As a result, surely we just need to run and keep on running, as Forrest Gump would say – “Isn’t this the case?”
Well frankly no.
For running and for any sport performed to a competitive level the mind is just as important if not more important than the physical effort and technical performance.
Listen to any sports commentary and it won’t be long before you hear references to team confidence or indidual performance levels affected by the mental approach.
Though these days marathon running is my sport, I have played football to a fairly high standard and various sports throughout my life and I think just about everyone who has ever participated in any kind of sport can remember when our state of mind interfered with a good performance.
Of course, it is not just sports performance either, many men encounter anxiety with sexual situations which affects their ability. For others similar anxiety may have affected performance in an exam or test of some kind. The mental approach to whatever you do is vitally important for success.
In sports, it might occur in an important competition. A great recent example is how Rory McIlroy. the golfer. lost his healthy lead in Augusta. However he recovered mentally and showed some amazing resilience just a few months later to go on and win the US Masters golf major in tremendous style. You must have seen how tennis players struggle with those important points in big championships and how our football teams get affected by the crowd when they play away from home.
For us marathon runners, our mental approach might affect our performance in races as well as in the important preparation. So the answer is that, of course we use more than just our legs.
How Do I Help My Mental Approach?
I think everyone knows these days that our state of mind affects how we perform, yet it seems quite common for individuals to not understand how to get in control of their own mentality and mind, especially when it comes to sports performance.
So in this training we will consider all aspects of the training:
In the coming 16 weeks of this audio programme I shall be speaking to you a lot about how to use your mind, and how we are going to use hypnosis and hypnotherapy for enhancing your running ability, belief in yourself and ensuring your mind is as equipped and trained for the marathon day as your body is with all those miles under your belt.
Within the research that I have been conducting as I have put this programme together, it is amazing to read accounts of athletes and sports people as to the reasons behind the wide variation in their sporting performance and results. Very, very few (top elite people) actually perform with major consistency.
Injuries and health issues aside, the vast majority of the accounts suggest that most athletes and sports people believe their own differences in performance are due to parallel variations in their state of mind. Many athletes I encounter through my work and through running events I attend, tend to suggest that it is 50/50 physical and mental when it comes to their sporting performance and though this is only subjective evidence based on my limited encountering of sports people, I would say that it is a very low percentage 3-10% max of training time that is spent on the psychological skills and mental abilities required for peak performance.
It is a rare occurrence to encounter an athlete or sports person who spends a great deal of time and effort on their psychological skills and mental side of training. Let’s make this clear – the psychological side of training is just as important as anything else when it comes to sporting performance. The athletes at the very top of their game are the ones who know this more than the rest and that is why they are there.
Throughout this audio programme, I am going to talking in depth about a wide variety of techniques, skills, applications and methods all designed at enhancing your running performance.
