TRAINING FOR SPECIAL EVENTS.
The excuse for this chapter in a book written (as set forth), not for
the athlete primarily, but for the average man, who is hopelessly
incapable of prominence or great excellence in any one branch of
athletics, lies in the fact that such a vast number of people nowadays
play games, and are so anxious on certain days to do their best at them
in some competition, that quite a fair percentage of readers will, it is
hoped, pick up a hint or two which may serve them in good stead at that
trying moment when they are about to drive a ball from the first tee on
some medal day; about to step out on to the glaring prominence of a
lawn-tennis court; about to go in (fifth wicket down) when a rot has
apparently set in; or, may be, to play a preliminary tie in the City and
Suburban Ping-pong Handicap. For it is at these cold and shuddering
moments, which no one can hope to meet with more than stolidity, that
one needs to have all one’s wits about one, to be able to keep one’s
nerve, and to have one’s strong points at one’s fingers’ ends, and one’s
weak points (we all have these, and the better one grows at any
particular sport, the more glaring they seem proportionately to become)
anyhow passably defended. At one minute, or less, from now it may be
that your weak point will be attacked; your drive may land you a full
iron shot from the green, a stroke you particularly detest; you may
have a scurry after a cross-court return; you may have a yorker on the
leg stump. In all such, the important thing is, not only to be prepared
for them now, but to have been prepared for them so long before that the
preparation has become a habit. Such strokes may still be your weak
point, but you will meet the emergencies calmly. And to meet any
emergency calmly is in itself a favourable defence, for you will then no
longer be flurried.
Now in any game, when you have to meet a definite attack of an
opponent--this necessity does not apply to a game like golf, or croquet,
or billiards, since in such games you have to do the best you can
yourself, without fear of active opposition--there is a golden rule,
which has never been enough insisted on, and it is the rule that lies at
the base of all we have said about training generally, as applied to
games. Practice is at the root of it, and the object is to get so
familiar with the stroke dictated by the exigencies of the moment, that
it is practically automatic.[15] That is to say, as soon as the attack
(your opponent’s return, or the bowler’s ball) is coming, you will, with
the least possible expenditure of energy, recognise it, get into the
position to meet it, and have the stroke ready. For instance, if the
game is lawn-tennis, you will see that a drive into the left-hand corner
of the court is probable, and before you have really formulated this to
yourself consciously, you should be half-way there, not vaguely, but
ready for the attack. Your body should have moved almost automatically,
and thus your attention and will-power is reserved for noticing your
opponent. He may change his mind at the last second (you can never tell
about opponents), and instead of driving into the left-hand corner he
may lob gently over the net into the right-hand court. Thus your
attention, which would--had you not cultivated a sort of correct
automatonism--have been used up in getting into the left-hand corner,
will be free to observe his change of tactics, and the result is that
you will be far more ready for his new attack than you would have been,
if all your attention had been taken up in getting into position
yourself.
This verbose illustration is necessary to explain a thing that is often
overlooked--namely, the necessity of observing your opponent; and the
more automatic your own preparations are, and the more instinctively
the body works,[16] the more attention you have at your disposal. It
follows, as a corollary, that the less trouble you have to take to meet
the actual attack, the more you can concentrate your mind on your
opponent. The eye should send to the brain the message--“Yorker on the
leg stump,” or whatever it may be--and with _the least possible
expenditure of force, either of muscle or nerve_, the attack should be
met. The more the movements of the body are automatic, the less you will
exhaust yourself. This, in a hard-fought game of racquets, for instance,
is an incalculable advantage.
But in order to ensure this automatic movement there is one thing
absolutely essential, and that is not practice merely, but correct
practice and swift practice. And correct swift practice implies not only
much repetition, but concentration of mind. If you perform a new
movement a hundred times, let us say, without thought, it may be done
correctly, but it cannot be done, if correctly, swiftly. Correctness is
the first essential, as we said in the chapter on exercise, and always
essential; the swiftness in execution comes mainly with practice; so
also does the automatic performance of the correct movement. But it is a
very easy thing to lose correctness as the speed increases, and with a
view to right this we have recommended--after the movement has been
completely understood, and learned in some cases part by part--practice
before a glass.
This, then, is the first essential--namely, to have practised one’s weak
points till, though they are still perhaps weak, they are performed with
the minimum possible of conscious thought, so that one’s attention, as
far as may be, is free to observe the opponent. For a long time before
the match continually practise your weak points, till they become, if
not satisfactory, at any rate fairly easy, and give to your strong
points only that amount of practice which will serve to keep them in
repair, so to speak. At the time of the event, of course, you will use
them as much as you possibly can, and at the same time give your
opponent as few chances as possible of attacking your weaknesses. And
the knowledge that you have a passable defence for such weaknesses, and
can use it with moderate ease, will vastly increase your measure of
confidence, whereas the knowledge that in some one point or so you are
nearly defenceless would cramp and worry you throughout the set.
