Techy Tuesday: Running Room Half Marathon Web Clinic - First Impressions

As a part of my Run Van Blogger experience, I had the opportunity to receive a complimentary half marathon clinic to help me prepare for race day.  While I did have a dedicated running coach for my first Half Marathon, I have always been really curious about the Running Room clinics so was excited to take this one for a spin.

The only problem was that I don't have a very typical life and attending a clinic in person is very difficult for me because:

a) I live a half hour outside of Calgary
b) We only have one vehicle
c) We have toddler twins who need to go to bed shortly after an in-store clinic would start
d) our commute is hellish enough as it is

Enter: the web clinic.
Problem solved.  

Soon, I was registered into the online clinic.  I thought I would share some of my initial impressions in case you've been considering doing one of these.

Perhaps the biggest thing I thought I would be missing out on, by doing an online clinic, was the demonstrations that go with it. There are some things that just can't be relayed succinctly in text.  As soon as I clicked on the curriculum link, I was pleasantly surprised to find audio files for many of the sessions, in addition to the textual write-ups.  

Other features of the online course are:

• Extensive PDF clinic training manual (could be downloaded to read on an e-reader)
• training plans - you can customize them based on your goal finish time and they feature goal paces for each training run
• printable pace bands
• training log
• calculators
• archive of the instructor emails (helpful when you start a few weeks in, like I did)
• a discount coupon for the Running Room

All of this is available from your Running Room account, so if you are already registered, you will soon notice a small button on the bottom left of your profile to access the clinic.

From what I can see, Running Room does e-learning right.  (And I can say this with some authority, since I worked in e-learning for years and years.)  They provide a ton of information within the profile that can be accessed at anytime PLUS, they have a dedicated instructor who is available to answer questions or provide guidance along the way.

The only thing I can initially see as being a disappointment was that there is no way to interact with other clinic participants. An online chat would have been wonderful, but it definitely does not distract from the truly awesome list of features the online clinic DOES have.

Just my initial impressions. Now that I have caught up on the curriculum I missed, I am looking forward to making the most out of my clinic experience and will hopefully emerge on the other side of my race with a new personal best!  I'll weigh in later with more thoughts!