Richard Allens Tips - March - Mental Training

As you get closer to the race season it is not just important to be physically ready it is vital to be mentally prepared for the competitions. So many people just don’t address their mental approach and this is often the difference between an ok performance and your best performance. Two key areas to work on are confidence and commitment.

The best way to work on your confidence is to make sure that every time you complete a good workout in training you register this performance in your mind. You must think to yourself that if you can perform like this in a training session then you know you can go well in the race. Don’t forget that you will be fresh and rested for the race and can take things to an even higher level. Once you get to the race then remember those great workouts you did and this will give you great confidence. You know you can do it as you have done it in training.

Commitment is also very important because if you are not on that start line for a very good reason then you will not get the best out of yourself. It is also impossible to do all those hard training sessions without commitment. Early on even before you start training you must have a goal. This is one major goal that you want to achieve at the end of the race. It must be a goal that is realistic and that you really, really want to achieve. Every time you have a key training session and every time you are struggling in training then remind yourself of this goal and why you are doing it. When you are at the race remind yourself of why you are racing. A goal can be anything that is important to you. Maybe you want to win or maybe you want to raise money for a charity? Just as important as the main goal are smaller goals where you break the race down into sections. If you are just focusing on the one big goal then the race can seem daunting. Stand on the start line and just think about the first small goal. You can have up to 10 small goals. Take one section at a time and tick to goals off as you go along. This breaks the race down, makes each section better quality and is far less overwhelming.