I think most of us give something to charity as our means permit. I would guess that most people donate to their church, their kid's schools, and probably a little (or a lot) to causes like Medicins sans Frontieres (Doctors without Borders). And I suspect a lot of people donate to their food shelf, the homeless network or some other community effort through their work or life. THESE ARE ALL GOOD THINGS!!! They do help people, and regardless of how you feel about people needing to get up off their ass and help themselves, sometimes people do need help. If your attitude is "I've got mine, so screw you" - you can probably stop reading now, turn the computer off and go enjoy your life. This isn't about you.
I've been doing more and more 'minifunding' of late. Small donations, as directly as I can, to specific programs or projects that serve a real need. Most of these are oriented towards kids, education and food safety nets. A kid who gets breakfast does better in school. Making sure they get something other than fried chicken products at lunch means they might learn about real food for themselves later on. And having books to read, robots to program, and widgets to build can mean that they aspire to something more than pushing a wheelbarrow or working at Wallyworld.
I consider myself privileged to have a number of friends who are educators. I think most of these folks are very good teachers, taking pride in their job, and caring about their students. I know a few who go the extra mile. Mark T., an educator here in Minneapolis teaches at a school in a lower income neighborhood. Mark started a biking program for the kids at his school. They started out small, but now have 30+ kids riding several miles every afternoon,
My buddy Tegan in Oklahoma City is another teach who cares far beyond the basics. By choice, Tegan teaches at one of the highest poverty rate schools in OKC. Her classes are full of kids who have lots going against them in life. But - they've got a great teacher. Tegan has built the foundation of a robotics lab for these 5th graders. Four classes of 5th graders share this small lab, but they are engaged!
Anyway, yesterday Tegan put out a donors choose fundraiser to buy a second laptop for this lab so that twice as many kids can be engaged in writing instruction programs for the robot at any given time. They met the goal in about a day, so the kids will get more time this year. Direct, low overhead, low cost, high impact. I'm so happy to see them get the chance. If you are interested in helping, you can donate to help fund whatever is next on her shopping list by clicking on the 'fundraiser' link at the top of this paragraph.
I'd like to find or fund another pair of laptops this year, and maybe a Raspberry PI or Arduino lab next year. If you are in the Minneapolis area and have a good surplus laptop or other things that would be useful to a lab, drop me a note and I can help with transport.
~marsh
Coach
Friday, April 17, 2015
Wednesday, April 1, 2015
Thought circles - coaching series
I'm a big believer in positive attitude and positive thought stream bringing rewards in just about anything you do.
If you ask top skiers how they mentally preview the course, it's always about attacking the gate, hitting the perfect line, and accelerating to the next gate - making the perfect run. There is no 'plan B', no 'what if', and definitely not 'watch out for...' Rehearsing disaster can do more to bring it on than ignoring it - it's a mental game, and really essential to focus on the positive mental aspects on race day. You *learn* how to dance, ski, paddle, row, ride, run, climb back on the training course, home gym, or lake. You learn how to deal with disaster there too. If you are training hard, you'll make mistakes, you'll crash and burn and sometimes, you get hurt. You also learn how to recover - brace with your toes, stick your butt out and regain your balance, and dab your brakes to stay in the trail. But come competition day, you clear your mind and put it all behind you. On race day, the only thing that matters is the positive, clear and perfect race.
In the words of Morpheus from the Matrix, "Free your mind." Get to the venue early enough to warm up, collect your gear, Talk to your coach if you have one. I get calls from some of my athletes at ridiculous hours of the morning on race day just for a pep talk. And it's not really a pep talk - just a chance to clear your mind about what you are doing.
The mechanics of *what* you think about on race day depends somewhat on the sport. Rule one is always "think only about positive things". Pre-race affirmations like "I am fast", "I know this course", "I'm feeling good today" are great, but come race time, park them, along with the negative stuff. You belong here. If you didn't, you wouldn't be on the line today. Park it all.
I teach a 'thought circle' to use while racing. The thoughts vary a lot depending on the event. When I was racing time trials on bike, back before the days of power meters, heart rate monitors and tri bars, my thought circle was "heart, head, heels" I'd repeat this every minute or so. It's just a checkin for your body - am I going as hard as possible, is my head staying in the game, am I on plan for my legs. You can vary this to fit your sport, and for a really short sprint, it may be a single word - like "breathe". The important part is to have something to trigger positive actions and thoughts locked in your mind.
What you think about next does depend to some extent on how long your race is. If it's a long race, like a ski marathon, you actually have lots of time to think, and if you tried to constantly think about a 3 word circle, you'd wear yourself out in about 2K. But there are lots of other things to think about in a marathon - the course, your technique, others around you. It's still very important to keep positive - even when your wax is slipping. Think about what you need to do to fix it, or correct it, not "my skis are slipping, I'm going slow," Reality may be "my skis are slipping because my wax is gone, but I have one climb left and it will cost me more time to stop than to herringbone that hill". Turn the negative into a positive PLAN.
