It’s been a while since I decided I wanted to be a running coach. I’d been to a talk by one of the coaches at my running club and it was obvious how much they loved running and sharing that with other people. While the rest of the runners in the room asked questions about their training and what they could do to run faster or further, my question was a bit different. At the end of the talk I spoke to a club coach and asked him what I needed to do to become one.

Since then the Serpentine Running Club have supported me in doing just that. They pointed me in the direction of the UK Athletics coaching pathway. I became a Leader in Running Fitness back in 2012 which allows me to lead runs, both for the Serpentine and my own  running groups. Then about 18 months ago I started my formal training to become a coach.

It generally takes less than 18 months to complete the coaching qualification, but last year training of a very different sort took over my life in the run up to the iron person. I still made it down to help out with a Serpentine track session each week, chatted with my coaching mentor and asked him lots of questions, and worked with a few coaching guinea pigs, but the paperwork that went with it was put on hold.

Since January, though, I’ve completed my paperwork, ticked off assessments and, finally on Saturday, passed my final assessment. Six hours spent at a running track coaching athletes and being coached by others later and UKA have decided that I know my stuff.

I didn’t plan to take 18 months to complete all this, but I’m glad I took my time. Working with a variety of different athletes has meant I’ve been asked a lot of different questions over the past year. When I haven’t known the answer, I’ve had to go off and find it out. It has meant working with people with different strengths and weaknesses and who respond to different ways of working. My confidence has grown and my voice has got a bit louder (leading 80 Serpies in a track warm-up kind of necessitates that). Above all, it has shown me that, while I may now have passed my course, I haven’t stopped learning.

So what happens now? Well, I’ll still be helping out with Serpentine sessions, and I’ll still be asking my mentor questions.

For my current runners nothing changes. I’ll still lead my groups twice a week and maybe I’ll add another session in a new location at some point this summer. But if they want to work with me one-on-one for a personal coaching session, I’ll be doing that now too.

I already informally coach a few friends training for races via email (writing their training plans and helping them towards their goals), and I’ll be taking on a few more people as coaching clients (need a coach? email me).

I’m excited about helping more people to reach their training goals and learn to love running. And I’m grateful to the coaches at Serpentine for inspiring me and helping me to be able to do this.