CONSISTENCY IS KEY

Hello everyone, hope you are all doing fine and meeting your goals you set so far this year. This month I wanted to talk about a very important subject for all athletes, and this is about being consistent with your training objectives and goals.

 I have been instructing a lot of students lately that have spent time at the Millsap’s Training Facility. During conversations about MTF, I think about why the riders who are spending a lot of time and money there are having success, and what I need to do to continue to get better as an instructor myself, and the answer is very simple and very obvious, CONSISTANT TRAINING!

 Think about this for a moment, Ricky Carmichael and Davi Millsaps, who are certainly two of the best riders ever, were basically trained by their mothers. I don’t really know if Jeannie Carmichael ever rode or raced motocross, and I do think that Colleen Millsaps did ride and race a bit, but certainly not to the extent that say Donnie Hansen, Gary Semics, Ronnie Tichenor, Shannon Niday or myself have, BUT they are getting results. Again, they understand that with a good plan and consistent execution, and addressing ALL facets of the plan, you can have success. And please don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that we are better that Jeannie or Colleen, I have a great deal of respect for them, but if we other instructors could all have the same riders in front of us every day of the year, think what we could do? Again, you must be consistent with your training.

 What are all the facets you ask? Well it’s not just showing up to your local track and riding, that’s for sure. Riding techniques, endurance moto’s, speed work and on the bike training are important, but if most any rider put as much time and effort into their physical training, rest and recovery, diet and nutrition, bike set up and maintenance, and mental focus, you would all have such better results. Let’s be honest here with ourselves, there are at least two major problems we must overcome. One is many of us are simply to lazy to put in the effort, instead of training, or riding in the heat, or finding healthy foods, or even setting goals, we would rather have Mom and Dad do all of our dirty work, so we can play video games, eat ice cream and get ourselves in trouble. Then there are those that are willing to put in the time and effort, spend hours training and riding, but never seeked out the proper help to learn how to do all of these things properly. There are good riding instructors, good physical trainers, good dieticians, good doctors, good mechanics, good psychologists, and good business people that you could surround yourselves with and they are in the business of helping you, but they are worthless if you don’t take advantage of them.

 You argue that they would cost too much money, but what is really costing you? What about spending money week in and week out, going to the races and always getting poor results. What about your bikes breaking all the time? What about you get tired half way through the moto? What about lack of motivation and frustration? What about crashing every week and being injured? What about all the crap you think you need for you bike that does absolutely for your lap times? What about wandering aimlessly week to wee, month o month, year to year with no plan? What about when you turn 18 and you are completely tapped out burned out and your parents are totally in debt, with nothing to show for it except it was a good time? It goes back to amateur choice or pro choice, and you made the wrong choices.

 I may seem a bit negative here, and maybe I am, but if you don’t pull things together, get a good plan, surround yourselves with the right people, and make the right choices, you have very little chance at success. You have to commit, execute and be CONSISTANT!

 Be sure to read Seiji’s column in this magazine as well, he is so good, he is here to help you, and he need’s to be part of your support system. Make the pro choice.

Take care and be good.

Larry