Floyd Landis – Train The Hardest & The Most To Win
February 25, 2007 by Ryan Merlin · Leave a Comment
After reading the article on Dean Karnazes that inspired me to experiment with 4 hour sleep training and the limits of human performance and training, I also found an incredible article on Floyd Landis. This is before the doping scandal, but paints an amazing picture of what it takes to race on that level. Sounds like he knows how to direct his energy, attention, and power in a distorted yet almost unbelievable direction. One can, almost feel his ability to overcome limits and pain.
From Outside Magazine
“Everybody wants to say, ‘I couldn’t win because of this or that,’ ” he says. “To my way of thinking, it doesn’t matter if your goddamn head fell off or your legs exploded. If you didn’t make it, you didn’t make it. One excuse is as good as another.”
Landis takes a sip and leans forward in his chair. “There’s only one rule: The guy who trains the hardest, the most, wins. Period. Because you won’t die. Even though you feel like you’ll die, you don’t actually die. Like when you’re training, you can always do one more. Always. As tired as you might think you are, you can always, always do one more.”
Z-Man rouses, concerned. “I hope some 16-year-old doesn’t read this and then go kill himself on the bike,” he says.
“That was what I did,” Landis says, not missing a beat. “I read something like that, and I trained like that, and, yeah, I was pretty damn depressed for a while. Then it got better.”
So there’s no such thing as overtraining?
“If you overtrained, it means that you didn’t train hard enough to handle that level of training,” Landis says, his fingertip rapping the table for emphasis. “So you weren’t overtrained; you were actually undertrained to begin with. So there’s the rule again: The guy who trains the hardest, the most, wins.”
“I saw firsthand what Lance did, and it was superhuman,” he continues. “I saw how his system worked. It’s not necessary for me to be like Lance in every way. But there are some things that I want to take from that and use.”
For instance?
“His boldness at taking charge of things. His willingness to say, This is what I want, and I’m going to take it. It’s very hard to compete against that.”
Dean Karnazes – It’s Not About Running, It’s About Life
February 5, 2007 by Ryan Merlin · Leave a Comment
Just reading about Dean Karnazes can inspire anyone to tap into deep wells of strength and courage. Here are a couple of clips that I found particularly powerful. I wanted to post it here because it has helped me to experiment with pushing my own limits of human performance such as sleeping, and has been amazing.
“Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention to arrive safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming: Wow!! What a ride!”
Western culture has things a little backwards right now. We think that if we had every comfort available to us, we’d be happy. We equate comfort with happiness. And now we’re so comfortable we’re miserable. There’s no struggle in our lives. No sense of adventure. We get in a car, we get in an elevator, it all comes easy. What I’ve found is that I’m never more alive than when I’m pushing and I’m in pain, and I’m struggling for high achievement, and in that struggle I think there’s a magic.
Outside Magazine Interview
Take a look under the hood of this engine by reading Dean’s blog.
Read about his enlightened epiphany from Wired.
Related:
Quote – Our Greatest Fear Is Not That We Are Inadequate
Secrets Of Greatness
The Alpha Project
Cyclocross Colorado State Championships
December 12, 2006 by Ryan Merlin · Leave a Comment
The last 2 races before this one, I crashed a few times which really blew my focus. But those were also a blessing, since I could use the emotion from “missing out” to get fired up and be really hungry for a win at the state championships. I had to fight my way back from starting mid pack around 40th.
I learned a while back from talking with Travis Brown, about the huge value of creating a routine before races. It creates focus, reduces stress, removes the mental blocks and frustrations, allows the flow state, etc. All I can say, is that if you’re interested in raising the bar in racing or any intense activity, develop your own flavor of routine, or ritual. It sets the stage for your best performance.
