Obstacle Mud Runner - issue 13

30 obstaclemudrunner.co.uk ForEliteAtheletes toFunRunners RACE : ATTITUDE it’s in the mind The power of kicking your own ass You know, that moment where you tell yourself something is possible, either once or over and over again, and before you know it, you’re experiencing a level of bliss and performance that even the World Anti- Doping Agency can’t ban. Well, for this edition, I thought I’d share simply some of the neuroscience that goes on when you apply some PMA, so you can call upon it with confidence in your next training session, race, or life adventure. To begin, have you ever wondered why our brains are constantly capable of evolving? The brains’ ability to do this is called neuroplasticity, and involves the synapses in our brains constantly creating, destroying and recreating links between two neurones again and again, which helps us store what we experience and fondly call memory. This mechanism is a real drain on our energy, with estimates showing that 20% of the synapses created in a 24-hour period are lost and replaced, and points to why we remember somethings that are important to us, and delete other information we find not so useful. The strength by which a memory can be formed has been proposed to come from two sources – episodic and autobiographical memory. Episodic memory is formed from a repeating episode of the same experience. Take eating with a knife and fork. Although the process is now automatic and unconscious for you, you have practiced the movement and thoughts so many times your brain and body know what to do without even thinking about it. Autobiographical memory is formed in those one-time moments. Those experiences that happen only once and are so incredibly powerful, you remember vividly every single detail – what you saw, the smells in the air, the sounds all around and the emotions you felt. Now, as we exercise we create more neurones, leading to increased opportunities to create new memories, which might explain why we can often recall every tiny detail of a race in the moments immediately after (autobiographical memory at work). Through aging we develop more experience and sense of the experiences we go through, and our brains choose to generalise, delete or distort the information we receive (we’d burn out if we didn’t do this, and hence children can feel incredibly tired from all the sense-making their brains do on a daily basis). If we’ve had an experience that is uncomfortable, undesired or scarring emotionally, that experience is coded in our memory, which is activated when we face a challenging situation. In that moment, our brains Amygdala is activated – which you may know as the fight or flight response – causing us to choose whether to walk into or away from that moment in time. Now, this is the point where PMA can kick in. Our brains choose to generalise, delete or distort the information we receive You’ve no doubt heard about, or even experienced, the benefit of Positive Mental Attitude. Strength of Memory Time Autobiographical Memory Episodic Memory Graham Roberts Performance Coach and Behavioural Change Consultant at Ispire Motivational Coaching Ltd, gives us an insight into a world. I think most of us can relate. motivational coaching