At meets, many swimmers make the mental mistake of attaching far too much importance to how they feel in warm-up or during their race. They mistakenly believe that if you feel like garbage pre-race (tired, sore or tight) or while you're swimming, then you will always put up slow times. This belief is not an etched-in-stone fact, but instead, is a BIG myth!
Here's today's KEY lesson: You can still have the race of your life even if you don't feel great in warm-up or during your race!
When I travel to clubs around the country, I'll frequently ask swimmers, “How many of you have had the experience of feeling really terrible in warm up and then during your race, yet you still had a great performance?” When I do, almost every hand in the room goes up!
Here's the problem that swimmers run into when they think that if they don't feel good before or during their event, then they won't swim fast: If you believe this myth, then you will continuously overthink about how bad how you feel! When you do this, you’ll start feeling even worse. This kind of focus where you evaluate how you’re feeling in a negative way will do two things that will sabotage your race.
