October: Voices

   Olympic track stars talk a lot about working in "the zone," that transcendent mental state in which each footstep proceeds without conscious effort, the mind seemingly still. Run in the zone, and your performance soars. All runners experience it from time to time. Many devote years to building training regimes timed to conjure it on race day.

   Yet growing ranks of experts now say fuggedaboutit. Mentally speaking, it's better to build the confidence that allows you to fall off your peak performance - even for extended periods - knowing that you can regain it. Without this confidence, you're apt to go spiraling into a full-fledged slump, which often only gets worse the harder you work. While slumps seem to come from nowhere (and runners tend to be downright superstitious about them), they often stem from a lack of mental preparation.

   Before you pooh-pooh the role of psychology in running, consider what happens when a loud, mysterious crash in the house wakes you at three in the morning. Instantly, the fog of sleep clears, thanks to adrenaline pumping through your body. Your heart races. And if you're unable to identify the source of the noise after several seconds of logical deduction, your palms will begin to sweat. In other words, rational thoughts have a direct effect on very primitive (autonomic) parts of the nervous system. So it is with runners and their honed, complex motor skills. Like it or not, your thoughts affect your performance.

   For most of us, running is so innate, so seemingly ingrained in our muscles, that our thoughts tend to float above the effort. This is where trouble brews. Our heads resonate with interminable voices as we process events - what psychologists call self-talk. There's more chatter than you might imagine, anywhere from 60 to 1,000 words per minute. As fatigue makes itself at home, these voices begin murmuring about failure, often without basis. When familiar competitors shoot ahead of you in a race, you're apt to tell yourself that you've lost your edge, which can set off a fight-or-flight response, releasing adrenaline and narrowing your field of vision. It's a self-defeating response.

   There's no way to stop negative thoughts, but you can train yourself to detect their arrival. Sports psychologists teach a technique called thought swapping, which is just a fancy kind of diversion: if you can't quiet the voices in your head, make them change the subject. Visualization is one trick. When negative thoughts arrive, try to evoke images of the course ahead of you: wide bends, grassy descents, or narrow passages where challenges and opportunities lurk. Relaxation techniques, especially deep-breathing exercises, can quell pre-race jitters and other forms of anxiety. Many runners turn to meditation, even prayer.

   Will thought swapping let you run in the zone? Not likely, but the best mental training strategies don't attempt to summon magic; they free you from self-doubt. Besides, the voices in your head aren't always negative. Hope, resolve, and victory may be little more than whispers, but pay attention to them.