Get yourself psyched up for race day
The big day is just around the corner. While you’re excited about your upcoming race, you’re also quite nervous. What if you don’t finish? What if you get injured? Or, what if you feel too nervous to compete or you lack the motivation to complete?
All of these fears are quite common for runners. The important thing is that you don’t let these fears get to you and that you instead find ways to psych yourself up for your big race. What can you do to become more relaxed and feel ready? Check out this guide to discover the top tips to psych yourself up for race day.
1. Make a Race Day T-Shirt
If you’re running with a friend or a group of people, making custom t-shirts can be an especially great way to psych yourself up for race day. If you want to, you can give your group a team name and print the name on your shirt. This way, it’ll remind you that you have a support system running with you.
You could also print an inspiring quote on the shirt or print a picture of something on the shirt that inspires you. Even just getting together with others to plan the t shirt printing can be a great way to get hyped for the race.
2. Get to Know the Course
To ease your nerves about the case and get yourself psyched up, it can help a lot if you get to know the course. If you can, run or drive part of the course in the weeks leading up the event. If you don’t have access to the course before the event, check out a video of the course online and review the elevation chart as well as the course map.
Be aware of sections where you’re going to need to push harder, and formulate a race strategy to help you handle the tough spots.
Develop a race strategy
3. Develop a Positive Race Mantra
No matter how hard you train, there’s a chance that at some point in the race, you’re going to want to quit and wonder why you ever even signed up in the first place.
To help yourself push through the challenging moments of the race, you should have some positive mantras in mind that you can repeat to yourself. Some examples of positive race mantras include:
- “If I push my body, my body will respond”
- “Think strong, be strong, finish strong”
- “You were strong enough to get this far so you’re strong enough to keep going”
- “I breathe in strength I breathe out weakness”
- “Just put one foot in front of the other”
4. Set Good Race Day Goals
Having specific goals for your race can also really help your mental state. The goals you set will depend on your own fitness level as well as your motivations for running the race.
Your goal may be to finish the race, run the race in a certain amount of time, avoid negative self-talk during the race, run even split times, or qualify yourself for a bigger race. Whatever your goal is, write it down beforehand and hang it up somewhere you can see it every day, such as on your bathroom mirror or on your bedroom door.
5. Keep Your Body Relaxed
Last but not least, don’t forget to keep your body relaxed. With all the adrenaline that’s running through your system, it can be easy for your body to clench up on race day.
Relax your jaw and shoulders, take deep breaths, and do some light stretching before hitting the course. With these tips in mind, you should be nice and psyched up for race day!