Written by Christopher Oleksiw, UESCA Certified Running Coach, RunDNA Level 1 Gait Analyst
What Is AI Coaching?
In almost every field, there are new concepts, equipment, or technology that can change how a game or sport is played. In golf, the Pro V1 golf ball was such a game changer that golf courses had to move the tees further back as pro golfers were driving the ball further than a normal golf ball. Helmets have made football much safer than without it. In the MLB, the pitch clock was introduced a few years ago to increase the pace of the game.
The running world is no exception. We have seen in the past few years many new things creep into the running field that have been both good and bad. Several years ago, all the rage was minimalist shoes. Many were running in glove shoes or even barefoot. The concept around it seemed solid and it resonated with many runners, but the amount of injuries increased soon after. People rushed into it too quickly and got hurt. Years later, carbon plated shoes entered the scene and runners’ race times dropped. Race qualification times have since gotten faster, but that may also be due to the increased interest in running.
A new technology has emerged and entered the running space: Artificial Intelligence. AI is nothing new. We have had AI for many years, but since OpenAI debuted ChatGPT, it has gained a heck of a lot of attention. There are many AI platforms out there (Gemini, CoPilot, DeepSeek, etc.) and they all work relatively the same. They have ingested all the information on the Internet and know how to speak in a very human way. These tools can be extremely useful.
I used AI to help me write code to automate various complex processes even though I hardly know any coding languages. However, †AI gives an answer no matter what, even if that answer is wrong. Remember when I said it ingested the whole Internet? Well, there is a lot of bad information on the Internet too (there is even a subreddit dedicated to when AI messes up called r/aifails). So how does AI affect running? Recently, new apps are appearing claiming to be AI Coaches for running. These apps claim to be able to coach athletes as effectively as a real human coach could.
Being Coached by a Robot…What Could Go Wrong?
I’ll be honest, I have used AI coaching in the past. This was long before I became a certified UESCA Road Running coach or even before I knew about Filla Endurance. Did it give me a plan to get to race day? Yes, but that does not mean the plan was a good plan. It was based on a generic plan that was not personalized to me or my life.
I gave it my estimated race time based on what I wanted to accomplish, not based on what I thought I was capable of. To say I was overreaching would have been an understatement. The app did not know me as a person beyond the little info it asked for. I remember training being brutal and the app didn’t care. It just kept spitting out the next run for me to do and only adjusting ever so slightly based on how my runs went. When I got sick, it did not adjust. It was just a missed week of running and had me get back to the plan with very little to no adjustments. It did not educate me on nutrition. It did not emphasize how important rest was. It did not alter the plan in any significant way when life events occurred. It did not give any meaningful feedback on how my runs and workouts were. I was just a data point for the app to ingest.
Thank goodness I did not get injured during training. I hate to think about what it would have me do with any kind of injury.
Why Effective Coaching Isn’t An AI App
Recent news has come out saying that Strava purchased Runna which is a very popular AI run coaching app. Being a UESCA coach, I have access to the UESCA Coaches Facebook group. Someone posted that news to the main page and almost every coach that commented said something along the lines of, “There are going to be so many injured runners because of this.”
The issue with AI is that you are just a data point. AI doesn’t care about you or how you do or what stressors are happening in your life that might affect your training. How can it? It’s just a robot.
It may know how to build a generalized plan, but it can’t build a personalized plan to fit an athlete’s life. If a life event happens (sickness, unexpected work trip, sleep issues, etc), it may not alter the plan enough to account for what is happening in your life.
AI has never been tired, so why would we trust it to know what running while fatigued is actually like? AI has never had stress from work. How can we trust it to know how mental fatigue would affect a run? What about accountability? If a run is missed, no harm no foul. It might adjust the plan, but has it adjusted the plan to properly fit the situation?
Earlier, I explained my experience with AI coaching, so let’s see how that compares to when I started being coached by Coach Laura Filla. When I said I wanted to start training to qualify for Boston, she asked me why that was important to me and recommended that I start training for a 10k first. When I started to feel an injury in my ankle, Coach Laura told me to back off of running and see a physical therapist. She also recommended I start incorporating strength training. When I told her that sleep has been an issue, she guided me on how to get better quality sleep and how to space my runs out (don’t run in the evening if the next morning I had speedwork, run before strength training, etc.).
When a workout was bad or disappointing, she reassured me that I was doing a great job and that I shouldn’t be down about a single bad run. When I PR’ed my marathon in November ‘24, she gave me such amazing feedback on my race and guided me through recovery by taking extra precautions about my weak ankle.
When I used AI coaching, I used it to train for my 2nd marathon. While I did slightly improve my time, my fueling was basically non-existent, the race was a death march, and I was nowhere close to the time that I wanted. When Coach Laura trained me for my 3rd marathon, she taught me how to fuel properly, why strength training was important, adjusted my plan when necessary, kept in constant communication with me on how training was going, and celebrated with me when I annihilated my marathon time! The difference was night in day.
Personalized run coaching is not a formula. It is not a bunch of code or algorithms. It is a relationship between athlete and coach. AI could have a place at the endurance training table in some fashion, but to fully remove a human coach and still have effective coaching isn’t going to happen any time soon. Don’t fall for the bling of a fancy looking app. Instead, find a coach who cares about you and wants you to succeed.
