Remote Coaching Part 1: What to Use to Connect with Athletes?

As a coach, I have used multiple methods to track training programs and stay connected with the athletes I work with. When I first started coaching, remote coaching involved using either a phone or a fax machine.  My business partner and I recognized the challenge of programming and coaching for the athletes we worked with and approached a grad student at U of T to help design a program that enabled us to create, monitor and track programs electronically.  There were challenges, glitches, and growing pains, especially for our athletes who lived and raced in different countries. Although there were challenges, there were also valuable lessons related to remote coaching.

For the past 15 years we have been using Training Peaks with great success. To declare, we are neither funded nor sponsored by Training Peaks.  It is simply a program that we have found serves our needs well due to the fact the majority of individuals we work with are triathletes, marathoners and other endurance sport athletes. Currently, there are dozens of options that enable you to program and monitor athletes. We will share interviews and feedback from other S&C coaches in future sharings on additional tools.

Additionally, we have used close to a dozen different platforms to connect with our athletes in the field of play, and off the field. For over a year we have used Zoom with great success. Especially when connecting with multiple people at the same time in different countries, with some on the computer and some on the phone. Another declaration, we are neither funded nor sponsored by Zoom. During these days of global challenge, appropriate programming, exercise prescription, and connection with our athletes is key.

As a strength coach, if you are struggling currently to connect with your athletes perhaps the two above options would be of value to you. To note, other coaches I work with are using Slack, Vimeo, WhatsApp, Skype, Teambuildr, Google Docs and Kinduct. I encourage you to share what you are using in the comments section below.

Best of luck!