Learn seven tips for calming the mind and strengthening the body as you prepare for an important climb or competition.
If you’re a weekend warrior like me, then many weeks and months of the year involve weekday training (and longer training blocks) in preparation for weekend climbs, running/biking races, peak bagging, or some other important physical event.
One of the ironies of the performance outcome of the weekend activity or competition is that as hard as you’ve physically trained in preparation, the outcome often hinges on the quality of your mental game.
The power point, here, is that when it comes down to the final days and hours leading up to an important physical event, the keys to performing your best are largely mental!
While many athletes “shoot themselves in the foot” in various ways, a well-coached and mentally apt individual will act in deliberate ways to set the stage for peak performance.
With the goal of helping you exemplify the latter trait, dear reader, here’s a short list of actionable “last-minute” items.
7 Physical & Mental Tips for Performing Your Best
1. Get a good night’s sleep two nights ahead of your event. Many athletes find that the length and quality of sleep on Thursday night correlates better to a Saturday performance than Friday night’s sleep.
2. Taper your training properly in the 3 to 5 days before your weekend event. Tuesday and Wednesday can include some moderately hard training; it just shouldn’t be excessive in volume. Thursday and Friday are best limited to “active rest” days with only mild exercise, stretching, and such. Beware: If you try to “cram” some hard training in on Thursday, it will negatively affect your Saturday performance (whether you realize it or not). Learn more here >>
3. Get to your event location or climb far ahead of time. Leave yourself plenty of time to engage in a slow, progressive warm-up. A rushed warm-up will result in inefficient muscle function, shaken confidence, and a lackluster performance. Learn more warm-up tips >>
4. Choose your foods and beverages carefully, both in the day before and day of your event. You can’t starve yourself to success, nor can you perform your best if you pump junk food and alcohol into your body in the 48 hours leading up to your event. Do your research and experiment–you’ll eventually zero in on what foods and eating rituals give you optimal energy and focus on game day. Learn about climbing nutrition to support your training and performance >>
5. Embrace pre-climb, pre-race, or pre-game jitters as a natural part of the process of engaging in an activity that matters to you. The more seasoned your are as an athlete the better you’ll learn to embrace the pressure of the situation…and rise to the occasion! Just as with learning to manage fear, you’ll gain mental prowess and perform better under pressure with each passing season. Read more on pre-performance rituals >>
6. Let go of outcome-oriented thoughts–stay in the moment and focus on execution. Develop a plan for the climb/race/game and immerse yourself in executing your game plan. If necessary, adjust the plan on the fly to account for unexpected situations that arise. Quash worrisome thoughts with targeted action-oriented thinking. Stay in the moment! Let the outcome evolve organically–you’ll be alright no matter how it ends up. Read more about the “mental game” >>
7. Enjoy the process, regardless of the eventual outcome. This is what you signed up for…and, likely, what you spent much of the past week/month/year thinking about and preparing for! To paraphrase Ralph Waldo Emerson, “it’s about the journey, not the destination.” So, enjoy the journey…win, lose, or hanging from a quickdraw!
Photo above: Lisa Hörst redpointing her mini project “Fat Bastard” (5.11d), Ten Sleep Canyon, WY. Photo: Fallon Rowe
