It’s All In Your Head: Making the Decision to Win or Lose

Photo Courtesy: Annie Grevers

By Cody Evans, Swimming World College Intern

The science behind swimming is more intricate than I initially would have thought. Each stroke must be done with extreme precision. Aside from the focus every swimmer puts on their stroke technique, swimmers are challenged due to the mental toughness required to perform well.

For many of us, the biggest difficulty in the pool is getting our minds to forget about how tired we are our how much pain we are putting ourselves through. Studies show that fatigue is just an emotion. Fatigue is a sensation that our body feels to prevent ourselves from getting to a level at which we are actually hurting our bodies.

I read an article written by Timothy David Noakes, who is in the research unit for Exercise Science and Sports Medicine at the University of Cape Town. The article was written with track runners in mind, but the two sports are so similar that I thought the conclusions reached in the article would fit very well with the physical demands and performance of swimmers as well.

The main point of Noakes’ piece is that “fatigue is a brain-derived emotion,” indicating that we are not actually as tired as we think we are. He explains that “the brain uses the symptoms of fatigue as key regulators to insure that the exercise is completed before harm develops.” Fatigue is not a stop sign, only an emotional indicator that we are pushing our body out of its comfort zone.

In the article Noakes touches on how we only recruit a portion of our muscle mass, “fatigue in all forms of exercise develops before there is complete skeletal muscle recruitment. Indeed only between 35 and 50 percent of the active muscle mass is recruited during prolonged exercise.” When we are in “maximal exercise this increases to only about 60 percent.”

So although you may think you are giving 100 percent in a set or race, there is still more that your muscles can handle. It’s just a matter of whether or not your brain will allow your muscles to push farther and feel that uncomfortable feeling of pain and fatigue.

Noakes had a very intriguing summation that will get any athlete thinking:

“My unproven hypothesis is that in the case of a close finish, physiology does not determine who wins. Rather somewhere in the final section of the race, the brains of the second, and lower placed finishers accept their respective finishing positions and no longer choose to challenge for a higher finish. Once each runner consciously accepts his or her finishing position, the outcome of the race is decided. So just as a single athlete must ‘decide’ to win, so too must the rest of the top finishers decide the opposite – specifically that they are not going to win.”

Next time you feel like you can’t give anymore and the race or set is slipping away from you, think about what you have just read. Allow your brain to let your muscles do more than you think they can. It’s all in your head, swimmers. Push through the fatigue and pain you are feeling, and in return you will see great results. Be mentally tougher than the person beside you.

Name*

Email*

Welcome to our community. We invite you to join our discussion. Our community guidelines are simple: be respectful and constructive, keep on topic, and support your fellow commenters. Commenting signifies that you agree to our Terms of Use

Name*

Email*

3 Comments

Oldest

Newest Most Voted

Inline Feedbacks

View all comments

Patrick Burda

7 years ago

Sarah Collins Campbell nice read for Emma.

Sarah Collins Campbell

7 years ago

Reply to Patrick Burda

Thanks! I will share this with her.

Rosie

7 years ago

Very true….