okansas.blogspot.com Occassional thoughts about orienteering
Tuesday, December 17, 2002
A bit of an interview with Johan Ivarsson
Last night I read a bit of an interview with Johan Ivarsson. He talked a bit about motivation and his thinking about orienteering. Here is a bit of the interview translated from Swedish:
Motivation leads to concentration. My motivation is to do the perfect race. That's what pays in the long run. You should still be satisfied with a good race. In my perfect race I make a few stops (that I've allowed myself to do). Orienteering technique steers my running speed. When I begin to think about running faster or pushing harder, then I've lost focus in what is important (orienteering technique) in favor of less important things. I've noticed that my running speed is high when the orienteering is going well.
I find Ivarsson's description of his approach appealing. It is quite close to my own way of thinking about orienteering.
One outcome of this sort of approach is that you tend to have steady results, but don't necessarily have the great results. You're a lot more likely to run five races and finish 3rd, 4th, 3rd, 5th and 4th, than to finish 1st, 10th, 1st, 10th and 10th.
Here is what Ivarsson said:
It is more fun to have a good run in every race and finish 5th than to win a race and run poorly in 4 or 5 races.
* The interview is part of the book "Traening" form the Swedish O' Federation.
posted by Michael |
8:59 PM
