Mind vs body

[pinkpanther]

i Know i can do well on a race but my mind is playing tricks on me.
I'm sure that this felling happened to everyone of us before a race so give your advices how to you deal with that "thing"

Thanks

[big steve]

usually i;m told i can do well but my legs are never up to it or i crash (on the mountain bike).

i guess its just down to confidence. the mental block is the hardest one to get past. dont think about the competitiuon and just ride aswell as you can i guess.

[Stolichnaya]

One of the problems could be preparation for the race. The angst you feel prior to the race is obviously staying with you DURING the race. Not good. But it is something we all experience to some extent or another. Try putting youself in a position to get the negative thoughts out of your head before the race starts. If you warm up on a trainer, use an iPOD loaded with a set of songs that takes your mind somewhere else. Try a catchy song with a lyric that you simply cannot get out of your head. The song may eventually annoy you, but at least it is not draining you as much as negative thoughts will.

I had a teammate once who would get so nervous on the start line. He eventually came to the conclusion that he had to get it all out before the race and began roaring or screaming at the top of his lungs before the gun to settle his nerves. It seems to have worked, and at a minimum it really freaked out some of the other racers to the point where they all gave him a wider bearth in the pack. ha ha.

[Tippster]

dance music on an ipod does it for me...

really loud so your mind and cycling tempo melds with the tempo of the music...

[DannyBoy]

dance music on an ipod does it for me...

really loud so your mind and cycling tempo melds with the tempo of the music...

I too have this problem. Espically in my last race I bumped up catagorys. I was well nervous about the harder competition. I felt my legs were up to it but my mind wasn't. Go with the iPOD idea. Get some really good tunes your feeling at the moment and that will have you sorted. It did the trick for me. After all the pre-race nerves I came 4th!

Danny

[BBAGDAN]

they let you race wearing earphones in europe? that is against the rules here in canada.

to work through the pain of a brutal effort, i do a few things:

1. relax every muscle that doesn't contribute to pedalling. do a 'system check' of all your muscles, from finger tip to forearm to upperarm to shoulder to neck, and so on, and make sure they are all relaxed.

2. ensure that i am breathing long and deep. leave the mouth hanging open.

3. think that the pain feels great, even repeat it aloud, "this feels great!". at a certain point the pain can almost feel orgasmic if you focus on the endorphins.

4. if you are on a hill, think, "i am light as a feather". say this aloud too.

5. smile, it seems to relieve the pain.

6. "nothing but the pedals". focus on all of your energies sizzling down your legs like electricity, through the ball of your foot and directly into the pedal axle. all pressure should be directly on top of the pedal axle-- get rid of all slop.

7. change cadence and saddle position every so often.

8. really pound out the gears hitting the right pedal hard 4 times while "resting" the left leg, then alternate to powering the left leg 4 times and resting the right leg, keep alternating. 4x4 strokes each leg, 3x3 strokes each leg, 2x2 strokes each leg, then apply equal power to each leg until cadence slows, then repeat the alteration of power.

[Tabe]

Well mental freshness is balance between your life outside cycling and cycling itself, right amount training and racing compared your own mental capabilities aso. It takes some age too, as you also get mental toughness from racing long enough. Many times you are hardest just before you retire. U23 boys are hardest bodys in this planet, but it takes 7-10 years more before they are 'The Hardest Ones'. In short, one should train so hard, that there is no suffering in race situation. This way it's pretty same if person sits and chats with a friends or listens good music before flag goes down.

they let you race wearing earphones in europe? that is against the rules here in canada.

to work through the pain of a brutal effort, i do a few things:

1. relax every muscle that doesn't contribute to pedalling. do a 'system check' of all your muscles, from finger tip to forearm to upperarm to shoulder to neck, and so on, and make sure they are all relaxed.

2. ensure that i am breathing long and deep. leave the mouth hanging open.

3. think that the pain feels great, even repeat it aloud, "this feels great!". at a certain point the pain can almost feel orgasmic if you focus on the endorphins.

4. if you are on a hill, think, "i am light as a feather". say this aloud too.

5. smile, it seems to relieve the pain.

6. "nothing but the pedals". focus on all of your energies sizzling down your legs like electricity, through the ball of your foot and directly into the pedal axle. all pressure should be directly on top of the pedal axle-- get rid of all slop.

7. change cadence and saddle position every so often.

8. really pound out the gears hitting the right pedal hard 4 times while "resting" the left leg, then alternate to powering the left leg 4 times and resting the right leg, keep alternating. 4x4 strokes each leg, 3x3 strokes each leg, 2x2 strokes each leg, then apply equal power to each leg until cadence slows, then repeat the alteration of power.

