Racing chaos - do you attack or retreat?
When everything goes nuts, do you shrink or pounce? Maybe you decide before you even hit the track.
Hi, welcome to the Terence Dove On Racing Drivers newsletter. Every week I'm aiming to give you a mix of driving technique and new perspectives to keep you fired up in the most worthy pursuit in the world; being a racing driver.
This means learning to love chaos. You need to prey for it, crave it. You want to feel your blood fizz at the prospect of drivers going berserk at the start so you can get stuck into them right now!
I’ve already gone on about planning for race starts:
But what I want to talk about now is how you react to chaos. When everything kicks off in front of you; when there’s contact at the start or when someone makes a divebomb move in front of you and drivers touch, causing karts to weave all over the place. What do you do?
In that instant your instinct decides way before you have time to reason it through. It’s more about your mood, your emotional state; how strong you feel, or how vulnerable you feel.
It either says:
Uh oh, watch out and get ready to avoid problems here, let’s look for the safest way to avoid getting into trouble.
Or
F**** yeah, things are going to open up, get ready to attack!
I hope its obvious which option I prefer. I’ll give you a clue… it’s not the ‘I will wait and see, then I make a move’ option.
It’s the ‘oh yeah, I’m taking advantage of this, let’s have it - then pounce’ option!
Of course it is… But in the actual moment it doesn’t even feel like we have a choice; instincts take over and we become a passenger.
If you wait for chaos to strike and then decide, you are already too late.
The decision to pounce when chaos strikes, has to be made before you exit the pit.
In fact, the decision has to be made before you even get to the track!
I know what it’s like to arrive at a circuit already beaten.
When I used to race I would get triggered by the smell of the track. As soon as I got there the smell of two-stroke oil would set my nervous system off big time.
The first effect was adrenaline, I could feel that adrenal gland react immediately and then thump, the heart responds.
When I felt confident:
With that hit of adrenaline came a beast who couldn’t wait to lay waste to the fools who dared race me.
Or, that adrenaline hit would create the exact opposite, the worrier:
As soon as the heart rate went up, whoosh ‘oh God, what’s the track like? is it slippery? it might rain, oh god they all know the wet lines, I don’t, oh no more clouds etc etc.’
There are no prizes for guessing which one of these guys would go all in at starts, or emerge unscathed when the it all hits the fan.
But I had no idea what caused the beast, or what caused the worrier - I was purely at the mercy of whatever the circumstances were. Here’s what I didn’t know at the time…
How to prepare to take an attack mindset to the track - way in advance.
So, the idea here is to arrive at the track with the right emotional state, so that when things kick off, which they will, your lightening fast instinctive reaction will be the right one.
What decides whether the beast or the worrier takes control.
How prepared you are practically. Plans for lines, overtaking spots, techniques, start plans etc etc.
How much you relish the emergence of chaos.
Point 1 is inescapable. You have to know what you are doing.
Point 2 is the one most drivers miss….
You need to RELISH the chaos of racing.
Don’t fall into the trap of preparing well, then being worried your plans will get scuppered by events.
Think like that and you are already inviting the worrier!
When you invite the worrier you become self-protective, you become afraid of making mistakes and you will hesitate. You’re on the back foot already, you’re screwed.
Be prepared AND CARELESS of your plans at the same time!
It’s like a proper racing outfit, their racing machines are prepared lovingly and meticulously. Every panel is perfect on a car, a lovely new sticker kit on a kart.
But of course, nobody says to the driver ‘please don’t scratch it’ - they expect you to race the hell out of it and not consider the state of the vehicle for a moment!
They care deeply about the vehicle being perfect AND don’t give a damn what happens to it at the same time.
Likewise, as a driver you need to be totally prepared AND at the same time hope like hell that it all kicks off, that your carefully laid plans all go out the window because that’s when you really fly.
This means learning to love chaos.
You need to pray for it, crave chaos. You want to feel your blood fizz at the prospect of drivers going berserk at the start, so you can get stuck into them right away.
You want to feel primed for random and sudden incidents, so when they suddenly occur you experience the sheer joyful exhilaration of being totally at home in the midst of a wild battle scene. That’s when you can operate fully in the zone and experience being some kind of freak of nature behind the wheel.
How to get primed every day. So when race day comes your are like a dog straining at the leash.
I’m hoping that as you read this you are actively imagining scenarios that usually make you nervous, but this time you are salivating at the prospect and generating the blood chemistry that gets you ready to fight.
Maybe you need a bit of music to go with it to get you going.
(Right now I’m plugged into Rage Against the Machine to write this, I’m buzzing!)
Create a messed up race start in your mind, reject the worrier, and think about getting stuck in as the beast.
Keep imagining race starts going bananas, karts weaving and bouncing off each other and you loving it.
Apply this to everything - train your body to love chaos out in the world.
When they put on the news that AI will be the end of the world say sweet, that’s going to cause mayhem, how do I take advantage? Or they say oh no, the economy - say mint, the most badass companies start right in the middle of these chaotic economies, I’m having it.
Give me chaos. That’s the way of the racing driver!
The more you exercise your mind every day to love the prospect of chaos, and you induce the blood chemistry that goes with it, the more chance you stand of bringing out the beast on race day.
Failing that, you can always learn to get comfortable with a cougar in the passenger seat every day and see how that goes - but that comes with a number of issues, especially concerning your upholstery.
Thanks for reading
Terence
On my way to a relatively big race, and reading this has changed my perspective on race starts. We’re running some reverse-grid heats too, so I’m hoping for all the chaos I can get😎