THE YOURTUBE PROCESS

Use YouTube for your advantage…

Train awake, transform overnight and discover just how much training can happen when your body is resting.

There is a reason I called this YourTube.

YouTube gives us almost unlimited access to the very best athletes, performances, techniques, tracks, circuits, courses and competition environments in the world. YourTube changes the way you use that access. Instead of simply watching someone perform, we turn what you are seeing into something your mind can begin learning, rehearsing and eventually recognising as familiar.

This takes visualisation far beyond closing your eyes and imagining yourself performing well.

The science behind mental rehearsal, motor imagery and neuroplasticity is fascinating because vividly rehearsed movement can engage many of the neural networks involved when you physically perform that movement. Across the last 16 years, what has fascinated me even more has been exploring just how far we can take those principles with real athletes in real performance situations.

That curiosity has taken YourTube into areas I never imagined when I first began experimenting with it.

I have used it to help athletes change technique, develop speed and strength, learn unfamiliar tracks and circuits before arriving, prepare for competition environments, rehearse routines and continue training when injury has temporarily taken physical practice away from them. We can incorporate video, audio, imagery, physical sensations and sleep based reinforcement, then personalise the process around the athlete and what they are trying to achieve.

And this is where it becomes seriously interesting.

You can train deliberately while you are awake, then create the conditions for that learning and rehearsal to continue while you sleep. Instead of asking your conscious mind to force the perfect performance, we give your unconscious mind quality information to work with and allow repetition and familiarity to begin doing their job.

One of my elite 100m freestyle swimmers gave me a wonderful demonstration of just how powerful this can become. We had created a process around race speed performance that he was mentally rehearsing 5 times a night. After 5 nights he returned absolutely exhausted and told me what had been happening. The experience had become so vivid that his body was responding to the mental workload far more strongly than either of us had anticipated.

That became another important piece of the YourTube evolution. More is not automatically better. Just as physical training needs to be programmed intelligently, mental rehearsal needs to be understood, measured and adapted to the athlete.

This is also why YourTube can become particularly valuable during injury. When your body needs recovery, one of the greatest frustrations can be feeling as though everyone else is progressing while you are standing still. YourTube gives us another option. We can keep appropriate movements, techniques and performance experiences familiar to the mind while respecting what the body needs physically. Your body may temporarily be unable to complete your normal training… your mind can still participate in your development.

The same principle becomes incredibly useful when something is unfamiliar. A new track, circuit, course or competition environment does not necessarily need to feel completely new when you arrive. We can begin creating familiarity before you get there. Instead of your first exposure happening when performance matters, parts of that environment can already feel recognised.

YourTube fits beautifully alongside Head Start because Head Start begins changing your understanding of how your mind influences performance, while YourTube gives you another practical way to use that understanding. It also combines powerfully with The Dear Diary Process because one can help shape the direction of your thinking while the other allows us to work directly with the performance experiences we want your mind and body to become increasingly familiar with.

And perhaps my favourite part is that much of this can be cleverly disguised as something remarkably simple…

Relaxation.

Sometimes you can genuinely be sitting with your feet up watching videos while doing something very deliberate for your performance.

So when your parents walk past and ask why you are sitting there watching YouTube instead of training, you finally have the perfect answer…

“I’m training.”

And if you are one of those athletes who has tried visualisation before, struggled to see pictures clearly or decided that visualisation simply doesn’t work for you, I understand.

You just haven’t done it like this yet.

Put your feet up… let’s train.