Top 5 Mental Skills For Triathlon

[Source: East Coast Cycos newsletter, in Tri-Rudy newsletter, October 30, 2008]

By Kerry Sullivan

How can you develop better mental skills?

1) Being aware of the chatter in your head is a good start. The voice inside your head is either your best friend or worst enemy. Would you keep some one in your life that follows you every ware you go and tells you that you are doing bad, screwing up and constantly brings you down? Probably not. So why would you talk to your self that way?
You have the choice to be your own best friend.
Think what you want about Kanye West but he once said the key to his success is that he is his own number one fan. Why not be your own number one fan?

2) Focus on what you want. This may sound simple but many fail to see how they are sabotaging themselves in regards to this. You want to be a better runner than you need to focus on being a better runner.
Take this goal and then break it into actions. Every action you take in life either gets you closer or further from your goals.
You decide to run, this takes you closer to your goal. You decide to stuff you self with fast food, this takes you further from your goals.
The chatter in your head is key here too. If you say to your self, "I don't want to be a slow runner." You are setting your self up for a struggle as you are focusing on slow running. In this case your mind only sees the slow running aspect.
You need to focus on what you want. An effective phrase to say to yourself would be, "I want to run fast"

3) Ask your self useful questions. This is a way to direct your focus in a useful way. Asking your self, "why am I slow on the bike" is a dis-empowering strategy as your mind will then start to come up with excuses supporting why your a slow on the bike.
Switch your focus ask your self, "how can I get faster on the bike." From this question you will begin to think proactive and develop empowering ideas to back what you desire.

4) Focus on what you can control. Focusing on the weather and the race course conditions are two elements that are out of your control. Focus on what you can control. You can control your nutrition, technique and training for example.
Striving to do your best in the elements you control will enable you to perform better. Focusing on the outside elements like weather puts focus away from you and is dis-empowering. You will focus on how hot or how cold it is and then loose concentration on the important task at hand, which you can control.

5) Believe. You must believe through and through you can achieve your goals. As Morphious said to Neo in the Matrix, "Don't think you are, know you are." The path may not always seem clear on your journey but as long as you keep taking action to your goals you can get there.
Your beliefs are every thing. You learned to walk largely because you had the belief that you could walk instilled in you from others. You are older now and can instill your own beliefs. Why not instill beliefs that empower you?

Remember this no one ever accomplished any thing by quitting. High achievers stick with it through and get it done. If you stick with it you are bound to succeed.