Couch to 5K training (Read 850 times)

Hey there- For awhile now, I've turned new runners on to this plan and I have had people ask me to help them run their first 5K. I love doing this and I'm thinking of making it a little more formal and actually starting a group in my neighborhood maybe two mornings a week and the other morning would be on their own. I'm a personal trainer, and as much as I'd like to do this for free, I actually think that if I charged something for the 9 weeks of training, then maybe people would have more buy in. What is your opinion on how much is a reasonable amount to charge? I'm going to do the walk/run with them two mornings a week. Plus, give them the third workout (I may even do this one too. I haven't figured out all of the details) I don't want to charge too much. What would you be willing to pay? Any other advice on how to go about forming a group like this? A little about me: I'm not fast, but I have been running for about 10 years: done 5Ks up to marathons (5) all in the 4 hour range. I feel like I know enough about running to help a beginner and that's what I really want to do.

Thanks for your help Chuck. i've read posts of yours and thought of asking you this question directly, so I'm glad that you responded. If you see this, hopefully, you don't mind a few more questions. 1. Would you charge people a total fee upfront? I'm thinking this is the way to go. 2. How did you handle people of differing abilities? right now I have two people interested. One is not really a beginner, but still on the newer side. she can comfortably run 3 miles whereas the other girl needs to take walk breaks to complete 2 miles. So, already I have people on different pages. I think I will just start advertising and see what happens and go from there. Thanks for your help.

Thanks for your help Chuck. i've read posts of yours and thought of asking you this question directly, so I'm glad that you responded. If you see this, hopefully, you don't mind a few more questions. 1. Would you charge people a total fee upfront? I'm thinking this is the way to go. 2. How did you handle people of differing abilities? right now I have two people interested. One is not really a beginner, but still on the newer side. she can comfortably run 3 miles whereas the other girl needs to take walk breaks to complete 2 miles. So, already I have people on different pages. I think I will just start advertising and see what happens and go from there. Thanks for your help.

Kimmie, I do believe you need the committment from people upfront, so a flat fee is ideal. A couple options for people of differing abilities. 1. Have another person help you with this class/group and they be in charge of the true beginner and walk/run with them or you do this and other person work with the others. 2. If this is not an option, you may have to go with this true beginner group more and have the slightly more advanced runners go on there own or rotate days. It can be tricky but as long as you have at least 2 or 3 people running together at same pace that is good even if you are not with them. Another suggestion is to have some routes ready. I am sure you are thinking of this. Use a Garmin, car or bike and put out 2, 3, 4, 5 mile etc. routes and have maps for the runners so they know the route that day in case people get split up.

The running club in my town - www.melroserunningclub.com offers a similar program - though I think it is ten weeks and they charge only $25 per person.

I know this is an old post but I wanted to get back to it and say that I finally put together a flyer for this and will start hopefully next week if there is interest. I ended up with charging $100.00 for a 10 week/ two times a week program where I run with them both of those times and they do the third workout on their own. This works out to only $5.00 a session and I think that's not too bad. I did mention this to a running friend this morning and this was her response: "You're going to charge people for running?" I then tried to explain to her that it would be a coaching thing... and that some people need a structured program to commit themselves and that it wasn't that much money, etc... But, it mostly just made me doubt myself again. I actually wouldn't have even pursued this if I didn't have clients that have asked me to do this. so... we'll see how it goes. Thanks for all of the responses and help.

Thanks Sandy. good job on all you've accomplished!