Hands on as Test Lead - To be or not to be - there lies the chanllenge

Yes! Would be an obvious answers from most (if not all) when asked "Is it really important be hands on the application and intricacies as a Test Lead?". True, neverthless everyone accepts and realizes the importance, equally would accept the hindrances and challenges that come in between total hands on. Smaller projects with experienced testers would generally give ample time for the leads to take proper care of all the activities. But otherwise, be it daily deliverables or status reporting, normal process chores or ad hoc requests from Test Manager or people issues or whatever that creep during the mid of execution would mean a lot to obstruct the core concentration on the technicalities. Given this situation a troublesome onsite coordinator could add a lot of pressure to the offshore leads to cope up with these and at times resemble a juggler in circus when imagine the tasks normal offshore leads handle. This I feel as an Offshore coordinator for almost 3 years as the major concern that would leave the leads to either choose to sarifice personal time or depend on the reliable testers for information and my experience has shown the latter category to be more even though many might not accept the fact.So, whatever said and done, it is the primary responsibility of the test leads to be hands on in order to maintain the project not to spill over to risk zones. The forum is open for all to add more suggestions and share their experiences over this. I totally agree the solution would be situation dependent, but strongly believe that atleast some of us could be sailing in the same boat. I will come with my experiences on this next time... till then keep thinking and please your inputs.