TRAIN THE MIND AND ENDURANCE
Historically it has been believed that what slowed down our body due to exhaustion was muscle fatigue , but today there are a number of scientific theories that put the key to physical resistance in the mind.
There are many studies that defend that athletes who train both physically and mentally, have a much greater range of improvement: they even speak of 120%, compared to 40% of the athletes who focus on working out their fitness.
We also found a theory that states that our brain has 3 distinct areas that are capable of working together. This theory defends the existence of a human side, which is logical, an animal side, which is emotional, which is also vital for survival and is responsible for anxiety or impulsive decisions and thirdly, there is our computer, which It would be responsible for programming what we think as well as the behavior learned.
For competitive athletes, control of their most animal side is crucial in achieving goals and for this they use specific mental training techniques.
T There is also another theory that argues that the most successful endurance athletes are those who manage to conserve as much oxygen as possible in their brain during exercise, but this does not It is an easy task and requires training since the human being in general terms does not have that highly developed capacity.
If we compare a normal person with an elite athlete, we will find big differences between the two, their brains will have very different ways of working.
The brains of athletes have strengthened synaptic connections in areas of the brain such as the hippocampus, related to learning and retention of information. The practice of continuous exercise releases a substance known as brain-derived neurotrophic factor (FNDC) that improves and increases long-term connections and reinforces new memories, helps to learn new skills and also allows us to find new ways to solve problems.
Research has shown that elite athletes tend to have better memory retention, greater peripheral vision, and faster reaction speed to do things instinctively.
Formerly there were a series of skills that were polished in the field and that now are improved in sports laboratories, working on brain training to improve athletic performance.
Today, mind training is considered as important as physical training, allowing athletes to add intensity and number of repetitions to their workouts or routines without losing endurance.
According to experts, the mind should be trained the same as the body and in fact, it should be just as exercised, but does physical resistance really reside in the mind?
In this sense there are contradictory theories, there are specialists who, even considering the fundamental role of the mind, consider that the development of resistance involves expanding physical training and yet there are other theories that defend what differentiates an elite of athletes from the rest of the group is how they have worked their mind.
In short, from now on, we should not only stay in physical training but we should also take into account the great role that the mind plays in our resistance .