Assessing Your Race
Debriefing after the race is a great way to close the loop on your goal-achievement journey. It allows you to record lessons learned so you can set yourself up for future success.
The best time to debrief after a race is not immediately after crossing the finish line. Give yourself time to relax, eat, and sleep before sitting down for a self-assessment. The next day or two is ideal, if possible. Otherwise, try to do it within a week or two at the most. You want to capture your thoughts while the experience is still fresh in your mind.
Approach your post-race debriefing with a growth mindset to pull out key learnings. Here are some questions to guide your self-assessment — or, if you’re working with a coach, to guide your discussion with your coach.
- What went well in the race? Consider things like pacing, nutrition, tactics, etc. You can note things both in your control and out of your control.
- What didn’t go well in the race? Consider things like pacing, nutrition, tactics, etc. You can note things both in your control and out of your control.
- If you had a race plan or strategy, were you able to follow it? Is there anything you would have changed about that plan or strategy?
- Did you stay on top of your fueling and hydration? If not, what barriers did you encounter? What lessons did you learn about food preferences while racing?
- How well did you show up and meet the performance standards you set for yourself? Consider where you met the standards. Consider where you may have struggled and what the barriers were to meeting them.
- In what areas did you feel particularly prepared and/or underprepared? Consider any issues that are relevant — physical, mental, nutritional, etc.
- What about your training would you do differently next time? If you could go back and adjust your training plan with 20/20 hindsight, how would you adjust it?
- What about your training would you keep the same next time? What are some things that worked well?
- What did you learn about yourself as an athlete and as a person from the experience? In what ways are you a different person now that you’ve gone through that experience?
- Any additional thoughts or reflections on the experience? Reflect on and discuss anything else that’s on your mind after the race.
Writing down your thoughts is not only a great way to facilitate self-assessment, but you can also look back on the lessons you recorded to guide your future success.
Dealing with Not Meeting Your Outcome Goal
“Don’t fear failure. Not failure, but low aim, is the crime. In great attempts it is glorious even to fail.”
— Bruce Lee
Many things on race day are out of our control, including many factors related to whether we achieve the outcome goal we set. As discussed in the goal setting section of the course, we have less control over outcome goals than we do over our performance standards and process goals. Maybe course or weather conditions mitigate against achieving the outcome goal. Maybe we experience illness or injury that keeps us from reaching the desired outcome.
Over the course of your athletic career, there will be times when you do not achieve the outcome you set for yourself and it’s important to be prepared to deal with that. One way to do that is by focusing on your performance standards. Remember, these standards represent how you want to perform even when everything around you seems to be unraveling. Keep those performance standards front of mind and pursue those even when the outcome goal moves out of reach.
Disappointment often comes with not reaching an outcome goal. Disappointment is fine, but don’t let disappointment turn to devastation by undermining your identity as an athlete or person. Not achieving an outcome goal is not the end of who you are. Keep things in perspective and remember that who you are as an athlete and person runs deeper than any single race.
Adopt a growth mindset to stay focused on learning and growth. The path to success never follows a straight line and we often learn the most from setbacks. After the sting of disappointment subsides, dive into the learnings you gained from the experience. Apply those lessons to continue to develop as an athlete and person. They’re valuable and you paid for them in sweat and tears, so don’t let them go to waste.
