Originally Posted by
Creakyknees
There's plenty of "how to train" coaching out there.
I still see a big gap missing "how to race" coaching. IMO the only and I mean only way to effectively coach a rider on "how to race" is to be there, in person, in the same race if possible.
Example: I know a rider who signed up with a great coach, remotely. Did the workouts, got super fit. Won a windy road race, solo. Yet he still can't get around a crit corner to save his life. Still spends most of the race sitting 3 feet out beside the group, in the wind. Still does the wrong kind of efforts at the wrong times for the wrong reasons. The remote coach can't see these mistakes, he's not in the race. A smart teammie could offer tips, if he had one.
Especially in the lower cats, I see it all the time - strong riders who don't get the results they deserve because of racing mistakes.
Horse to water.
I've been in more than one "leader" situation where tactics were discussed numerous times in advance of an event and there would still be one guy who would not stick to the plan. Inevitably their response to "why did you do that?" would start with "I thought..."
Great interview with Nelson Vails. The jist from him was he didn't think. He rode to the plan.
The reason you see the "DS/Coach" model on junior teams and not on most other teams until the pro ranks is that juniors have to listen to adults or you take their toys away. The pros get fired. The rest of the folks have no real obligation to listen, and often have a bunch of ego and self interest tied up in their racing. Read back through this thread and all the "coaches" mentioned were either working with juniors or 1/2 teams.
Best coach riding alongside someone can't always make some people comfortable rubbing elbows in a crit, or help some people turn off their brain. We've all seen the person who repeats the same mistakes in racing or in life. Some people you just can't reach.
That said you can impart a lot without riding next to folks. It requires a bit of inventiveness at times, and more so a willingness and interest from the racer.
And the bigger part of this is that it's far rarer to find people who have both a Big Book of Tactics (BBoT) and the teaching skills to impart that wisdom than it is to find people who know how to train. There are a whole bunch of coaches who haven't hardly won a race, a whole bunch who have won a few, but not many that have won a lot...it's pretty much a mirror of the cycling population as a whole. Then you take that small group and divide it into people who have teaching skills and those that don't. Shrinks it down further.
It's not hard to get a picture of this even at the pro ranks...certain DS's seem to fail with great regularity.
There was a great vignette in "Ball Four" about a hitting coach who was a terror at the plate back in the day. He couldn't articulate much of anything because he was just a natural talent. After watching guys mess up he would take the bat from them, whack one over the fence, then turn around and say "See? That's how you do it". Being a great racer doesn't make you a great teacher.