The Easy
Way: Part 1
Improving your economy and
efficiency is the “easiest” way to increase your athletic
endurance and speed. I qualify “easiest” with quotes because
there is no investment-free way to performance gains. The easy
way requires diligence and passion; it requires absolute
commitment and awareness. If you want to swim, bike and run
efficiently, gracefully and fast , you must diligently
investigate and refine posture and alignment (body position), as
well as stroke/stride biomechanics (sport-specific movements) in
every training session.
Posture and alignment are
essential for engaging the body’s core muscles. As you combine
these with stroke/stride mechanics, you will move more from the
body’s core and less from the limbs. This is true for swimming,
biking and running. For true performance gains, you must
perfect this coordination of core and limbs throughout a broad
spectrum of intensity levels, especially at goal race pace. The
reward for this relentless, intense pursuit of kinetic
intelligence? You feel more at ease as you perform better.
In the next few columns, we will
identify some guiding principles that enhance this process of
improving economy and efficiency so we can “accelerate our
technique”, speeding up the process of acquiring and refining
technique. The most intriguing characteristic is that acquiring
great technique is a lot like… falling asleep! We cannot
force ourselves to improve economy and efficiency anymore than
we can force ourselves to fall asleep. After all, force
implies effort and exertion – precisely what we are trying to
eliminate. Even mental force, known as “mind over
matter”, is detrimental to technique. The notion that we can
force our bodies to go faster with sheer mental force is
erroneous.
As we approach our speed and
endurance limits, we experience pain. “Mind over matter”
implies that you grit your teeth, tense up your body and fight
the pain with a greater force and energy. But this resisting
force and energy only diminishes efficiency and economy. Learn
to be at ease with the pain, as well as the fears and anxieties
of racing. Just like falling asleep, this requires you to
disengage your mind and relax our body in order to be at
ease.
The mental component is the most
challenging - learning to disengage from the relentless
commentary of judgments, opinions and reactions that fills so
much of our mental space. (That commentary can go into
hyper-drive in the presence of pain.) This vital process of
disengagement is called “contemplation”. Contemplation
is essential to the easy way. Efficiency, grace and speed
require intense kinesthetic awareness, and a clear, calm mind.
Only then are we keenly aware of exactly what the body is
doing. As Terry Laughlin, founder of Total Immersion Swim,
says, “Mind first, then muscles. We believe swimming should
be done as a ‘practice’, much like yoga or tai chi, rather than
as a ‘workout’.” The distinction between a practice and a
workout is this contemplative mindful component.
Approach each training session (swim, bike and run) with
mindfulness, and you accelerate the acquisition and improvement
of technique. You get graceful, efficient and fast… at a
faster rate. This is the power of mind in matter.
Contemplation is very foreign to
our active and highly stimulated culture. Endurance training
provides a great opportunity to transform athletic workouts into
a mindful practice of perfectly executed rhythmic movements, so
you enjoy a flowing, optimal experience, instead of pushing
through a workout as an obligation of exertion.
The second essential component
for accelerating technique is physical relaxation. The notion
that relaxation can actually bring improvements to athletic
performance seems contradictory. Yet our kinesthetic awareness
functions best when the muscles and connective tissues are
relaxed. We experience our greatest coordination, balance,
grace and fluidity when our bodies are at ease. Only then are
we able to execute our very best technique. The trick is
learning how to stay relaxed even at the highest intensity.
Your recovery sessions
provide the perfect introductory opportunity to develop
mindfulness and relaxation as you concentrate on improving
technique. Allot 10-15 minutes in the beginning of the session
just to empty your mind and relax your body by starting at a
very easy pace with slow, deep, easy breathing. Then, execute
your technique drills with the utmost clarity and presence of
mind, choosing one or two specific focal points, with absolute
physical relaxation and mental clarity. There is no hurry!
Imagine this is the last time you will ever swim, bike or
run. Would you be in a hurry? Conclude your recovery session
by moving with absolute perfection and grace, as you integrate
your technique improvements and strive for athletic excellence.
Discover the “easy” way, and renew your passion and joy for our
sport.
This essay originally appeared in
USA Triathlon Life Magazine, Summer 2008
Copyright Shane Eversfield 2008
