Sometimes an athlete picks a coach based on financial concerns. This is most likely to happen with sports that involve expensive private lessons. In order to attract the best talent, coaches are sometimes willing to be creative when it comes to getting paid. Here are some options they may offer:
1. Sponsorship money.
Sponsorship is a common way for athletes to cover training expenses. Usually athletes find their own sponsors, but sometimes sponsors work with coaches instead. Example:
Athletes who want to tap into this kind of sponsorship money have to be prepared to work with the coaches who have it. There's nothing wrong with this arrangement, but some athletes may feel compromised. Example:
He went on to win two gold medals and a bronze at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.
Unfortunately, some athletes cannot afford to be so selective: either they go where the handouts are or they are forced to quit. Still, the best solution is probably to train with the coach you really want, even if it means finding your own sponsorship money or cutting corners to keep expenses down.
2. Paying back a coach in the future.
Some coaches are willing to forego payment in the present in hopes of recovering it in the future. Among these coaches, some do it to have access to talented, but sometimes financially strapped, athletes; others hope to reap long-term financial rewards. Some coaches operate with an informal understanding that they will be paid eventually; others sign a formal agreement with their athletes to take a percentage of future earnings or winnings. Example:
The Williams sisters trained with Macci until 1995.
Athletes, particularly those who can't afford coaching otherwise, often willingly agree to a financial arrangement based on future earnings. Unfortunately, these situations do not always work out as planned. Examples:
''She knew I fought tooth and nail to get her to where she was. I took a reduction in salary all the way through....
''Her mother came to me after the first few lessons and said, 'Look, I don't have any money for more lessons.' I always said to them 'you can always pay me back when you are rich and famous.' I never put anything in writing, I just did it.'' (4)
''You raise the grapes. Someone else makes wine.'' (5)
These problems seem to arise for one of two reasons: the athletes either don't fully understand what they are agreeing to or they want to change the arrangement after the fact.
Initially athletes are willing to do anything to win, short of signing a pack with the devil. They agree to pay their coaches either a set amount or a percentage of future earnings. This is a legitimate business arrangement. But sometimes, after they are famous, these athletes resent having their former coaches own a share of them.
The coaches, on the other hand, feel they are entitled to some compensation because, in their eyes, any success their athletes achieve has been a team effort. As they see it, their former students couldn't have made it to the top without them. Why should they be limited to a coach's salary when the athlete's earning potential is so much higher? How else are they going to increase their income unless it's by developing a group of successful competitors and then sharing in their future? Example:
Arias responded: "I understand where Nick's coming from. I would feel slighted, too, if I were working with a kid from the time he was twelve years old and he made it to number five in the world, and I never got a dime. But how do you write up a contract with a twelve-year-old? You don't.
"When I was growing up, when I was a kid at the academy, I never even thought of paying Nick. He was my coach for free, just as, before him, my father had been my coach for free. They coached me because they wanted to coach me. When I got to the semifinals of the U.S. Open at nineteen, the idea of giving Nick a tip, a bonus -- which I would certainly do today -- didn't even occur to me." (6)
The only real solution is for athletes not to agree (either verbally or in writing) to any arrangement they aren't willing to abide by in the future.
If you are presented with such an agreement, think it through. Even if you can't afford to pay a coach now, don't promise to pay him or her back later if you don't mean it. It's much more honest and professional to find another coach in the first place than to renege on a deal later on.
Occasionally coaches have been known to railroad athletes into such agreements. Nothing is mentioned initially, and then when the athlete is on the verge of success, the coach says he or she will no longer coach unless an agreement is signed. Even in these cases it is better to leave than to agree to something which will be unworkable later on.
Some points to consider:
A. Is future payment a set amount or a percentage of earnings? If the coach expects the athlete to have substantial earning power, he or she may ask for a percentage. But from the athlete's point-of-view, a set fee is an easier concept to grasp. Such a fee would, most likely, include all expenses and normal coaching fees incurred over the course of the relationship, plus additional money to compensate the coach for not being paid at the time the services were rendered.
B. If payment is a percentage of earnings, what earnings are involved and for how long? Does the coach get a percentage of all earnings or just sports-related activities? For example, is a skating coach's percentage limited to ice show contracts or is he or she entitled to a percentage of all earnings, including endorsements and non-sports activities? And for how long? Until the next Olympics or for a lifetime? What if an athlete gets out of sports altogether and into a totally different field? Is he or she still expected to pay?
3. Coaching for free.
Occasionally it happens.
Sometimes the coach is not well-known and is willing to take on a talented athlete for nothing in order to gain visibility in the sport. Example:
Other times a coach is altruistic enough to want to help someone with potential, but no financial resources. Examples:
The main problem with getting free coaching is that other students, the ones who have to pay, may become resentful. Knowing this, a coach isn't likely to broadcast that he or she is providing freebies for a select few. But such information usually leaks out anyway. (And rumors run rampant. True or not, people tend to assume that an impoverished athlete training with an expensive coach is receiving special treatment.)
Some coaches get around the problem of jealousy by setting up certain publicly announced criteria based on need, talent, or competitive accomplishments. Examples: