okansas.blogspot.com Occassional thoughts about orienteering
Tuesday, December 23, 2003
Stress and competing
I've had some good races when I've been stressed by work or school or something else. Sometimes it seems like you can put your troubles out of your mind and compete well despite the stress.
I've also had some disasters when I've been stressed by work or school or something else. I remember one race in particular where I hit the first control, missed the next several, then bailed out to a road and jogged back to the finish without doing more than about a third of the course.
I wonder why stress helps in some cases (or at least can be dealt with constructively) and hurts in others?
I was interested to see that the football player, Brett Favre, played a great game just after learning his father had died. It is hard to imagine a much more stressful situation. I wonder why he had a great game instead of a collapse? Motivation, stress, concentration .... those are interesting things.