About run2bu

Welcome to run2bu, the running and coaching company owned and run by Richard Pickering. We believe in helping everyone to be the best they can be and our aim is to provide excellent service and advice in a professional manner.
We offer a personal 1-1 coaching service. This involves us writing a training programme tailored specifically to your needs and level of development. With regular feedback from you we can really focus on your individual development. We believe this strategy is the best way to bring you the best results.

We offer individual mentoring appointments which may be a conversation or could include a run with a coach, along with a full review and assessment of your current level of training and future goals.
We work with our colleagues at Full Potential to deliver some fabulous training days in the UK where we can offer a little more depth of coaching expertise. We also work with Full Potential on a warm weather training camp in March in the beautiful Algarve.

We have, for the last few years, run a trip to the Edinburgh marathon, and we will be going back in 2013. There is a special atmosphere at this event and whether you are running in the half, full marathon or the relay there seems to be something for everyone which brings a real sense of camaraderie to the day. This year a 5 and 10k is also planned. Our aim is to run similar trips in the future to some other popular, but slightly different, races. 

We are also planning to hold our own 10k series across a number of existing races. More details to follow shortly. .

Last, but by no means least, we are passionate about developing young athletes and helping to bring through our potential stars of the future. We give all young athletes (U20) a discounted service for personalised training and this year along with our colleagues at Full Potential ran a fantastic young athlete’s training camp in the Summer, the week before the Olympics started. We were spoilt with the best weather seen in this country so far in 2012 and had a fabulous week with fantastic kids and  great team of experienced and dedicated coaches, staff and young athlete helpers. 

We are absolutely committed to providing an outstanding level of service and helping you to be the best you can be. We don’t do generic programmes that other companies provide because we believe that every athlete is an individual and we firmly believe that what we provide represents the very best value for money in the market. It gives you the opportunity to really embrace and enjoy our sport as well as helping you to deliver the results you are looking for.

For further information please email us at Richard@run2bu.co.uk

About Richard Pickering

Richard is a UKA qualified endurance coach and has been coaching for about 9 years. “I did not run seriously when I was younger, I played football throughout my 20s and really just ran for fitness. Although I was always a big athletics fan I didn’t really get into running until later in life. However I am making up for it now and, along with my interest in running, I also bring with me an absolute passion for the development of others. I have 18 years of professional experience in learning and development with John Lewis Department stores. This, along with my qualification and experience as a professional life coach, puts me in a great place to understand your needs and give you the right programme which works best for you.

It was with John Lewis that I became involved in athletics through a track and field competition which, my then branch at Oxford Street won. From then on I really became hooked and the distances gradually grew until I eventually ran my first marathon at London in 2001”. Richard has since ran 14 marathons with a relatively modest PB (his words) of 3.06. “I still reckon there’s a sub-3 in there somewhere” he concludes.
He has worked with athletes at club level up to championship marathon standard, both men and women and U20 athletes at club and county level , with 1 athlete running x country for England. He is one of about 30 coaches nationwide on the National coach mentoring scheme run by England Athletics. Their aim is to develop the coaches of the future and in so doing improve endurance standards in the country. As part of this he has access to the most experienced endurance coaches in the country as well as the best written and on-line resources available.

Richard says: “ Our aim, as a company, is to be totally in touch with the needs of the new or more experienced club athlete trying to reach their potential as well as providing the support structure and expertise to help athletes developing into the elite ranks of the sport. Our desire is to support everyone to be the best they can be, whatever level they are at.”