Bike Week: Free meditation and visualisation sessions for cycling

For those who are less aware visualisation is a brain training technique to align the body with the mind, helping people to achieve more than is normally possible. These types of techniques are predominantly used for the success of high level business people and elite performance athletes. 

Cycling UK aims to bring this powerful tool to everyday cyclists to see if it will improve your confidence and cycling performance on a bike.

Can you really improve your cycling performance just by thinking about it?

Scientific evidence shows the human mind can be trained to enhance physical ability, and top athletes are tapping into it. 90% of Olympic athletes use some form of psychological training* and it is also often used by successful people in business, too. 

We’ll be offering you a series of four free meditations on the Cycling UK Facebook page during Bike Week on the following: 

Sunday 7 June

10.00-10.15 am Meditation: The motivation is the setting of the goals

Wednesday 10 June 

7.00pm Meditation: Doing something new is the carrying out the goals

Saturday 13 June

12.00-12.15pm Meditation. Dig deeper in your training and realise how much more you can push your body when you tap into the extra power of the mind

Sunday 14 June 

12.00-12.15 pm Meditation: Confidence is the growth you get from success.

If you’re still not sure James Lovett from Miynd answers your questions below. 

Can you become a better cyclist just by thinking about it? 

You can become a better everything by thinking about it - as long as you are thinking about it in the right way. Everyone knows physical training will make you a better cyclist, and nobody would think twice about exercising several times a week if they really wanted to be better at it. 

In fact, exercising will help every single aspect of your life. Is it therefore really such a shock to find out that exercising your mind several times a week will increase your mental capacity too?

Your body needs to be fit to perform well, but your body does what your mind tells it to do, so it makes sense to ensure that your mind is in top condition too. 

The conscious part of your mind can work out what to do with knowledge and experience - i.e work out what to do for the best in many situations. But the much more powerful part of your mind, the subconscious is what directs you.

It directs your body - think of how your body language unconsciously acts. 

It directs your health - maybe you eat that junk food when you logically know the salad would be better for you. 

And yes, it even directs your cycling. Did you ever as a child cycle between the white lines in the middle of the road, slaloming to miss them? You tried to avoid the white lines and maybe you did okay. If you did exactly the same thing but instead of trying to avoid the white lines you tried to aim for the grey spaces between them, you would slalom much better... 

If you train your subconscious mind to do something, it will do it better than you can consciously do it as it is simply much more powerful.  

What do we say about a great performer of anything? "They make it look effortless. That’s because they’ve trained so consistently that it becomes consciously effortless because their subconscious is doing it for them. 

You can accomplish this through a lot of time and repetition... or you can train your subconscious directly and get there much quicker. 

What is visualisation and how does it work? 

Visualisation is engaging your subconscious mind to become focused on something by creating a picture of it in your head. When you think about something you tend to use your conscious mind - for example when you work out a problem. 

As you start to visualise it you bring your subconscious mind onboard, and when you begin to feel an emotion about something you really start to engage your subconscious. So, what does that do? 

Whatever is in your subconscious focus you will connect with. Remember when you bought that car or piece of clothing that you thought was unique, only to find soon after that everybody suddenly had one? 

They always did you were just never focused on it before. For example, when you cycle between the white lines ... you draw yourself towards whatever you focus on, whether that is the white line or the gap between them. 

You are not going towards what the conscious mind wants (and what you probably want!), but towards what your subconscious mind is focused on. Are we talking about the key to all of life here? Yes. But this is about cycling... 

 

What types of people tend to use brain training to maximise their success? And are there any famous examples? 

People that visualise a lot (positively and with emotional input) tend to be very successful people. 

Yes, lots of people 'dream' of success but the people who visualise it positively, see it as a reality. They then visualise the steps towards it repeatedly and are much more likely to achieve it. 

Many top sports people are able to complete the Tour de France without getting out of bed. They visualise in their mind and engage their subconscious to do it for them. 

The better you can imagine what you do and especially feel what you do, the stronger you will programme your subconscious to do it. Even Einstein said "Imagination is more important than intelligence". 

 

Is brain training for all cyclists, or will it stay a tool just for the top athletes? 

Like many things that start off as only for the elite, as an increasing awareness of how training your mind affects everything you do, the rest of the community begins to pick up on it. 

Those who understand this earlier and use it will go further, but the beauty is it is never too late in life to learn this.