What Coaching Athletes Teaches You About Building a Business

Lewis Moses is a high-performance running coach and business owner, helping athletes and coaches grow through clear systems, strong values and long-term thinking.In this conversation, he shares the parallels between coaching elite athletes and building a service-based business – from people management and leadership to patience, consistency and handling setbacks.Lewis also talks about scaling a coaching brand, maintaining standards across a team, using routines like journaling and exercise to stay grounded, and why technology and AI should enhance great coaching rather than replace it.A thoughtful discussion on performance, purpose and building something that lasts.Chapters00:00 Intro00:18 What’s harder: coaching athletes or building a business?01:46 What surprised Lewis most about starting a company03:47 Patience, process, and long-term thinking in business04:26 Sticking to the plan vs knowing when to pivot06:35 How improving a business is like improving a runner09:02 When Lewis realised the business needed systems11:42 Building trust and consistency across multiple coaches14:22 How to motivate athletes and employees who lose belief17:13 Fear vs belief in performance and business19:27 Resetting after setbacks, injuries, and difficult periods22:36 Daily habits for long-term performance and resilience25:12 Micro-recovery, structure, and avoiding burnout26:26 Will technology and AI replace coaches?28:29 Lewis’s advice for starting a service-based business29:52 Outro