Speed Secrets: The Mental Game & Simulators
The power of mental imagery and simulators.
You could look at driving and going fast around a track as having two components:
Physical Game: skills and techniques such as braking, steering, accelerating, where you look, and the line you drive. Of course, physical strength and stamina are part of this, as well.
Mental Game: the mental game covers many areas: from the ability to focus to mentally rehearsing and programming a physical skill; and from managing your state of mind to how to learn a track more quickly.
Actually, there’s also the “mechanical game,” which is all about modifying and tuning your car (including installing new tires) to make it faster, but we’re going to ignore that in this article and just focus on the physical and mental factors. Why? Because unlike putting new tires on your car to make it faster, learning physical and mental skills never wears out!
When I ask drivers what percentage of driving is mental versus physical, everyone agrees that performance and race driving is more of a mental game than a physical one. When I follow up by asking what they’re doing to improve in these areas, I get lots of answers about the physical game, but rarely much about the mental game.
Why? Because most drivers don’t know where to start when it comes to developing their mental game. Okay, that’s not fair, not totally true. Most use visualization to mentally drive a track to prepare, and some have read about other aspects of the mental game, but it’s not something that many drivers (based on the thousands I talk to each year) use in a deliberate, strategic, and consistent manner. And most only scratch the surface of what can be done to improve their performance.
That’s good news for you, as it’s an opportunity to be better than those who ignore the mental game!
The last time you were at a track, of all the talk with other drivers, how much of it was spent discussing the line around the track? How much did you talk about track conditions? How about where you all brake for a corner? And whether anyone is able go full throttle through a section of track? In other words, what percentage of talk at the track was about the physical game?
Now, how much time was spent discussing ways to help your brain process information faster? Or what you can deliberately do to change your confidence level? How you can learn a track faster? How you can sense the limits of your car better? How you can make better decisions on the track? Where, when, and how can you use mental imagery more effectively?
I know that you who read what I write think about and do more with the mental game than most. And that gives you an edge.
Just like buying a treadmill, you have to use it to see the benefits of it, though, right? I know, I know...darnn, I wish treadmills would do the exercise for me!
Buying into the benefits of (and using) the mental game was a gradual process for me, but one that started a long, long time ago. And it inspired a lifetime of commitment to using—and sharing—the mental game with others. Okay, a quick story (one that Iʻve shared in more detail here before).
When I was fifteen years or so old, I went into my school’s phys-ed teacher’s office to drop something off. On a shelf behind his desk was an “Athletics” magazine with an article about visualizing. Now, this was a long time ago—50-ish years ago—and sports psychology had barely been invented! But research had been going on for many years about the effectiveness of visualization for athletes, with much of it conducted to help Olympians.
So, I “borrowed” the magazine, taking it home and reading that article over and over again. At the time I was involved with a lot of sports, but tennis was my main focus (when I wasn’t going to a race track with my dad, thinking about how I was going to race at Indy one day). I began using visualization to help my game. Every night before bed, I would hit a hundred or so serves—in my mind. I’d practice my forehand and backhand, and my volleys. All in my mind. In a matter of six months, I went from barely making my high school’s tennis team, to being the number one player, and captain of the team. Over the next couple of years, my game progressed faster than many who had been better players than me, even though I spent less time physically practicing.