Friday, April 22, 2022
Managing the Pain & Fatigue of Oxygen Debt in Practice and During Races
One of the more common things that can derail swimmers during races and hard training is when they run into the intense pain and fatigue from oxygen debt. When that happens, swimmers tend to focus on the discomfort that they're experiencing in their arms, legs and lungs.
Unfortunately, when you allow your concentration to go to this pain and fatigue while you're training or racing, you will inadvertently set yourself up to struggle even more. Focusing on the pain that you're experiencing will create multiple problems that will all lead to slower, more frustrating performances.
The reasoning behind this is very basic. Thinking about and focusing on your pain and fatigue while you're swimming will always make you nervous. When that happens, your muscles will tighten up and your breathing will get faster and shallower. These two physical changes will make your discomfort even more intense. Tight muscles are inefficient and will wreck your mechanics. Not only will tight muscles slow you down, but they will also increase the intensity of your pain! Faster, shallower breathing will always undermine your endurance, leading you to feel even more tired!
Furthermore, thinking about and focusing on how much you're hurting, how tired you are and how much more you have to go will immediately slow you down because you're no longer concentrating on the feel of your movement. Remember, focusing on the feel of your movement while you train and race is absolutely necessary for you to swim fast, while thinking while you swim will always slow you down!
So if you really want to develop the mental toughness to better handle discomfort from hard training and racing, you need to learn to better control your focus of concentration going into and during your practices and races. Specifically, you need to be sure that your focus does two things:
First, it needs to stay in the moment or what I can the "now."
The absolute best strategy for mastering discomfort is keeping your focus on one stroke at a time and not allowing your concentration to jump ahead to thoughts of the future and how much longer you have to go and how much more it's going to hurt! By staying in the “now” whenever you swim, you'll go beyond the artificial limits that your thinking brain tends to put on you.
Second, and closely related, you must train yourself to stay focused in the now on the feel of your movement and NOT the feel of your pain and fatigue!
When I talk about the feel of your movement, I'm specifically referring to things like staying long, how much water you're pulling, grabbing the water each stroke, a certain number of under-waters, the feeling of your shoulder roll or your head staying quiet. This feel focus varies per swimmer and the event that he or she may be doing. Keep in mind that if you are focusing on how tired you “feel” or how much this hurts, this is NOT the feel of movement! Instead, what you're doing is evaluating or thinking about what's happening!
So, what you have to train yourself to do when you race or practice is to stay aware of your focus and be sure to keep it on the feel of the movement in the NOW and away from your thoughts. This requires that you become aware of the instant your discomfort begins to “speak” to you! Then your job is to immediately return your focus back to the feel of what you're doing movement-wise, one stroke at a time! Don't worry if you find yourself being continually drawn back to how much you're hurting — this is absolutely normal! Just immediately return your focus back to the feel of your movement each and every time that you drift.
In order to do this successfully, you have to have several “feel focal points” already picked out before your race or practice session. That is, you have to know what it feels like with each of your strokes when you're going fast. Are you pulling a lot of water, and if so, where exactly do you feel that? If going fast for you involves staying long, then where do you feel that long feeling or stretch in your body/arm/hand? The more specific you can be in your body about where you feel those feelings that go with fast swims, the easier it will be for you to get back to them when the discomfort hits you!
My suggestion to you is to practice noticing where in your body you feel the movements of going fast. Spend some time in practice looking for these “feel focal points.” Having two or more for each of your strokes will make your job of managing the pain and fatigue of oxygen debt much easier! And once you've found these, look for times during really hard sets where you're hurting and being drawn towards thinking about this discomfort so that you can practice switching your focus away from these thoughts and to the feel of your movement.
As a Sports Performance Consultant, Dr. G works with swimmers at every level from Olympians right down to age groupers. A popular presenter at coaches clinics and clubs around the country, Dr. G specializes in helping swimmers get unstuck and swimming fast when it counts the most. Dr. G. is the author of Swimming Fast When It Counts The Most, DMTS (Developing Mentally Tough Swimmers), and his newest mental toughness training program, Swimming With The Competitive Edge.
