Tom van Venrooij

MY BIO:

I’m a certified 80/20 Endurance coach with experience in the field of running and knowledge of sports physiology. With Grow Beyond Coaching I guide ambitious recreational runners to run faster and farther with great enjoyment. This is realized by designing 100% tailor made training plans for individual athletes and their specific goals and circumstances. The plans include features to realize personal growth that can be applied outside running and can lead to a sustainable increase in quality of life.
I’m continuously learning to deepen my knowledge of physiology and training philosophies and learn the necessary skills to use this knowledge to design successful training plans for athletes. Next to the 80/20 Endurance certification, I also completed the courses “Assistant Running Coach” of the Royal Dutch Athletics Federation, UESCA Running Coach Certification and TrainingPeaks Level 2 Certification. The knowledge gained from these courses enable me to design tailor made training plans built around a clear and collectively established goal and taking into account the specific circumstances, abilities, preferences and demands of the athlete and the goal.

After 15 years of playing several sports (including soccer, tennis, and snowboarding), a serious injury in 2010 prevented me from continuing playing American Football. I started specifically training for running goals and due to my lack of knowledge and guidance my “training” consisted of running very challenging workouts as often as possible. I improved quickly, but was also frequently injured. From 2012 onwards I gained knowledge in the field of sports physiology through reading relevant literature and achieved sustained periods of training without injuries. I gained experience in designing my training plans for running fast at shorter distances (e.g. 10k in 36:32) and for completing over 15 ultramarathons (e.g. 115 km Swiss Canyon Trail in Switzerland, 119 km Mozart 100 in Austria and self supported 101 km trail run in The Netherlands). Since 2024, Grow Beyond Coaching enables me to share my passion and knowledge and guide athletes to achieve their running goals responsibly and run faster and/or farther with great enjoyment of the training process. I coach a maximum of 15 athletes at a time, to make sure that I have the time and energy to truly dedicate myself to the coaching of every single athlete on the roster.