How much do I work?

You might wonder how much work does a job like mine entail. After all, I am 'just' a triathlon coach, right? I have been at it for nearly a decade and have a reasonable athlete/client base. This is an average weekly breakdown from January through October, when things quiet down a bit.

In no particular order:

Athlete schedule writing: 20 hours
Phone consulting with athletes: 3 hours
Swim practice and lessons: 6 hours
General office work (check writing, deposits, supplies): 2 hours
Personal training with athletes: 3 hours
Marketing (email blasts, materials, etc): 2 hours
Accounting: 2 hours
Email support & schedule adjustments for athletes: 8 hours
Continuing education (reading articles, books): 2 hours
Business development: 2 hours
Travel time: 2 hours

I have the long term goal of getting to the point where I do very little work on the weekends, but that has not happened yet. My work is spread around the clock, seven days a week. This past Tuesday when I drove to the beach to surf and then came home to celebrate Bri's birthday was the first time in a couple of months where I did zero to barely any work - I answered a few emails on my crackberry.

This is a comfortable workload for me; there are uncomfortably busy periods (like January & February of this year) where I may work up to 50% more than this, and uncomfortable un-busy periods (like the late 2008 to mid 2009 recession) where I work less.

So next time you imagine that all I do is sit home and go train, check your presumptions. I do enjoy most of what I do but it is still work on some levels.

That is your thought for the day.

Now I am off to play with Tassie in the backyard and go for a run-swim-run. Ha!