and at one point was told ‘call yourself a coach?’ Well, yes I do and any coach will tell you that being competitive over that period of time, week in , week out is impossible.

So we start working on specific goals, finding out what races they like, what races they do well in, what their other commitments they have and then we build a plan. It’s amazing how many cyclists think they’re full time pros who physical ability makes them sprint faster the Cavendish, climb like Contador and TT like Armstrong. When in reality they have 6 hours a week to train, and have a TT position like a dead donkey. Still, from realisation comes reality and something we can all work towards.

So you set a plan and pass over a schedule and then you talk to the rider on a regular basis to see if it’s working. And then the trouble starts. Your rider is reporting that he’s knackered, worn out, exhausted. So you look at the plan and that just shouldn’t be happening, he’s in a recovery phase, he’s taking rest. Maybe he’s sickening for something? You look at the HRM numbers, review the ‘feel good factor’, check his weight, it all looks good, you suggest a doctors visit, you cut right back on the training, but it’s still not good.
So, talk to him day by day and ask him to describe his whole day and then you find the problem. There’s a guy in his club who’s ‘a bit of a coach’, he’s got no experience, no qualifications, but he has read a book. Just the one book mind, called something like ‘Cycle coaching for dummies (beginners edition)’
And this ‘bit of a coach’ has seen your schedule and plan and he’s decided it’s all wrong, he’s decided that your rider is not doing enough miles, so during the phase of recovery, when the rider recovers from the tough seasons training load this ‘bit of a coach’ has had your man riding extra miles, day by day he’s been cranking up the distance at a time when cranking up the rest is what’s needed.
So you tell your rider that he can only be coached by one ‘coach’ and that having two conflicting programmes, one from someone with no qualifications or experience is doing him damage and guess what? ‘It’s make you mind up time’. So he goes with his ‘bit of a coach’ (who of course is not charging for his services) and when you see him the following season his TT times are slower and he’s getting dropped on the hills, he’s been sick a lot, he’s not enjoying it.

Of course in building a plan for a rider you need to know a lot of stuff and a lot of that stuff is not directly connected to the bike. Family support is a good one. It’s easy to forget there are other people in your house, and you need to support each other to be successful. In the past I have recommended that riders take time out to go to the movies with their kids or take the family to the beach. Getting the balance right is what counts, well actually what counts is having a grip on reality, without that don’t even think of employing a coach.

Colin’s Blog: On The Banking
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