First 5 are very good, but rest I don't fully agree. These are things one should not have time to think, they must be honed in technique training so well. Pounding other side is pure rubbish. One may alternate emphasis from slightly more pulling up pedals to slightly more pushing down, but never left-right. It ruins your smoothness.

[Skillgannon]

Sounds like you have an arousal problem

Right, imature guys and gals, pissoff now.

This is basically going off the Arousal principle, which is bassed around the idea of optimum performance being in a set level of arousal. Picture a bell graph, the center bit of the graph is the optimum level of performance, to far to the right is is over-aroused, eg. Butterflies in the stomach, so far to the left is under-arousal - eg. No commitment to the race.

If your finding our to nervous, try slow deep breathing, classical music, sit still and slowly stretch before a race.
If your on the no commitment side, then try faster breathing, hard fast music, stuff like that.

This is more prerace stuff though, not during...

[rohaimie]

they let you race wearing earphones in europe? that is against the rules here in canada.

to work through the pain of a brutal effort, i do a few things:

1. relax every muscle that doesn't contribute to pedalling. do a 'system check' of all your muscles, from finger tip to forearm to upperarm to shoulder to neck, and so on, and make sure they are all relaxed.

2. ensure that i am breathing long and deep. leave the mouth hanging open.

3. think that the pain feels great, even repeat it aloud, "this feels great!". at a certain point the pain can almost feel orgasmic if you focus on the endorphins.

4. if you are on a hill, think, "i am light as a feather". say this aloud too.

5. smile, it seems to relieve the pain.

6. "nothing but the pedals". focus on all of your energies sizzling down your legs like electricity, through the ball of your foot and directly into the pedal axle. all pressure should be directly on top of the pedal axle-- get rid of all slop.

7. change cadence and saddle position every so often.

8. really pound out the gears hitting the right pedal hard 4 times while "resting" the left leg, then alternate to powering the left leg 4 times and resting the right leg, keep alternating. 4x4 strokes each leg, 3x3 strokes each leg, 2x2 strokes each leg, then apply equal power to each leg until cadence slows, then repeat the alteration of power.

Please explain number 7,why must change saddle position often?

[evilgeek]

when it hurts, and you want to slow down, remember that the guy in front of you is probably hurting just as much.

[stumpytrunks]

Have a plan for your race and stick to it. Most importantly if you aren't mentally fresh, do something a bit different out training, have a couple of sprints or go for a ride with some other people.

[henkie]

when it hurts, and you want to slow down, remember that the guy in front of you is probably hurting just as much.

This is the one, definitely. It makes racing easier for me. When I'm in an breakaway or just in the bunch on a climb and it hurts, I look at other cyclists who don't look that fit and I think about the sentence.

A few months ago, there was an interview with Boonen on Belgian television after "omloop het Volk" and Boonen said: yeah, it hurts, but when it hurts for me, it certainly hurts for the rest of the bunch.

[Koen]

it's true, but I don't think that Boonen is a reference for a normal-cyclist, he's in the top noch of cyclists so ofcourse he doesn't feel that much pain as others.
i'm a cyclist too (belgium competition - juniors 17year), and for me it just gets down to this:
You just have to be faster at the finish line than the others, and I just think about these finish line, and I'll do my outmost (enormous pains by time.. ) to be as fast as I can.
I'm not so talented, and there are several riders which are better than me, but it has occurred regularly that I was faster and closer to a win than they were.

Pain is great--> think about the reward

[BBAGDAN]

First 5 are very good, but rest I don't fully agree. These are things one should not have time to think, they must be honed in technique training so well. Pounding other side is pure rubbish. One may alternate emphasis from slightly more pulling up pedals to slightly more pushing down, but never left-right. It ruins your smoothness.

I agree about pedalling smoothly. this is not something i would do for an entire time trial, but something to get you through the last 1-3 minutes of a brutal effort. yes, i will also pull up slightly in alternating patterns to recruit the underutilized power of the hamstrings.

with regard to #7, changing saddle position and cadence, i mean if you notice your cadence slipping, move forward on the seat and shift to a lower gear and spin faster (uses more quads), or move rearward slightly and use a bigger gear (more glutes). this keeps you fresher.

i also forgot to mention envisioning glory and getting hot chicks from being an uber stud.

[Tabe]

Last time I entered race I had mp3s playing Van Halen's Light Up The Sky befor a bang. It really gives a lift, but..When I was racing and we escaped from a small group with one guy I remember well how we went and it was hard at that moment and in my head was playing Van Halen's Little Dreamer (quite soft song) It was fking annoing, I was almost shouting "wrong track Grommit it's a wrong track dammit!"