That’s ‘runcoach 1to1’ I mean, not my actual name (third generation Russian immigrant in case you wondered, my great grand-father never got round to Anglicising the surname) . I liked the name so much I bought a few domains with very similar names. It’s actually a very accurate description of what I do, and pretty much all I do in coaching. By that I mean, there are a load of things that running coaches can do that I choose not to do. So I don’t do corporates, I don’t do groups, I don’t do secondary sell, I don’t go running with anyone I coach, I don’t endorse products.  Things where I would worry that the effect on my coaching competence would be, at best, neutral. 

I don't do any specific promotion - just this website and word of mouth.

The key area of external partnership working I do is really about keeping runners healthy and helps my own CPD. So, the sports medic world is where I strive to seek the best people and to develop my own understanding. You can run very well without getting unduly involved with clothes, shoes, apps, or lab tests. You can’t run well if you are getting injured. Indeed, you might spend a while not being able to run at all. So that is the key field where as runcoach1to1 I am very keen to have something else in the mix when it is necessary.  

 I quite like writing although I seem to be about twenty years too late for the period when writing about running could be commercial. At least, writing about running the way I would want to.   When I was 22 I wrote one little column for Runners World. I think it was because Mike Gratton, then London Marathon champion, was away for his usual slot, so there was a gap to fill.  My article made a risqué reference to a G string.  I was paid £60 which at the time could cover a down payment on a small cottage in Wales and a Ford Cortina though that’s not what I actually spent it on. The theory was that this would lead to me swanning around the elite athletics circuit penning insightful articles for a Fleet Street ((Fleet Street!) broadsheet.   Clearly something changed and my career planning missed several journalistic boats as now I get periodically asked by the monthlies to write bland-sounding stuff for free. So I don’t. 

The flip side of this is, and for which I am very appreciative, that the new world of digital technology, increased leisure time and affluence for many, and the recent growth of running as a sport, at varying degrees of intensity and commitment, has created a society in which professional running coaching is a valid and, for some, valued activity.