Linden Recap

The theme for Linden was confidence. Not only for many was it a stepping stone for building more confidence, it was more importantly a lesson in how we respond to different racing environments and the confidence we have going into a race.

Both on the boys and girls side we had runners running in different races and this allowed some runners to relax a little more and JUST RUN. When we can control the pressure we place on ourselves, we can run freely and fast. Just as our fitness gets higher and higher through faster and faster training, our confidence can grow and grow by becoming aware of our thoughts/feelings towards racing.

Perfection will never occur in terms of gaining control of your emotions. Perfection means that you have come to an end... we don't want that. You want to always be living and responding to your environment. You can come close, but you will change and the environment you live in will change, so don't necessarily strive for perfection. Strive to gain control of what you do and who you are. No one can do this for you. You must do it for yourself.

There is absolutely no substitute for having CONFIDENCE in yourself. How do you gain confidence to race faster? There is not an easy "cookie cutter" answer to this question. Everyone is different and as you go through life your confidence will go up and down, but hopefully with the right experiences it will steadily grow from year to year.

Here are some ways to gain more confidence in your running abilities.

• Run with faster people in practice.
• Brush off bad races and practices so you can get back on the "good bandwagon" ASAP.
  
• Do some type of physical activity before school (push ups, cross-train, run, core, yoga, etc). If you do this it will be harder to give up in a race or fast workout because you have invested so much more into the sport. The more you invest the harder it is to give up.
• Don't worry about other people in a race. Listen to your body. You know when you are running all out and when you are not. Use the competition around you to bring out every last ounce of energy you have. It's not nice to use people, but in races (sports) you can.
  
• Your coaches believe in you... so why shouldn't you believe in yourself?
• You are part of the Haslett Cross Country Team.

If you think of more ways to gain confidence please let us know. We are a team and we need to breed confidence. We are Haslett and we are Confident.