NE Coaching Network

  Daily, Mental Training Practice in 5 Easy Steps Many athletes write off mental training as something they don’t need to worry too much about—after all, it doesn’t immediately feel like you’re gaining those hard-earned results that a rigorous workout would give you, right? As a result, many procrastinate on or ignore their need for mental training. But what if I told you that mental toughness only takes a few minutes out of your athletes’ day? Here’s how to build a consistent daily mental toughness practice that will transform your athletes’ performance. Step 1: Understand the component Mental fitness training can and should be applied in the same way as physical fitness training. When a coach designs a fitness plan, it is important that they understand the five components of physical fitness: strength, speed, suppleness, stamina, and skill.  On the other hand, to build a mentally tough mindset you need to understand the essential “Five C” components: commitment, courage, con...

How to Build Workouts Coaches have so many different choices for workout for athletes. It can be overwhelming at times to decide which workouts to prescribe and when in the training cycle. At times, it is tempting to use the same well known intervals for many different athletes, which may or may not be the ideal. There are often training architectures that we can roughly follow for many athletes. For example you probably train first time century riders in largely the same way. However, coaching is also an individualistic enterprise – the training plan and workouts are customized and tailored to each individual athlete. In this article, we talk about a framework to use to help you decide which workouts to prescribe and how to consider the big picture for each athlete. We go beyond the basic formula of training stimulus + recovery = adaptation. As experienced coaches, we understand much of this process implicitly, based on experience. Hopefully you can use this post as a simple step-by-s...