The same concept holds true for a sprint race. Kayaking and rowing are two of the highest energy output sports, and two of the most technical sports around. So many things *can* go wrong, that it's easy to dwell upon them, and not think about the good that *will* happen when the horn goes off.
The thought circle becomes really important in sprint. Write down the words you want to key on. Setup, Catch, Pull, Exit, Return. Add in the elements of your race plan 'accelerate 20 blades at 500m', 'repeat at 750m', 'drive the final 50' Don't focus on balance, don't focus on steering, don't worry about wind or waves or crabs or other distractions. Don't even worry about your competition. You won't be able to see them anyway, Just assume they are all right there with you. Instead, commit yourself to that positive circle of thought. You know what each word means, what it feels like when it's on. How the boat gets 'the glide' when it's running well. You know what you should feel like 75 or 80 blades down the course as you cross the finish line. And you *know* how it feels when you do it right.
And when things go well in a race, and you finish well (or maybe win!), lock that moment in your mind. Remember how you felt after you crossed that line. Know that for that moment in time, you had the rock balanced at the top of the world. It's a good feeling. And it can become part of the circle next time.
~marsh
If you ask top skiers how they mentally preview the course, it's always about attacking the gate, hitting the perfect line, and accelerating to the next gate - making the perfect run. There is no 'plan B', no 'what if', and definitely not 'watch out for...' Rehearsing disaster can do more to bring it on than ignoring it - it's a mental game, and really essential to focus on the positive mental aspects on race day. You *learn* how to dance, ski, paddle, row, ride, run, climb back on the training course, home gym, or lake. You learn how to deal with disaster there too. If you are training hard, you'll make mistakes, you'll crash and burn and sometimes, you get hurt. You also learn how to recover - brace with your toes, stick your butt out and regain your balance, and dab your brakes to stay in the trail. But come competition day, you clear your mind and put it all behind you. On race day, the only thing that matters is the positive, clear and perfect race.
In the words of Morpheus from the Matrix, "Free your mind." Get to the venue early enough to warm up, collect your gear, Talk to your coach if you have one. I get calls from some of my athletes at ridiculous hours of the morning on race day just for a pep talk. And it's not really a pep talk - just a chance to clear your mind about what you are doing.
I teach a 'thought circle' to use while racing. The thoughts vary a lot depending on the event. When I was racing time trials on bike, back before the days of power meters, heart rate monitors and tri bars, my thought circle was "heart, head, heels" I'd repeat this every minute or so. It's just a checkin for your body - am I going as hard as possible, is my head staying in the game, am I on plan for my legs. You can vary this to fit your sport, and for a really short sprint, it may be a single word - like "breathe". The important part is to have something to trigger positive actions and thoughts locked in your mind.
What you think about next does depend to some extent on how long your race is. If it's a long race, like a ski marathon, you actually have lots of time to think, and if you tried to constantly think about a 3 word circle, you'd wear yourself out in about 2K. But there are lots of other things to think about in a marathon - the course, your technique, others around you. It's still very important to keep positive - even when your wax is slipping. Think about what you need to do to fix it, or correct it, not "my skis are slipping, I'm going slow," Reality may be "my skis are slipping because my wax is gone, but I have one climb left and it will cost me more time to stop than to herringbone that hill". Turn the negative into a positive PLAN.
The same concept holds true for a sprint race. Kayaking and rowing are two of the highest energy output sports, and two of the most technical sports around. So many things *can* go wrong, that it's easy to dwell upon them, and not think about the good that *will* happen when the horn goes off.
The thought circle becomes really important in sprint. Write down the words you want to key on. Setup, Catch, Pull, Exit, Return. Add in the elements of your race plan 'accelerate 20 blades at 500m', 'repeat at 750m', 'drive the final 50' Don't focus on balance, don't focus on steering, don't worry about wind or waves or crabs or other distractions. Don't even worry about your competition. You won't be able to see them anyway, Just assume they are all right there with you. Instead, commit yourself to that positive circle of thought. You know what each word means, what it feels like when it's on. How the boat gets 'the glide' when it's running well. You know what you should feel like 75 or 80 blades down the course as you cross the finish line. And you *know* how it feels when you do it right.
And when things go well in a race, and you finish well (or maybe win!), lock that moment in your mind. Remember how you felt after you crossed that line. Know that for that moment in time, you had the rock balanced at the top of the world. It's a good feeling. And it can become part of the circle next time.
~marsh
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