Reaching Peak Event Performance

Why does a little pressure make you perform better, while too much sends you spiraling? This collaboration with elite athlete Rebecca Rusch can help you master your mental game when it matters most.

Optimal Arousal

The arousal theory of motivation, encapsulated by the Yerkes-Dodson law, suggests there's a sweet spot of stress that enhances our performance. This law illustrates that while a certain level of arousal can boost our performance, there's a tipping point where too much stress becomes counterproductive.

What Determines Your Optimal Arousal Level?

Several factors influence this delicate balance:

• Genetics: Introverts and those more attuned to their inner processes might find their peak performance at lower arousal levels, whereas extroverts might thrive under higher pressure.

• Experience: Novices may benefit from a calmer environment, while veterans might seek an extra challenge to hit their stride.

• Current Context: Life's external pressures can dictate whether we need to dial down the intensity or handle more excitement in our endeavors.

Adjusting the Arousal Knob

When arousal levels dip too low (you are bored and unmotivated), spicing things up with friendly competition or adding an incentive (a race?) can reinvigorate your drive. Conversely, when stress levels soar too high, it's crucial to lean on mental, physical, and behavioral strategies to regain balance.

Mental Strategies

• Perspective taking on success and failure
• Practicing self-compassion in the face of anxiety

Physical Strategies

• Engaging in slow, diaphragmatic breathing
• Grounding techniques to connect with the present moment outside of you (what you are tasting, touching, seeing, smelling, hearing. Stay with it).

Behavioral Strategies

• Prepare and practice in situations that closely simulate your race (weather, rivalry, distance, effort, nutrition plan). Remind yourself of this preparation.
• Establishing a warm-up routine involves reviewing your plan, remembering your successes, and shaking out the jitters.

Perspective-Taking: Increase Carrots, Decrease Sticks!

Understanding your motivation, adapting your expectations, and managing the sting of failure are pivotal. Differentiating disappointment from failure and learning from each experience can redefine your notion of success, focusing on what's within your control.

• Focus on the aspects of the endeavor you are embarking on that bring you joy, inspiration, and connection.
• Healthy expectation calibration means setting realistic goals you are 80 percent sure you can achieve with effort, and focusing on your process—and what is in your control, not just outcomes—including aspects that might not be in your control. Setting realistic, process-oriented goals can make all the difference in how we perceive and react to challenges.
• Embrace Failure as a Learning Tool: Getting comfortable with failure, and recognizing it as an essential part of learning, can significantly enhance our resilience and capacity for achievement. Rebecca Rush’s cycling coach, Tim Cusack, said it well: “In my observations in 20-plus years of coaching, one key element that tends to be at the core of an athlete's mental toughness: How they perceive failure. Mentally strong athletes avoid associating failure with ego and often embrace failure as an opportunity.”

At the start line of Breck Epic. Rebecca Rusch destroyed me of, course. We connected with ourselves, others, and nature on some of the raddest trails on the planet.

Source: Image by Jaimie Lusk

R.A.C.E to Success

Rebecca Rusch has taught thousands to focus on the positive aspects of racing with the acronym R.A.C.E: Reward, accountability, community, and excitement.

• Rewards: Not extrinsic (podiums and medals) but intrinsic: the adventure, meeting new people, and the accomplishment of pushing yourself harder than you would alone.
• Accountability: When we commit ourselves, we enhance our accountability and performance. If you want to double down on your accountability, sign up for a race with a friend.
• Community: In a race, you are among your community and you’ll end up riding with others at your same pace and find people you align with. We are communal beings and gathering for races is one great way to build and engage with your community. Community makes us feel good.
• Excitement: There is energy when people gather on a start line. There’s a buzz in the air that you don’t get on your own. Excitement and anxiety feel the same in our bodies, it’s just a different perspective. How will you choose to think about it?

Co-author Rebecca Rusch is a seven-time world champion endurance athlete, two-time Hall of Fame inductee, Emmy award winner, and best-selling author.

Rebecca Rusch and I motivating each other up a climb in Laos.

Source: Adventure Scout Media / Used With Permission