Pushing yourself during a race - how do you do it?

Fear

I don't know if it's from growing up with sports and always having a coach watching over me but fear is the answer.  Fear that I let myself down.  Fear that I wasted my time training.  Fear that I'll be embarrassed by my finish time.  Fear I won't finish.  Fear someone will beat me.  That one happens a little more than I'd like in triathlon. 

Growing up it was fear I wouldn't win plain and simple.  I used to stand behind the blocks telling myself, I can't beat this guy, he's faster, no one thinks I can win.    

It's not fun to suffer so I will also dial it back if I veer into suffer territory.  I'm not competing for podiums but will beat 80-90% of the field and my AG at any given race.

I have told people my Suffer Switch is permanently broken.  I just don't care that much.

Like someone mentioned... in order to really push oneself you need to know where your blow up point is and I'm not willing to find out.

I'm pretty confident I could qualify for the 70.3 WC given the right training and right race but I'm nowhere near the point I want to dedicate myself fully to the process.  Maybe I will someday, maybe I won't.

I had a friend on my cross country team who was convinced that he ran so much faster when he was mad, so before a meet he would go around to each of us and ask us to insult his mother.

Good thoughts so far, thanks!   I am not sure I can summon up the fear (other than of missing out on something, I guess), but I might be able to do anger.  I'll think about the last time I had to call the cable company, for instance.   

From what I am hearing, it may be that I need to work on finding different/more motivation. Currently my motivation only gets me through training and TO the race.  Just not to really compete, even with only myself.

For some people, that is all they need and it is enough to be satisfied.  The training is the hard part; the race is the reward for all of that hard work.  My wife has done about 10 triathlons and she's trained WAY harder than she's raced, because that's the important part to her.

For me, the thing that pushes me is just a competitive streak, more so against myself than anyone else (though having someone 10 yards ahead with 200 to go in a 5K helps with the kick).  Some people just don't have that competitive gene.

As I get older, I'm finding it harder and harder to suffer while training on the bike.

Honestly, it's mostly training. I seriously doubt that it was a 50% psychological problem. 

The 'tough guy/gal' approach by saying it's all mental on race day generally fails. Even a pro/elite is only so 'tough', and it's actually not much tougher than the typical AGer on race day. Make them run at their true VO2max rate for a 5k, and even they'll give up if you push them further, pretty much the same as an AGer does.

Being able to 'push' at the end of a race is a lot more about training. You've got to have the training to hold those high race-part HRs when it counts at the end, and enough tempo work to maintain the power phases of the run/stroke/whatever when the going gets tough. 

Training predominantly slow is great for base, but if you avoid doing the VO2max and hard tempo work, you will feel it on race day when you try to push into the red zone, and you find that you just can't do it, even though you're not hurting so bad and your brain really wants you to.   

You have to put in regular 'red-zone' training, meaning VO2max and LT work, which are typically faster than race pace efforts. They'll only be a small minority of your training per week, but doing so will give you a boost in overall speed plus give you that hi-end reserve efforts that you want at the tail end of a race. 

Now if you're really doing gut-busting weekly VO2max and tempo sessions regularly in the buildup to your marathon/race, ok, let's talk psychology. But until that happens, it's largely training that allows you to go hard on race day. 

For me it's pretty simple.  My training tells me what I'm capable of doing.  A good taper might allow me to be a little bit more aggressive but you have to constantly monitor how you are feeling during the race.  I'm usually toast at the end of every race whether it be a 5k, sprint, HM or HIM because I try eke out a little bit more than what my training indicates I'm capable of doing.

1) My mental preparation starts with training.  I commit to a training plan and do everything I can to get through it day in and day out.  Some work outs really push me and I can either dial it back and take it easy or I can stick to the plan.  I figure I can either hurt now or hurt later.  That is I can push through the training and be prepares to where on race day I am ready or I can take short cuts to the work out and by not being prepares on race day have it hurt me.  By getting through difficult workouts I develop a method to get through difficulties on race day.

2) I go into a race with a plan sometimes when things get rough I start counting steps.  Sometimes when I don't think I can go another step and want to stop I tell my self go 100 steps and by about 70 steps I am feeling better and can keep going,  Some times I choose a person that means a lot to me and say okay run this mile for them.  Doing it for yourself it is easy to dial it back because you aren't letting anyone down.  When you are running the mile for someone else you don't want to do a half hearted effort and you push a little further.

3) Distractions - I try to make goals like click my heels together at mile 18, or give 5 kids high fives as I rub by.  Those put your mind on other things and help you through.  I also have things in my fuel belt to distract me.  It could be a sour Gel or something different to take you mind off the pain and focus on the food for a few minutes.

I always set myself a goal based on data from training.  How I do this will depend on the race I am competing in (with a shorter race you can be more 'aspirational' without fear of going so hard you can't complete it).  For example, recently I have been trying to improve my 5k time.  After running one in training I had a time to base training around (ie. min/mile pace to do certain workouts).  I then set a time I wanted to achieve in my next race, worked out my minute per mile pace then ran the race at that pace (as a minimum).  Usefully (in terms of setting PBs) my GPS watch underestimates the pace I am running at, so if I set myself a target of 6:30 per mile and run at this based on my watch, I am actually running faster...

I think it is easier to set time based goals when running and swimming as you are less affected by the elements and road condition.  On the bike a poor road surface can knock off several mph or a tailwind could add 5+mph.  It could be demoralising to set a speed or time based goal on the bike and not achieve due to factors out of your control.  For this reason I usually go on perceived effort.

Again, reading through and thinking a lot - thank you guys.  I am getting closer to figuring myself out, even if it's not a one-size-fits-all approach.

There was a time when I was really motivated by my coach (I am reminded of this period by Hot Runner).  I really looked forward to recording my workout and race details in Training Peaks, knowing I'd get a response.  I still remember the e-mail response after logging a long zone (very successful) training run in 2011 of "WOW WOW WOW".  That was huge and meant a lot!  I definitely performed better in the years that I used a coach.  Hugely, of course, due to being better training.  But completing the training and the races well was almost just to impress her.  Weird but true.  So, if anyone other than me is readying this for ideas - being accountable to someone who is really paying attention helps.

So, perhaps one technique would be to develop the desire to make myself proud?!  Or, find a surrogate for the attention I felt from the coach.