Coaching rules
Ten rules
I coach you by.
The principles behind every plan I write — and how to use me to actually live them. Train by these and let the app handle the detail.
01
Have a goal. Train with intent.
Aimless miles plateau. A target — a race, a time, a distance — gives every week a purpose and tells me how to shape your training. Use races as milestones, not just finish lines.
Set your goal with
/setplan, then build a season with /races: an A race to peak for, B races as tune-ups, C races to train through.
02
Wear a heart-rate monitor.
Pace lies — hills, heat, wind and tiredness all distort it. Heart rate tells the truth about effort, and it’s how I tell an easy day from a hard one and notice when you’re cooked.
Sync HR from Strava or Garmin and set your zones with
/setzones — I rate every session against them.
03
Easy days easy. Hard days hard.
Most of your running should be genuinely easy — conversational. Save the hard for when it counts. The grey zone in between, medium-hard every day, is where progress quietly dies.
I flag when your easy runs creep too fast and keep the contrast in your plan. Check any session with
/analyse.
04
Consistency beats heroics.
Three steady weeks beat one enormous week and two you miss. The body adapts to what it sees often, not what it sees once. Turn up; the rest takes care of itself.
I track your training load and adherence (
/load), show how your recent weeks actually broke down (/breakdown), and rebuild next week around what you actually did — not what was planned in theory.
05
Tell me how it felt.
The data can’t feel your legs or your bad night’s sleep. Ten seconds of honesty after a session changes what I prescribe next.
Reply to the post-run debrief with an RPE and a quick note — it feeds straight into your plan.
06
Recovery is training.
You don’t get fitter during the work — you get fitter recovering from it. Sleep, easy days and down weeks aren’t slacking; they’re where adaptation happens.
I watch HRV, sleep and resting HR from Garmin and build recovery in. Flag a niggle (
/wellness) and I’ll ease the next hard session before it becomes an injury.
07
Fuel the work.
You can’t out-train under-eating. Carbohydrate around your hard and long sessions, enough food overall, and never try new race-day nutrition on race day.
I send fuelling cues before long sessions, and a full fuelling plan in race week.
08
Build, sharpen, taper — in that order.
Fitness is layered: base before speed, volume before intensity, and a real taper so you arrive fresh, not flat. You can’t cram endurance.
Your plan periodises automatically — A races get a full taper, B races a mini-taper, C races you run straight through.
09
Test, don’t guess.
Your paces and zones drift as you get fitter. Training to last spring’s numbers leaves gains on the table — re-benchmark every few months.
I’ll nudge you for a fresh time trial when your numbers go stale; log the result (
/setpbs) and every pace recalibrates.
10
Play the long game.
The athletes who improve for years stay healthy, stay curious, and don’t blow themselves up chasing one session. Patience compounds; injury resets the clock.
Finish a block and I’ll help you set the next goal — or keep you ticking over until you’re ready for one.
Above all — talk to me.
Ask anything, tell me what’s going on in your training and your life. I remember what you share, and the more I know, the better I coach you.
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