Again, since in many cases correctness of striking lies between two
opposite faults, it is often useful to practise deliberately the fault
which is opposite to your besetting sin. If, for instance, you do not
use your wrist enough in a certain stroke, practise using it far more
than is in the least advisable; if, on the other hand, you use it too
much, not giving the forearm, for instance, its share in the stroke,
practise the stroke with the forearm alone, keeping the wrist rigid, and
you will often find that you thus attain correctness more quickly than
if you had practised correctness. The longest way round, in fact, is
here the shortest way home.
It is a great fallacy, as we have said before, to suppose that mere
practice makes perfect. Instead of improving, you may be merely
ingraining an existing fault; or, again, practice without briskness and
without full attention given is only practice in sluggishness, and
confirms and strengthens want of concentration. Thus it is always
better, if possible, to practise in short spells, and never go on if you
find your attention irresistibly flags; for not only is such practice no
good, but it encourages slack performance. This inability to attend,
which besets almost everyone for a long or short period during a course
of training, and is the arch-enemy to progress, is often the result of
fatigue, genuine tiredness of muscles or nerves; the eye times a stroke
incorrectly, or the overworked muscles are slow to respond. Now this
condition should have been avoided; and most people who have suffered
from it are perfectly aware that yesterday, or two days ago, they went
on with their practice when something, eye, muscle, or nerve, distinctly
told them: “We have had enough.” However, here the condition is now, and
there is only one remedy--rest. It is a bore, but it is your own fault.
This genuine tiredness must not be confounded with a symptom which
certainly it closely resembles in its effects, but which appears to us
to be really different, and may be treated with success by an opposite
method: the symptom known as staleness. One is not conscious in any way
of fatigue, the practice may easily have not been at all excessive, yet
for the time all briskness is lost. Now though rest is recommended by
many as a remedy for staleness, the opposite treatment--namely,
continuance, if not increase of work--is worth a trial; and if one
steadily and perseveringly plays through an attack of staleness, one
usually emerges from it better than when one went in. It is a point on
which trainers disagree, some recommending, as we have said, an
emollient treatment--namely, rest; others a tonic. But above all, if you
decide, rightly as we think, to play through your staleness, play with
all the concentration and briskness you are capable of, and do not lay
the foundations of a habit of slackness. Your best efforts, it is true,
will produce deplorable results; but if you can harden your resolution
to care nothing about the results, and hammer steadfastly along, an
object of pity to men and angels, you will probably be the better for
it. But if your resolution breaks down, and you relax from the poor best
still possible to you, stop at once, for always and always slack
practice is worse than none.
Another demon that, like the Promethean vulture, tears at the vitals of
the man practising for a special event, or for general improvement, is
the apparent slowness of the improvement, and at times its apparent
complete cessation. Such a man, for instance, with the best intentions
in the world will take out a handful of golf-balls to practise, let us
say, mashie shots on to a green. The mashie is a weakness in his game,
and the resultant positions of the first dozen shots cannot be covered
with the traditional table-cloth. The next dozen perhaps are even less
satisfactory, and at this point he will be wise to ask a candid friend
if he is doing anything wrong; or, if the candid friend is a good
player, to show him half a dozen shots. But it is quite possible that
there is no obvious fault at all--only a general weakness. Then, having
eliminated that most dangerous possibility--namely, of _practising a
fault_, let this assiduous gentleman go on with his practice as long as
he is brisk and attentive, and let him continue it every day for a week.
Then, and this is the work of the demon alluded to, he may honestly
think that he has not improved at all, and be disposed to label the
principle of practice to a hot destination. But we solemnly assure him,
if he has the least aptitude for the game, he quite certainly either has
improved, though he is not conscious of it, or he has at least by his
practice made some necessary steps towards improvement, and this
improvement, when it comes, will probably be more rapid than he has
thought possible. From being a poor performer with the mashie he will
one day suddenly find that the club _has arrived_; that it has
shouldered its way through the other mediocre performers in his bag and
now stands predominant. But two postulates are required: (1) that he
must be capable of improvement, (2) that he practises correctly.
Now this sounds a cheerful gospel, and will perhaps not be readily
believed, especially by the person who is in the habit of telling one
after a foozled mashie-shot that he always foozles with a mashie, and by
way of showing how persevering he is, does not use the club again
throughout the round, but plays improperly with an iron. And here it
might be remarked, that though a match at golf certainly does give one
practice it is by no means an ideal form of practice, any more than a
set of tennis is an ideal form of practice. Indeed, it is even less
ideal; for at tennis there is the fact that you are playing against an
attacking opponent, to observe whom is no small part of the game,
whereas one’s real enemy at golf is not one’s opponent, but one’s own
mistakes. Consequently, with the idea of winning the match one
studiously avoids such strokes as may land one in such a position as to
require the use of a shot which one knows to be weak, whereas in
practice one should, instead of avoiding such a shot, do it a dozen
times and yet another dozen. That is practice, and it is by such
practice alone that the demon of despair is exorcised.
