Team Average - No.1 Swimming Coach

So it's time to meet the first member of Team Average and his name is Richard Nicholas who's my Swimming Coach.

This is Richard on the very first occasion I actually met him, now I know what you're thinking nice boots!

They are in fact his own boots which he claims he had when he dressed up as Ginger Spice from the Spice Girls, Union Jack mini dress and all!

I can confirm that this is the case as I have seen the pictures which are still giving me nightmares even now although I do think he had them way before this!

But putting the boots to one side Richard is a qualified swimming teacher where swimming has always been passion of his even though he was a non swimmer until he was 9yrs of age.

 

He learnt to swim at Abbey Sports Centre in Barking which was where I met him last year as one of my team of swimming teachers.

 

After learning how to swim he started swimming for Ilford swimming club, training 5 times a week and representing the club at the weekends. 

He qualified at the age of 18 as a level 2 swimming teacher and spent the next four years teaching  swimming at Goresbrook leisure centre where he decided that this was an ideal career path to follow.

He helped to develop the programme and even introduced parent and baby lessons to the centre which were a great success. 

 

However Life took him off in a different direction where he got married to the lovely Nina and having their first child, Harry, and becoming a manager of a car hire company at  Stansted airport.

Despite this he always kept my toe in the water (excuse the pun) teaching on Sunday mornings. 

 

Over the past 3 years he has been back teaching and is now in a full time teaching post at the recently opened by the Queen, Abbey Leisure Centre.

He is also a qualified Aqua-aerobic instructor where he can be found throwing some shapes on weekly basis!

As I've mentioned the biggest challenge for me is the swimming part and already in the first couple of weeks he has got me swimming 20 lengths (500m) each session.

Richard has many years of experience and is a very enthusiastic, skilful and technical coach but what he also brings which for me is far more important, given the amount of training I'm going to have to do, is making it fun.

It was evident in my first session with him that he was the right man for the job when he provided me with a bright yellow swim hat.

He wasn't phased by the fact that I insisted in wearing it during a busy evening casual swimming session at a local pool and despite how nervous I was we had a great laugh and he made me feel so relaxed.

So ladies and gentlemen this is the first piece of Team Average Mr Richard Nicholas!

 

 

 

There's no 'I' in Team

Well what an amazing week I had last week.

I had the honour of meeting the Queen as she officially opened the leisure centre that I operate.

Now those that know me would not be surprised that I would try and shoehorn this is to a blog about me training for an Ironman however humour me as there is reason other than me wanting to show off the fact that I met the Queen!

You the Royal visit didn't just happen, it wasn't a case of getting a phone call from the palace to say that the Queen fancied a day out and will be popping along.

This was a meticulously planned visit and had been in carefully put together for months.

But it wasn't just the planning stage that was impressive it was the support team that was in place to ensure that every last detail, including food and drink, and eventuality was looked into but also to ensure that everyone on the day enjoyed themselves.

You see so here's the thing it made it clear to me that in order for me to do this massive challenge I'm going to need a team around me to ensure that every last detail is looked in to and planned to get me to the finish line.

Now clearly I'm not going to have the number of people that the Royal party had but it is important for me to build a team I can trust as I'm not going to be able to do this without help and careful planning.

The first part of my support team is obviously my family, mainly my wife and kids, they have been there for me through all the previous challenges and have a lot of patients particularly when I'm not around because I'm training, but the support of them however vital and improtant it is to me I'm going to need a few more people as part of the team.

So where do I start looking for a team, well fortunately I work in the leisure industry so I have a few specialists in different fields available but it's about selecting the right people.

I've also looked at the areas where I feel I need the most support at this time so I have focused on a swimming coach, nutritional and strength coach and sports therapist.

Now it's still early days but I have started piecing Team Average together and hopefully in the coming weeks I will be able to introduce you to the team.

As for now I'm going to continue smiling over the events of last week as well as training for the Race the Train event I have in 4 weeks time.

Average Joe returns

The last time I wrote a blog was back in December 2013 as I completed 12 challenges in 12 months (http://averagejoechallenge2013.blogspot.com)

So what have I been up to since then, well I have remained active and following the end of the challenge I started to play hockey again. I hadn't played in over five years but I joined a great little club and I've loved playing again.

I've continued to run as well as playing but I have missed pushing myself to the extreme although if you see me the day after I've played hockey you'd think I had just ran a marathon!

So this year I have completed the Essex and Halstead Marathon in May and in August I will be taking part in Race the Train in Tywyn, Wales.

This has just wet my appetite for more and so I have decided that despite my 'fear' of swimming I will do a triathlon. Well that's not a challenge I hear some of you say and to a certain degree you are right however I plan to do an Ironman distance triathlon!

So what does that mean, well this would mean swimming 2.4 miles in open water, cycle 112 miles and then run 26.2 miles (a marathon).

So this is just the start of the journey and although I haven't officially entered yet I am planning to do an event in September 2016 and I will share with you my journey through the good times and the bad, the highs and lows.

I want to share how an average person can achieve the seemingly impossible and prove those doubters wrong!