Interested in more tips?
https://www.competitivedge.com/mental-toughness-tips-swimming/
Unfortunately, when you allow your concentration to go to this pain and fatigue while you're training or racing, you will inadvertently set yourself up to struggle even more. Focusing on the pain that you're experiencing will create multiple problems that will all lead to slower, more frustrating performances.
The reasoning behind this is very basic. Thinking about and focusing on your pain and fatigue while you're swimming will always make you nervous. When that happens, your muscles will tighten up and your breathing will get faster and shallower. These two physical changes will make your discomfort even more intense. Tight muscles are inefficient and will wreck your mechanics. Not only will tight muscles slow you down, but they will also increase the intensity of your pain! Faster, shallower breathing will always undermine your endurance, leading you to feel even more tired!
Furthermore, thinking about and focusing on how much you're hurting, how tired you are and how much more you have to go will immediately slow you down because you're no longer concentrating on the feel of your movement. Remember, focusing on the feel of your movement while you train and race is absolutely necessary for you to swim fast, while thinking while you swim will always slow you down!
So if you really want to develop the mental toughness to better handle discomfort from hard training and racing, you need to learn to better control your focus of concentration going into and during your practices and races. Specifically, you need to be sure that your focus does two things:
First, it needs to stay in the moment or what I can the "now."
The absolute best strategy for mastering discomfort is keeping your focus on one stroke at a time and not allowing your concentration to jump ahead to thoughts of the future and how much longer you have to go and how much more it's going to hurt! By staying in the “now” whenever you swim, you'll go beyond the artificial limits that your thinking brain tends to put on you.
Second, and closely related, you must train yourself to stay focused in the now on the feel of your movement and NOT the feel of your pain and fatigue!
When I talk about the feel of your movement, I'm specifically referring to things like staying long, how much water you're pulling, grabbing the water each stroke, a certain number of under-waters, the feeling of your shoulder roll or your head staying quiet. This feel focus varies per swimmer and the event that he or she may be doing. Keep in mind that if you are focusing on how tired you “feel” or how much this hurts, this is NOT the feel of movement! Instead, what you're doing is evaluating or thinking about what's happening!
So, what you have to train yourself to do when you race or practice is to stay aware of your focus and be sure to keep it on the feel of the movement in the NOW and away from your thoughts. This requires that you become aware of the instant your discomfort begins to “speak” to you! Then your job is to immediately return your focus back to the feel of what you're doing movement-wise, one stroke at a time! Don't worry if you find yourself being continually drawn back to how much you're hurting — this is absolutely normal! Just immediately return your focus back to the feel of your movement each and every time that you drift.
In order to do this successfully, you have to have several “feel focal points” already picked out before your race or practice session. That is, you have to know what it feels like with each of your strokes when you're going fast. Are you pulling a lot of water, and if so, where exactly do you feel that? If going fast for you involves staying long, then where do you feel that long feeling or stretch in your body/arm/hand? The more specific you can be in your body about where you feel those feelings that go with fast swims, the easier it will be for you to get back to them when the discomfort hits you!
My suggestion to you is to practice noticing where in your body you feel the movements of going fast. Spend some time in practice looking for these “feel focal points.” Having two or more for each of your strokes will make your job of managing the pain and fatigue of oxygen debt much easier! And once you've found these, look for times during really hard sets where you're hurting and being drawn towards thinking about this discomfort so that you can practice switching your focus away from these thoughts and to the feel of your movement.
As a Sports Performance Consultant, Dr. G works with swimmers at every level from Olympians right down to age groupers. A popular presenter at coaches clinics and clubs around the country, Dr. G specializes in helping swimmers get unstuck and swimming fast when it counts the most. Dr. G. is the author of Swimming Fast When It Counts The Most, DMTS (Developing Mentally Tough Swimmers), and his newest mental toughness training program, Swimming With The Competitive Edge.
Interested in more tips?
https://www.competitivedge.com/mental-toughness-tips-swimming/