Coping with the Sufferfest

100Suns

I was going to post something like this in this thread:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056205758

but thought it maybe best to leave that thread take its own course.

Getting away in a break and making it stick takes a massive effort and demands high intensity repeats. The head can go before the legs (which you tend to realise as soon as you change your mind and have no chance of getting back on on :mad:) What coping strategies have people employed to deal with the suffering. I've tried signing (in my head-very difficult), focusing on breathing to a rhythm which reflects the pace line if you're lucky enough to get one going (up steady, down deep), and concentrating on the satisfaction of staying away and getting a result. They all help.

Has anyone found anything else that helps?

Lumen

100Suns wrote: »

I've tried signing (in my head-very difficult)

shaungil

Jens says "Shut up legs"

Keep_Her_Lit

[SIZE=-1]I'm no good at hillclimbs but the intensity of a tough climb appeals very strongly, in a love/hate kind of way. For example, I typically approach the start of the Bohernabreena hillclimb (South Dublin) with a sense of dread in my gut, though generally feel a whole lot better at the top!

My preferred technique for dealing with the array of sensations experienced on the way up is to adopt the position of a third party, an external observer.

I try to convince myself that these sensations are being experienced only by my body, not by "me". The "me" that is half way up this b*****d hill is the same "me" who was relaxing at home, having a bite of breakfast a couple of hours earlier. Nothing has changed. So the option is there to remain in that state and just calmly note what is going on, to observe the events and changes in a detached and dispassionate manner.

Without wishing to make light of real human suffering, "suffering" in the context of a club hillclimb is just the term used to classify a particular subset of messages sent by the body to the brain. If you can exercise sufficient control, you are free to deal with that information in ways other than that intended by the body.

Sometimes it works better than others. If I haven't done enough preparation to deserve a good result (by my own lowly standards), then guilt gets in the way - suffering is then deserved!

In any event, it has never resulted in any remarkable athletic or sporting achievement on my part. So its effectiveness is debatable. However, just playing this little mind game is part of what I like about tackling a climb.[/SIZE]

12 sprocket

Try to reduce the suffering at high speeds by training really well so that suffering only begins at a higher speed than it currently kicks in.