Runner Rising with Nicole Dobransky
Oct 2, 2026 · 24 min · 8 segments
Do you believe you're a damn good run coach? Or do you sometimes worry you're not experienced enough or doing enough? If your marketing isn't "working" or you feel that you can't charge more, it…
Nicole DobranskyHost
And that is the first question I wanna ask you is do you think you're a damn good coach, a great coach, an excellent coach? And if your first instinct was no, or yes, but maybe, that's not...
And I don't want you to beat yourself up or think that you're not a good coach because your first instinct was that.
But if you were able to turn it around and say, "You know, yeah, I am a great coach," then that's a great sign that you are gonna continue to grow your business.
You're going to build- be able to charge more, and you're gonna build a bigger business.
But if you're wavering, and maybe it's, you know, it's pretty normal to think, "Do my athletes think it's worth it to pay me $200 a month?" Or whatever you're charging.
It's a, it's a good amount of money, and you are wondering, do they think it's worth it? Are they still gonna wanna work with me if they don't PR in their upcoming race, or they don't hit their goal, or they're disappointed in their time? You might think, "Am I really qualified to do this because I've only been coaching a couple years?" Or I just got my, you know, certification six months ago, even though I've been running for 20 years, and I've read millions of running books, and I've listened to the podcasts, and I've helped people for free, and I've been...
I haven't technically done that for this long, right? Do I really know what I'm doing [laughs] when I make this schedule, when I create this workout? 'Cause I know I went through the RRCA coach certification.
I was like, "Wait, are you gonna actually teach us how to, like, make workouts?" But they don't, because...
If they just gave you a, uh, a guidebook with all these speed workouts and you just picked and picked them, that wouldn't be coaching.
When you're a coach, you create the training based on what happened in the previous weeks, the per- cur- the fitness.
You're, you're pulling one lever, right? You're either decreasing the rest, or you're increasing the interval, or you're changing the pace, right? You're doing one thing at a time, and that's what you've learned and you're applying.
But I know it can be daunting at times to be like, "Are these the right workouts?" Like, even when you've been doing it for a long time.
And then you might look at other coaches and think, "That coach charges less, and they have one more- way more experience, or they run faster." It's like, what am I doing, right, charging this much? Like, right? So if you're having these thoughts, and you know, I just had this conversation with a Runner Rising client who, she's VIP, so we booked, she booked her one-on-one call.
And I sensed the hesitation there with the confidence in her pricing and in, you know, you know, promoting herself.
And I think it's very natural in general for anyone to feel hesitant promoting themselves, and there's a whole different podcast on the sales side of business, but we're not talking about that today.
But what it came up with, or another podcast I've done that you should go back and listen to if you're hesitant about selling.
Um, but I wanna talk about today is just this hesitancy 'cause she was like, "Well..." 'Cause I was like, "Well, do you have experience with this one situation?" She's like, "Yeah, but you know, I've only been doing this for two years," or, you know, "Technically I only got certified in this other aspect at this point," right? She was just, like, justifying, like, that her...
That she wasn't really, really, you know, she wasn't really confident in her, in her pricing and her skills.
And if that's the case for you, if you're constantly, like, thinking, "Well, I just need another certification," or, "I need a few more years," or, "I need this," you're losing, you're losing money.
And that is the first question I wanna ask you is do you think you're a damn good coach, a great coach, an excellent coach? And if your first instinct was no, or yes, but maybe, that's not...
And I don't want you to beat yourself up or think that you're not a good coach because your first instinct was that.
But if you were able to turn it around and say, "You know, yeah, I am a great coach," then that's a great sign that you are gonna continue to grow your business.
You're going to build- be able to charge more, and you're gonna build a bigger business.
But if you're wavering, and maybe it's, you know, it's pretty normal to think, "Do my athletes think it's worth it to pay me $200 a month?" Or whatever you're charging.
It's a, it's a good amount of money, and you are wondering, do they think it's worth it? Are they still gonna wanna work with me if they don't PR in their upcoming race, or they don't hit their goal, or they're disappointed in their time? You might think, "Am I really qualified to do this because I've only been coaching a couple years?" Or I just got my, you know, certification six months ago, even though I've been running for 20 years, and I've read millions of running books, and I've listened to the podcasts, and I've helped people for free, and I've been...
I haven't technically done that for this long, right? Do I really know what I'm doing [laughs] when I make this schedule, when I create this workout? 'Cause I know I went through the RRCA coach certification.
I was like, "Wait, are you gonna actually teach us how to, like, make workouts?" But they don't, because...
If they just gave you a, uh, a guidebook with all these speed workouts and you just picked and picked them, that wouldn't be coaching.
When you're a coach, you create the training based on what happened in the previous weeks, the per- cur- the fitness.
You're, you're pulling one lever, right? You're either decreasing the rest, or you're increasing the interval, or you're changing the pace, right? You're doing one thing at a time, and that's what you've learned and you're applying.
But I know it can be daunting at times to be like, "Are these the right workouts?" Like, even when you've been doing it for a long time.
And then you might look at other coaches and think, "That coach charges less, and they have one more- way more experience, or they run faster." It's like, what am I doing, right, charging this much? Like, right? So if you're having these thoughts, and you know, I just had this conversation with a Runner Rising client who, she's VIP, so we booked, she booked her one-on-one call.
And I sensed the hesitation there with the confidence in her pricing and in, you know, you know, promoting herself.
And I think it's very natural in general for anyone to feel hesitant promoting themselves, and there's a whole different podcast on the sales side of business, but we're not talking about that today.
But what it came up with, or another podcast I've done that you should go back and listen to if you're hesitant about selling.
Um, but I wanna talk about today is just this hesitancy 'cause she was like, "Well..." 'Cause I was like, "Well, do you have experience with this one situation?" She's like, "Yeah, but you know, I've only been doing this for two years," or, you know, "Technically I only got certified in this other aspect at this point," right? She was just, like, justifying, like, that her...
That she wasn't really, really, you know, she wasn't really confident in her, in her pricing and her skills.
And if that's the case for you, if you're constantly, like, thinking, "Well, I just need another certification," or, "I need a few more years," or, "I need this," you're losing, you're losing money.
The rest of this transcript — segmented and speaker-labeled, so you land on the exact moment something was said
Search every transcript — by keyword, by phrase, or by meaning, across every show Radar indexes
Trends — what is surging across podcasts, measured against its own baseline
Alerts — when a name you follow appears in a newly indexed episode
No account is needed to search Radar.
