Pine Belt Pacers Forum

I came across this article in my search to improve my mental toughness for racing.

http://www.running.net/read_feature/what-mental-toughness

I think I am really mentally tough for training, but as mentioned previously, not as much on race day. Many of you are what I would call "mentally tough" on race day. This evening while thinking about mental toughness, the racers that I know to be mentally tough are VERY competitive racers. I am not really competitive, except I am competitive about improving my race times, or with myself.

So now I am wondering????? are the people that I consider to be mentally tough racers, just basically competitive. Maybe that's my problem.

I do think I need to toughen up for race day. So do I need to become mentally tough on race day, become competitive on race day, or both??????

I have 5 weeks to do either or both.

I ran across this article today and thought it may be helpful for some.

http://usatriathlon.org/content/index/7279

From your post it does not sound as much about mental toughness as it does about race day execution. I think most of us are very good in the day-in-day-out training. We enjoy it, we like to see the improvements, we like the social aspects but then we just show up on race day. Race day is the culmination of all of the training and demands that you approach the day with a plan.

How many times have you toed the line and ‘hoped’ for a good result? That is not enough. You need to have broken down the race (whatever distance) and determined your pacing and how you want to execute. That is what allows for a good race day – otherwise it is just hoping for the best.

Regarding the competitiveness, I think that this is just a tool that can be used during training or racing. It can allow you to dig deeper and harder to achieve better results, however, without that race plan in effect than competitiveness can just as easily work against you.

I think that I lack a lot of mental toughness – my mind wanders during longer races – I find it difficult to hold that edge when the going gets tough – I even get chatty with other racers - it is something that I am working on. I am, however, quite competitive but that does not really account for race day success.

During shorter races I have to keep asking myself “Can you go harder?”

Susan - thanks for the article, I liked that. Pulverize the monster - that's what I'm gonna do!

James - I agree. I typically go into my races well planned, but I have, on several occasions, made a last minute decision to change the plan, and it turned out to be a mistake. Of course, at the time, it seemed like a great idea, but upon race reflection and race day execution, maybe not so smart. I have been thinking about my race day for weeks and have thought many times that I will "stick to my plan" on race day, no matter what the hype, feeling, or crazy idea that pops into my head.

But most of all I need to FINISH THE RACE (by that I mean race til the end).
Pulverize the monster That's what I'm gonna do!

Racing the plan can be so hard - in that ironman I planned to run walk the entire run. It was very hard to stop running after only one mile and walk - I saw so many people passing me and I was waiting for the encouragement as people ran by - you know - all of the the "You can do it!"...

The encouragement never came - thank goodness - but I was almost embarrassed to be walking!

But, deep down I knew that I needed to work the plan - I did not want the entire run to fall apart so I followed through with the execution and it worked better than I had hoped for!

My competiveness is sometimes my downfall. It drives me to abandon the plan, and get crazy, and take off as fast as I can, and hold it as long as I can. (Bad idea). In the more recent past, when I held back, and followed Terry's training plan, I performed much better, felt better, and had a PR in a half marathon. Now, at the end of a run, if I am anywhere near the finish line, I will kill myself all out if I feel pressure from another runner. Not sure what happens to me, someone takes over my body. I mean, what is the purpose? Anyway, Ginny, and James, I think you both are much smarter runners than I am. Oh, speaking of being competitive? I ran at the Trace today, tried to run past Lauren Hill, she spead up, so I felt like I should try and keep pace with her. Well, ran a little faster than I planned, but hey, had a good run, so it's all good!!