Mental training

Tomek

· 27.04.2006

Photo: Unbekannt

Mental training

One person fails at the stairs, another at the ten-metre drop, the next at their goals. Mental training helps to deal with anxiety and motivation problems. Get fit for all situations - even in your head.

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Anyone who encounters a sabre-toothed tiger has little time. On reflex, the brain decides in a flash between playing dead, fight or flight. Our ancestors were programmed for these options thousands of years ago when they ran into a superior opponent on the hunt. Think clearly? Impossible in a stressful situation.

Today, the threat of wild animals is very rare. We look for challenges in sport, replacing fight or flight by tackling the most diverse, seemingly insurmountable hurdles. And when it comes to biking in particular, everyone reaches their limits at some point - difficult trails, motivational problems or sporting failures that you nibble at. What makes you fail varies from person to person. For freerider Josh Bender, this may be an 18-metre drop, for a beginner perhaps a ten-step staircase or a wet root trail. However, the reactions to such a stressful situation are still the same as they were at the sight of a sabre-toothed tiger. The difference is that today we know methods of putting the "escape" model to one side and taking up the fight with the stairs, the drop or the roots.

DRIVING TECHNIQUE HURDLES ARE SCARY

"Discomfort, anxiety and stress mean that you can't perform at your best," explains Petra Müssig, a qualified mental coach and three-time snowboarding world champion. She knows the difficulties from her own experience - and knows what to do: "You can learn to deal with anxiety. The feeling of fear reduces with practice and experience". Through mental training, you learn to access your potential in a targeted way and change the way you deal with situations that make you angry. You can defuse difficult situations, increase satisfaction and calmness. The techniques of visualisation, relaxation and self-talk play the biggest roles here. Mental training means going through a certain situation in your mind without actually doing it. The aim is to prepare the muscles for the movement sequence - if the situation is anticipated in the mind's eye, the body can adapt to the challenges. But mental training doesn't just help with difficult passages. Top sporting performance also comes from the mind. For a professional racer, this may be the long-awaited World Cup victory, but for an amateur cyclist, the long distance of a marathon may be an insurmountable hurdle. Most people have less confidence in themselves than they are really capable of. But this is precisely the fascination of bike sports: every athlete can constantly push their limits - whether in competition or in terms of riding technique. These individual limits are easier to push if you prepare yourself mentally. In coordinative sports such as gymnastics, attitude accounts for at least 50 per cent of success. Nevertheless, mental skills are usually neglected when planning training. Bikers utilise this potential similarly poorly.

SPORTING PERFORMANCE NEEDS GOALS

Mental problems in sport often start with goal setting (see below). "Goals must come from within". However, this also means that you have to be realistic. "You can't achieve every goal," says Müssig. "I see this with very ambitious people who want to achieve top performance alongside their job. I recommend that they decide in favour of competitive sport and look for a job that is compatible with it. If you don't want to or can't do that, you have to come to terms with your limits." Because if you push these limits in the long term because you have set the bar too high, you will pay for it at some point. The goal of finishing the Transalp Challenge is certainly not that far away. The goal of winning the Transalp is absurd for amateurs. Those who have defined their goals can reach their "ideal performance level", their personal best form, if the following factors are also present: You have to

1. be in very good physical condition,

2. know exactly what you want to do,

3. be - and remain - fully focussed on what lies ahead and

4. maintain mental and emotional control at all times.

To describe the whole range of mental training here would go beyond the scope of this article. We therefore recommend the specialist literature

or coaching from a mental coach. However, we have picked out three classic problems of a biker's life and show you examples of how you can work your way out of a slump. If you internalise these suggested solutions, you can almost always decide to fight rather than flee when faced with your personal sabre-toothed tiger!

STANDARD SITUATION 1: DEALING WITH SETBACKS

The problem: You have not achieved a goal (e.g. due to bad luck with equipment, poor form on the day, poor nutrition, giving up in the race).

The attempted solution: Analyse the competition as objectively and impartially as possible:

"What was the reason for the failure? Why did the defect occur? Why didn't the form fit?" Don't dwell on the mishap, but accept bad luck for what it is: bad luck. "The chain is broken, full stop!" Make plans for how you can avoid this situation next time. "I can do this and that so that it doesn't happen to me again". Look at such experiences from a long-term perspective, as a means to an end: every mishap is a building block on the way to your goal. "The moment you realise what went wrong, you have the chance to do it differently next time," says Petra Müssig, "It's a matter of practice. Even in everyday life, take mishaps as an opportunity to learn something from them. Practise dealing constructively with yourself and take responsibility for yourself. Don't put the blame on others. Tell yourself: "I don't make mistakes, I gain experience!". Of course a flat tyre in the race is annoying, but you then have a choice: you can get angry or stay calm (the technical term for this is "attitude choice"). The latter will get you further on your way.

STANDARD SITUATION 2: FEAR OF A TRAIL PASSAGE

The problem: for some it's a staircase, for others it's an exposed single trail or a 10-metre drop. The fear remains the same.

Attempt a solution: Breathe slowly and deeply, look around in a relaxed manner and have the conviction in your head: "I'm doing this now!" Breathing calmly sends a tension-relieving signal to the muscles. Look at the passage without judgement: "In front of me is a staircase with three steps". It would be wrong to say: "I'll never make it up these steep stairs". Mentally play through the passage, imagine with your eyes closed how you would manage the section. Replace "don't" sentences such as "That's not dangerous at all" with positively worded instructions such as "I'll stay relaxed on the bike, breathe calmly and keep my finger on the brake." This can be used to bridge a stressful situation. During the passage, precise, positively formulated instructions in self-talk help: "Open the brake, hold the handlebars straight". The field of vision should always be several metres in front of you. To memorise the situation in the long term: After the action, go through the situation in your head and determine whether it went as desired. Make a note of what went well and what you could do differently (not better!) next time. "There is nothing bad, there are only experiences," says mental coach Petra Müssig. Keep enjoying these experiences, even if things don't go so well.

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