Another rule which applies to practice of all games is that the
practiser should gradually increase the severity of his work, in
proportion as the stroke becomes easier to him, till, long before his
match comes off, he has become accustomed (in games of attack and
defence) to meet a much fiercer attack than he is likely to be subjected
to, and himself to attack with a ferocity which he will probably not
need. This gives him the comfortable feeling during the match itself
that he is playing within his limits. So, also, in golf-practice, let
him by degrees increase the difficulties he must contend against, and no
longer place the ball he wishes to play on to the green in as good a lie
as possible, but in a rather bad one; and if his _bête noir_ is a
hanging ball, let him place for himself--after his initial difficulties
are conquered--a dozen balls that hang not badly, but atrociously badly.
Such practice as this will diminish his dread of such a hanging ball as
he is probably liable to encounter, just because he has been in the
habit of playing infinitely more poisonous ones.
Again, it is impossible to emphasize too much the value of the habit of
sparing oneself as far as possible. You may be pretty certain that when
the event comes off you will need all the nervous and muscular force at
your disposal, and it is well to remember that the amount you have is
but limited, and that although you have to play as effectively as
possible throughout, there are many strokes which can be done with
comparatively little effort in one way, but which if done in another are
exceedingly tiring. For instance, the correct timing of a ball at
tennis, and the bringing forward the weight of the body, using the large
muscle areas to back up the arm, will drive a force or a boast with
greater velocity than could have been attained by the arm alone, while
the contribution towards fatigue and exhaustion thus entailed is
infinitely less than if the forearm and wrist were taxed to their
utmost.
It is the business of every trainer, and so of every one, for each man
is his own trainer to a far greater degree than anyone else can be, to
develop his individuality, and though certain broad rules can be laid
down about the wrong way to do a thing, and in a less degree the right
way, much should be left to natural aptness and facility. For instance,
if a man can easily execute a stroke in a certain way with good results,
it is impossible to say that such is not the right way for him to do it;
for the orthodox “right way” may be very difficult to such a man, and it
is mere waste of time for him to acquire it, if by another method he can
accomplish the same thing easily. Here everyone can find out a great
deal for himself, and since facility in movement is half the secret of
success, he should, if he finds a real difficulty in executing some
stroke in the prescribed way, carefully look about to see if he has not
at his command some other method. It is idle, for instance, for a short,
thick-set man to emulate a long loose swing at golf; he might as well
practise high jump in order to be able to deliver a service at
lawn-tennis from the height at which a taller man can, or practise the
“split,” in order to increase his reach. On the other hand, he has
assuredly some advantage in his shortness that the long-legged man has
not; it is this he must grasp and develop.
Finally, it is probably good for everybody to rest, if not completely,
at any rate very largely, for a day or two before the event; for if a
man is not fit then, it is highly improbable that a day or two more of
severe training and practice will make him fit. On the other hand,
rest--provided he does not fret--will largely increase his fund of
nervous force, and his muscles already in condition will lose not one
atom of their briskness by so short a repose. Again, the danger of
over-training is far greater than that of under-training, and the risk
of staleness or tiredness on the day of your match is far more likely,
and, if it occurs, far more prejudicial to your chances, than the risk
of not being quite at concert pitch. But if a man frets, he loses half
the benefit that the rest would give him, and if he finds he inevitably
does so, it is probably better that he should soothe his jangled nerves
by employment. Yet there is a great, if commonly neglected, preventive
against fretting, and that is the reasonable employment of the brain
during the period of training. Then, when the rest before the event
comes, it is easy to find distraction from the very natural nervousness,
in mental pursuits, whereas if, as often happens, the period of training
has been one of inaction for the brain, except in so far as the training
itself was concerned, it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to
busy the mind with other and intellectual occupations. In fact, if only
for the sake of the tranquil, not fretful, rest of the day or two before
the event, it is well worth while, throughout the period of training, to
have some definite and interesting piece of mental work every day. It
should not, of course, be very exciting or very fatiguing, nor should
the hours of work be so long that together with the physical preparation
they produce fatigue; but nothing is a greater mistake than to drop
brain-work altogether, not only, as we have said, for the sake of the
rest before the event, which is practicably impossible unless the mind
is otherwise occupied, but for the sake of the general flatness and
utter want of interest in things after the day is passed. For the mind
gets flabby and in ill condition if not used, just as the body does,
while its reasonable use even during the most severe physical training
cannot, we believe, have any ill effect at all on the body, for it is
not in the nature of things that it should have; while if it has been
unused for weeks, it is practically impossible to rest, as is strongly
recommended, for a few days before the event, without fretting.
There is a sentence in the Latin grammar: “Too much confidence is wont
to be a calamity.” This is no doubt true, but it must be remembered that
too little confidence is certain to be one; and though to inculcate a
frame of mind is perhaps a useless task, yet there is, as it were, a
correct attitude for winning, just as a straight bat is the correct
attitude for a yorker, and it seems in the main to be this.
Never despise your adversary, but whoever he is treat him with respect.
Cultivate a belief in your chances of winning, but remember that though
you are not beaten till the last set has been finished, or the
eighteenth hole putted into, yet neither is he. Husband your resources,
unless things are positively desperate.
And so good luck to you. But if you have bad luck, remember you are a
gentleman, or, if you are not, that you have an excellent opportunity
for making other people think so.