Day’s Verse:
Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.
James 1:12

Oh my goodness. It is so much worse than I thought or expected, and I already had extremely low expectations; it really is like a train wreck in slow motion. I’m not going into the full extent of the awfulness here right now, but let me just mention one extremely disturbing development: The LCI Coach is the person who teaches an LCI Seminar and he’s responsible for training new LCIs. The LCI Assistants, of which I am one, serve as extra eyes and ears for the LCI Coach in assessing the new LCIs as they teach. At least, that’s what I was led to believe.

Last night, however, the LCI Coach mentioned sort of off-hand, “I have assigned a few presentations to the LCI Assistants, and I trust they’ll volunteer to cover those.”

Let me just say right now that when I did my LCI Seminar in October, I spent hours preparing for my two presentations. I created lesson plans, I designed handouts and printed enough copies for everybody in the class (something this LCI Coach and the organizer of the Seminar both seem incapable of, but that’s a different story), found props, and practiced over and over to refine the amount of time my presentations took. Ian got really tired of hearing me talk about bike nutrition and bike fit, but even with that preparation, I felt a little bit anxious. Happily, my preparations paid off and both my presentations went beautifully; everybody loved them.

That said, imagine how I feel when last night, with no advance warning (despite my having emailed the LCI Coach and the seminar organizer in charge of the event asking if I should prepare in any way) or any time to prepare, I found out that I would be responsible for a group presentation today (Saturday) and an individual presentation on Sunday. And the LCI Coach specifically mentioned that he wanted “assess me” because he’d never seen me teach before, since I took my LCI Seminar in Boston with a different Coach. Yet that Coach passed me as an LCI-in-Training just fine. Why do I need more assessment?

In short — I know, I know, too late — I am seething. I agreed somewhat spur-of-the-moment to help with this because I thought it would give me a chance to review LCI need-to-know information before I start teaching bike classes myself. Also, they offered $100 for the weekend (not exactly a prime motivation since I’m spending over 20 hours on this activity in 2.5 days). Now I’m ready to walk out, not just over what I described above, but over a number of other issues. Only my concern for the other LCI Candidates, one of whom was in tears because of the other issues with the seminar Coach when I encountered her in the bathroom yesterday evening, makes me willing to go back. Boy am I glad I didn’t pay money for this like all the LCI Candidates.

I’m just keeping my eyes on the goal: Monday, and getting one class under my belt so I can shed the “In Training” part and become a full LCI. When I get to go back to work at the usual time without any breaks after this grueling weekend, and I’m confident I will feel only the deepest relief that Saturday and Sunday have passed.

4 thoughts on “LCI Seminar Trainwreck

  1. Hi. I wanted to do a little bit of research on reviews for the LCI seminar and stubbled upon this. Right now I am in the process of setting up a seminar here in Iowa. I will serve as the SF. It’s so much work and seems like it could be made so much easier. I am wondering if it is even worth it to bring LAB here do teach this seminar. Any advice would be much appreciated. Ride on.

  2. Hi Audrey,

    Since I wrote this blog in 2010, LAB has done a huge amount of work on their education program and it’s much, much better. The particular seminar I assisted with was quite rocky, but don’t let that deter you. The LCI Seminar I did to become an LCI went quite well and I had a great experience. It depends a great deal on the local facilitator and the LCI Coach who does the teaching.

    I haven’t been to an LCI Seminar since I assisted with the one in this post, but I’m impressed with the woman running the program, Alissa Simcox, and the changes she’s implemented to improve it. I’d highly recommend contacting her for the most up-to-date information on LCI Seminars. Her email is Alissa [at] bikeleague.org.

    Let me know if you have any other questions about LCI stuff. I’d be happy to help if I can.

    -KF

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