I’m a die hard believer in the mind-body and it’s my mission to understand and use the best of the best. The higher the stakes the more focused I become, and this one was no different. I visualized it, and scripted it in my mind. I could see myself throughout the race, how I wanted to feel, what I was saying to myself, how I would look for opportunities and take advantage of it, etc. It payed huge dividends for me by being able to be spot-on with handling through the muddy conditions and dodge a couple of key crashes and bottlenecks.
-Awesome Book! Working Out, Working Within – Jerry Lynch
On a funny note, I tried out a wacky idea of spraying cooking oil (PAM spray) on my cleats. Hah! I had a horrible time last week with my SPD and not being able to click in from all the mud. I didn’t expect it to make any difference, but it actually did work! I had almost no problems clipping.
Major props to the crew at Alpha Bicycle Co. for flawless bike performance throughout the season especially through the mud and snow last Saturday. I’ve thrashed both my Maverick MTB and my G&T Cyclocross bike and they have always come through for me! Thanks guys!
I’m definitely looking forward to moving up next year and to face the next level and some phenomenal athletes!
The Performance Zone Before Any Event – Flow
December 3, 2006 by Ryan Merlin · 2 Comments
I’ve always been fascinated with “The Zone”. That place where everything works like precision clockwork, with more focus, more power, and the best results. It is also called “Flow” and almost everyone has experienced it in a few instances in their life. You might have even known you were going to win before the competition even started. But how do you get there?
One of the things required to Creating the Flow State, is for you to remove any blocks that distract (dis-trac) you. Those things take create tension, constriction and take your focus away from the two most important things:
- What you want to do/create.
- More importantly, Why you want that? Your motivation, what’s producing the juice, the fulfillment, the strong desire.
One of the biggest, most tempting distractions is Doubt. As I’m sitting here gearing up for one of the last 2 cyclocross races of the season, I’m taking a deep look at any doubts that I have. There’s always a reason to distract you from your goals. It’s below freezing, I feel a little tired, my ankle still hurts from my crash last week….
But first, what is doubt and why is it there?
I always hear people talk about “just don’t think about it”, “ignore it”, “focus on the direction that you’re going”, “don’t think just do”, and so on. Which sounds good and positive, but is usually nearly impossible to do. Why? Because it’s part of the basic nature of being this thing called a human.
Doubt, performance anxiety, fear of failure, are actually incredibly useful emotions, and incredibly powerful. It is an anxiety which helps you take action to prepare more, to focus on what you need to do to meet the challenge, to overcome the obstacle, or to win. You have to understand that these emotions come up even when you think you can ignore it or deny it. And the key is not to try and get rid of the feeling, because it’s going to be there anyway. The key is this:
Understand that any emotion is power & energy, even doubts and fears. And that it’s not a matter of forcing yourself to feel certain emotions and not feel others, but instead choose to channel all of it into the direction of what you want to create.
What does that mean? You are going to feel what your going to feel, which is the reality of the situation. Your job is to learn how to use it to your advantage instead of your disadvantage. Realize long before, that the more important the event is (the higher the motivation), the more likely you will have stronger doubts and anxieties appear. Welcome it as a personal challenge to use it. The only thing ignoring it will do is push it down into your subconscious which still effects your performance anyway.
Everyone experiences doubt and anxiety, just to different degrees and about different situations/events. Some people become paralyzed by it stopping them dead in their tracks and others feed on it, pushing them harder to higher levels than ever before. What’s the difference? It has to do with what it means to you personally. That decision is made consciously or subconsciously, long before the event, before you ever have any doubt or anxiety. The people that get paralyzed and freeze, are the ones that decided long before (probably subconsciously) that it’s more important to believe it. The ones that feed on it, know that it will be there and have decided that when they see it come up, they see it as something they can and will overcome inside themselves, regardless of the outside situation or outcome.
Think about it. Some of the times you’ve probably felt invincible or the most alive, is when you overcome your own doubts and fears. You end up feeling suprised and in disbelief that you actually pulled it off.
What would it take to take action today? To do today whatever you think you cannot do? To take just one more step to creating your dreams?