The Mental Aspect of Coaching
While our title is “instructor,” our responsibilities include being a profile creator, DJ, storyteller, and occasionally even an entertainer. But, our most important role is to coach our members. Proper coaching includes the technical aspects, such as knowledge of exercise physiology, safety precautions, biomechanics, and injury prevention. Perhaps the most difficult part of coaching to understand, let alone master, is the mental component. This involves motivating our riders to push themselves out of their comfort zones; giving them the confidence to stay there, despite how awful it feels; and then encouraging them to try it again. Whether our members’ goals are general fitness, weight loss, or specific to a sport, going outside their comfort zones will provide them with the physiological adaptations and mental beliefs needed to make significant progress toward achieving those goals. As coaches who understand the mental aspect of coaching, we can help our classes feel confident enough in themselves to be able to achieve whatever they’ve set out to accomplish through their indoor cycling training. A recent class of mine provides an example of this.
What is the rpm range, 85-105?
In this ride, I kept the cadence constant in the range of 80 – 95 (influenced by the BPM of the music) and had the riders increase their load (gear or resistance) to raise their power and intensity. It would work just as well increasing cadence at a constant load but you may need to find or edit music to increase the BPM over the 10 minutes.
Getting to the heart of the matter? Indeed! Well written article. Preparation is important & so is defining the goal(s), but often a lack of confidence in one’s self can foil a great plan as well as the lack of proper support. Stressing the importance of heart is so smart. The word’s association is strong enough to reach each athlete individually. Also being there close by to offer encouragement & support provided the safety net, so to speak, as they launched out of their comfort zones. Thank you for sharing! I will remember & apply this knowledge.
This is a great profile…I’m going to do this tomorrow. thanks Bill.
This sounds like a great profile! Could you tell me what is the timing for the 2 middle intervals?
The 4 intervals were sequenced as:
4,3,2,1
3,4,1,2
2,1,4,3
1,2,3,4
If you have a white board or mirror available in the room, you may write the sequence numbers down before performing each interval.
Really enjoyed reading this, gave me another perspective to put into my teaching.
For this offering you’ve given Bill, I say to you my closing for each class “My mind, my heart and my legs thank you for sharing/riding with me today.”