Why don’t you just shoot a quick note to your coach saying “mind if I do xxx today instead?”

Some of us aren’t drill sargeants and realize that going off plan, or doing something slightly different than what’s on the plan will keep you sane and engaged with the training for the long haul.

Otherwise you could create trust issues by hiding what you’re actually doing...and then what’s the point.

Just communicate bro.

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Steve Johnson
DARK HORSE TRIATHLON |

If you don't trust your coach I would recommend looking for a different one. If you tell him/her that you are fresh and want to go harder, but he/she thinks you should rest, you are either a moron for not listening, or it is time to part ways. The whole point of having a coach is to not get good ideas/let someone else be in charge. If you can't go ease, you're probably uncoachable or just not disciplined enough.

I did when I was my own coach. I always added extra to my plan. I have a coach because they know better than me and my results show it.

Just talk to the coach. Communication is the most important thing in that relationship.

You're paying your coach to give you a good quality plan, then hiding what you do to undermine the quality of that plan? That seems like a great strategy...

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

Why are you paying a coach if you are going to go off plan? Rest and recovery (both in terms of down-weeks in season, and during off season) are so vitally important to your continued progress as an athlete. If you are cheating on your rest time, you are only doing yourself a disservice. Your coach is giving you that time to adapt to the training (for rest weeks in-season), or to fully recover from a long season of stress on your body.

At the very least, record it so your coach knows you did this.

That said, doing something like this on occasion isn't going to hurt things too much, but if you are always putting added stress on your body (especially when your coach doesn't know about it), you are setting yourself up for injury and disappointment.

I have asked that the athletes I coach always record anything "extra" they do just so I am aware of it. I have never had to admonish anyone (yet) for doing too many extra unscheduled sessions, but if I saw something like this all the time I would be asking why they felt the need to do this.

Edit to add: in almost all cases of athletes doing extra work (and to honest here I do this myself from time to time), it's a case of "it's super nice out, I didn't have an afternoon workout on the schedule, and I had time to kill, so I went for a joyride" sort of situation. And honestly those are never a problem. Nobody has ever gone and done (as far as they would admit) some random extra workout with high power intervals or whatever.

nope. I just communicate. If I'm getting close to a big event like an IM and am wanting to skip a critical workout for no good reason my coach my get annoyed.

I coach 12 athletes and I’ve set the expectation that they follow the plan unless something comes up. I also encourage them to provide feedback based on how they are feeling. Sometimes it’s hard to gauge what a newer athlete can handle and how quickly they progress so adjustments need to happen. This is pretty organic and I don’t ever see anyone going rogue. I am actually more concerned with athletes falsifying metrics and completed workouts.

I think communication is key. Reach out and talk through the workouts.

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USAT Level II- Ironman U Certified Coach

When I had a coach it was understood that I could add easy running or riding any time I wanted. I just reported it to him.

Touching on this... this is called exercise bulimia, and isn't a good habit to get into.

It would be more workout for me to falsify my workouts. Everything just syncs automatically so I'd need to turn that off and manually upload. Just not worth the effort.

In training peaks, it has that "how did it feel" feature with rpe. If I mark the :( face I know I'll quickly get a text from my coach. I also usually add a comment there as well for the workout if it was easy or felt really hard or something went wrong. whatever. Any of the more critical workouts, I get pretty quick texts about how it went or how a interval went. sure, my coach has all the data to look at so she already has a pretty good idea of how the workout went but we have a lot of communication back and forth about how I'm feeling both physically and mentally.

I've worked with my coach a couple years. I skipped one year in between. But my plan now is much different than the first year I worked with her. Sure some workouts always are included in IM training but a lot of it's different and I'm sure a lot of that has to do with learning what I can handle and what sort of workouts I seem to respond better to.

Nope.

As others have said, just communicate. If you feel the urge to do more, just ask if you can do more. I do this all the time. Sometimes she says yes, sometimes no. I trust her. I'm getting results by listening to her. Sometimes we disagree, and I talk her into letting me do more after explaining (for example) that I've been getting more sleep than usual and life is lower stress than usual, etc. Sometimes she talks sense into me. I haven't had a major injury in a year, which is the longest I've gone since middle school, so something's working.

Sometimes I'll ask people on this forum about what's working and not working for them, but I always talk it over with my coach.

If you don't trust your coach to make the final recommendation, you should probably get a new coach.

This topic is so disappointing...........I thought we were talking about getting your heart-rate up a different way......kind of like in T3.

It all depends on if the coach makes me wear a trucker hat....

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

You are uncoachable. I would drop you as a client, if I was your coach and found out. In the end the person you’re really cheating is yourself.

This is precisely why I don't have a coach.

Sometimes I feel much better than expected.

Sometimes I feel much worse than expected.

I'm not a robot, and no one can predict how I'm going to respond to any particular dose of training, so why waste money on it?

A little experience and data goes a very long way.

As a coach that is on both ends of this, I'd rather the athlete communicate to me first if they think they can handle more.
I'd then structure the existing plan differently rather than add more workouts and see if the athlete can lift their ass out of bed by the end of the week, if that's what they are looking for.

