Coaching Services

Running, Cycling and Multisport Coaching and Consulting

I offer remote-based coaching and consulting for runners, cyclists and multisport athletes. I enjoy working with athletes of all levels of experience, fitness and ability. Helping others enjoy sport, challenge themselves and pursue their goals brings me a great deal of happiness. 

Who am I?

I'm Albert Harrison - most people call me Bert.



I was fortunate enough to grow up running and racing bikes. I ran cross country and track at Berry College from 2007-2011. I found duathlon as a post collegiate athlete. 

I am a four-time USA Triathlon All-American in duathlon, a three-time national champion, and a two-time age-group world champion. I finished 6th at the 2018 ITU Powerman Zofingen Duathlon World Championship. As of 2023, I am still competing as an Elite Duathlete, a Masters/Cat 2 road cyclist and an "Elite/Pro" mountain biker.

But of course, race results don't make you a good coach. I also received a master's degree in exercise science from Appalachian State University. In my time at App State, I worked closely with coach and physiologist David Morris to examine the effects of different oxygen concentrations on training intensity and cycling performance. Environmental physiology, strength training, bioenergetics and nutrition remain my primary interests in exercise science. My experience as a scientist has had a profound impact on my training and coaching philosophies.

I've had the opportunity to coach with four NCAA cross country and track and field programs (men's and women's teams). I've also had the opportunity to work with post-collegiate runners, cyclists and multi-sport athletes from all levels. From elementary school kids to the master's weekend warriors; state champions, to Boston qualifiers; ultramarathoners to Cat 1 cyclists.

My coaching philosophy centers around the athlete's overall health and his or her enjoyment of sport. I love helping athletes challenge themselves and pursue their goals. I enjoy applying the concepts I have learned as an exercise scientist and using the knowledge I have gleaned from over 20 years of involvement in endurance sports to formulate progressive training plans.

Whether you want to improve your sprint speed, raise your threshold power, run a fast mile or marathon - I'd like to help! Pricing is negotiable. We can create a plan tailored specifically to your needs. For more information, contact me by email.

Thanks!

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Lactate, Lactic Acid and Acidosis

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With respect to exercise, what do you think of when I say, “Lactic Acid?” Legs burning? Acidosis? Horrible stuff that slows me down? Lactic acid and lactate typically get a bad rap from athletes, but what if I said that rather than slowing you down, lactate production enables high-intensity exercise? Well, it does. Lactate vs. Lactic Acid      First, let’s discuss the compound itself. Lactate is not lactic acid. Lactate is a carboxylate, whereas lactic acid is a carboxylic acid. This means the carboxyl group of the lactate molecule is deprotonated and cannot contribute further to acidosis.  The image below shows the difference between the two molecule types.      The reason lactate does not exist as it's protonated acid form in the body is because the pKa of lactate is a low 3.9. This means is that in a solution with a pH higher than 3.9, the compound will exist as the deprotonated carboxylate, lactate.  As shown below, in Table I from Cairns ( 2006 ), the
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Don't believe everything that you read.

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Leave it to Twitter to get me riled up. A tweet caught my attention a few days ago. It read: "Greater improvements in cycling performance parameters following HRV-guided vs. block training." I was intrigued, so I read the abstract . I didn't have access to the peer review journal at the time, but I could see in the abstract, "Between-group fitness and performance were similar after the study." So I called out the original "tweeter," saying there was no statistically significant difference between the two groups. Claiming one is superior, misrepresents the study's findings. By this point I noticed the individual is a  professor and researcher and maintains a blog devoted to heart rate variability (HRV) research - which surprised me. If he's a professor, surely he understands statistics - I couldn't help but think he was misrepresenting the findings to support his bias in favor of  HRV-guided training... After I pointed out
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Fractional Utilization, Low Carbohydrate Diets and Running Performance

Fractional utilization refers to the fraction of VO2max that an athlete sustains during an event. It varies between events and between athletes. An athlete can sustain a greater percentage of VO2max for a shorter duration (5000m vs. 10,000m). Fractional utilization is sometimes referred to as lactate threshold. While the concepts are related, they are not the same. Consider an athlete with a VO2max of 70 ml/kg/min: If we find that he can average 90% of VO2max over the course of a 5000m run, he averages 63.0 ml/kg/min for the race. If he averages 86% of VO2max during a 10,000m run, he averages 60.2 ml/kg/min. Athletes may train for years, increasing fractional utilization. By increasing fractional utilization, an athlete will be able to complete a distance at a greater percentage of VO2max. For example, if that same athlete increases his fractional utilization during the 5000m to 93%, he can now average 65.1 ml/kg/min. That 2.1 ml/kg/min increase in utilization means more O2 is cons
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