Getting To The Starting Line

There are so many different coaches, training plans, and training methods out there and it's not very clear which path is the best for me. I'm in the process of trying to figure out how I'm going to go about training and preparing for this race. So many coaching sites promise Personal Record (PR) or Personal Best (PB) times and some talk about percentage improvements that their athletes have seen. There are USAT coaching certifications but outside of that there’s nothing to really offer insight to their coaching methods or what they know. Here are the options I’m looking at. Prices are approximate.

• Self Coached - Free - Just as the name implies, you do it yourself. This is the least expensive option and there are a lot of books (The Training Bible, Going Long) out there with great information which go into the details that you need to successfully make it to the finish line. I tried something like this for my first Half Ironman and that race HURT! Granted, I didn't read much on the sport and have learned a lot since then.
• Download A Training Plan – Free – There are several training plans on the internet and in some of the books that offer you the self coaching tools. They provide the workouts and all you have to do is follow the schedule.
• New Coach – TBD - A friend of mine is training someone for this same race through work and I'm trying to persuade her to train me as well. She is an elite athlete and an Ironman but this is her first shot at coaching.
• Endurance Nation (EN) - $700 – EN is an on-line coaching company that seems to offer more of a One Size Fits All approach to their training plans. Their marketing says that their program is targeted towards busy people and they can get you ready for an IM in around 10 hours of training a week. Very Appealing. The down side is that it appears they heavily rely on their other coached athletes to mentor and guide each other through the program. There are pros and cons to that approach and I wonder how often it leads to a mixed message on their coaching.
• Training Bible Coaching - $185/mo – They have the name and a friend of mine who is using their service now is a huge fan. Also, I’m currently taking computrainer classes lead by one of their coaches so I have some exposure to them and how they operate. However, their price tag makes them the least desirable of the list.
  

The goal is to get this piece figured out by next week so I can move on to the fun part: Planning Races!