I have athletes that shoot me a message "hey, want to do a group ride for an hour" and we figure it out.
Some want to do a 2 hour group ride, and if they REALLY want to do it, I structure their week around it.
I always ask them what their goal is. Race performance. Fitness. Social interaction. Hard to mash it all in there and weeks may change.

I also have had athletes with other coaches come to me and ask about addition workouts... and I'm like "go talk to your coach first".

Like some have mentioned, if you don't feel like your coach is in tune with you, time to move on.

It should be a clear line of communication and understanding.

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Ryan
http://www.SetThePaceTriathlon.com
http://www.TriathlonTrainingDaddy.com
I got plans - https://www.trainingpeaks.com/...dotcom#trainingplans

You described a training plan. Not a coach. Of course you are not a robot (something my coach recently reminded me about after I complained about being worn out at the top of an Ironman build). The entire point of a coach is to balance those feel good days with feel bad days, and optimize the work you can (or should) do based on the way you feel at the time.

Wow, I really touched a nerve with all the coaches here.

It's nothing personal; I love my coach and we communicate wonderfully. And I talk to my coach about these things, but I don't wait for him to return my text or call just so I can go for an extra run if I feel good.

In fact this has nothing to do with coaching. It has to do with feeling great and wanting to get a little extra work in and perhaps feeling guilty about it.

Don't get me wrong, either. I got over that kind of situation a long time ago.
Just perspective from a coach.

The main factor for me as a coach would be to consider if they are going for broke, KQ, Ag win, all in, etc.
If we are threading the needle through the eye for the best performance on race day, rest days are rest days. No added activities, period. Planned that way for a reason and doing a fun ride or run doesn't jive with the goal.

If they are wanting to have a life, then hit the fun runs, social rides, whatever. Life's too short. :)

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Ryan
http://www.SetThePaceTriathlon.com
http://www.TriathlonTrainingDaddy.com
I got plans - https://www.trainingpeaks.com/...dotcom#trainingplans

Is this Lionel???

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Let food be thy medicine...

dang it!!! you beat me to it!

What he doesn’t know can’t hurt him...

I've been all over the map on this. There's one race I do which if I'm honest, I don't think gets the build it deserves. And when I declared it my A race, it didn't get the offer for a phone call that other A races did. And that disappointed me and I'm absolutely spineless when it comes to providing feedback like this. Always in my head is I'm just a random adult, will never be amazing, so what would I complain for?

Then there are the occassional & recurring stream of motivational issues. Seasonal affect. Injury that hampers my spirits. Work stress that I have not yet figured out how to resolve. In these times I completely disregard what's written and consider it a success if I do any exercise at all. I want to be consistant. I want to progress. But I don't know how to consistently do that and manage the other situations that arise, and keep my S.O. from walking out.

So the end result is as indicated in my 1st sentence. If that renders me uncoachable, so be it. (shrug).

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To breathe, to feel, to know I'm alive.

There is nothing wrong in wanting other things than training in life. Or wanting other things in life more than training. You still probably want to work out, but life has different aspects to it.

Most people I meet seem to have this urge to justify to me why they don't work out more and why they don't eat healthier. Quite frankly I am pretty self absorbed and couldn't care less about what other people do/don't do. But after encountering this again and again I have started to ask why they tell me this.

"I feel that you're judging me", is the answer I get.

It is not based on what I say, apparently, so I guess it is their guilt being projected onto me. Or maybe it is based on what I say, they just don't want to tell it to my face. Anyway, I don't get the mentality. You probably work out to feel better, but don't let it be another stressor in life. The same goes for a coach. I think the most important task for a coach is to be able to objectively evaluate what you should/shouldnt do in training, based on all the information you have provided.

If this helps you with your training, then use it. If you feel guilty about it (adds stress), you don't follow the plan (which is why you paid for it in the first place) or you don't trust your coach, I don't think a coach is right for you. Or maybe it is, but the coach you are working with now is definitely not the right coach for you.

"So the end result is as indicated in my 1st sentence. If that renders me uncoachable, so be it. (shrug). "

That just isn't good enough. I have a friend who treats his relationship in the same way. Of course that is completely different, but without comparing the gravity of the situations, the similarities are striking:

She cheats on him. Feels bad about it. Tells me. I tell her to tell him/dump him/never do it again. She takes door number 3, EVERY FUCKING TIME. Time passes. The cycle repeats.

So what can you learn from this? Evaluate yourself. Are you cheating on your coach? Drop him/her. Find a new coach or try to be self coached. My friend has feelings for her BF, which keeps her in her relationship. What keeps you from dumping your coach? Some skewed sense of loyalty?

You obviously aren't getting what you are paying for. Moreover, your coach will use your data to gain knowledge he/she then can use to train other people more effectively. So not only are you sabotaging yourself, you are sabotaging your coach`s career without him/her knowing it.

It is not fair to him/her, but but screw that. You owe it to yourself (and your wallet) to do an honest evaluation.