It is no coincidence that we run, swim, or cycle faster in a competition than during training. But what are the reasons?

Every endurance athlete knows this scenario: they prepare themselves consistently and seriously for a competition, work hard and at some point, feel in top form. But are then faced with a sobering experience during the last test run before the big event. The marathon runners are aghast to discover that their speed per kilometre in the half marathon is even slower than that in the full city marathon they ran two months ago. And the cyclists are forced to realise that they conquered the mountain much faster during the last race. What was the point of all that training…? 

Don't panic about your training performance

It is a well-known phenomenon that athletes are only very rarely able to perform better during training than in a competition. However, it has recently been discovered that particularly endurance athletes who train alone have clear discrepancies between their training and competition times.

While explanations such as “competitors pull you along during an event”, “the race mode motivates the body and mind”, and “suffering is only possible in competition mode” are certainly true, they do not explain why you are really faster when directly competing with an opponent and are seemingly able to exceed your performance capacities. 

For this reason, sports scientists have focused more intensely on this phenomenon in various studies over the last few years. Dutch sports scientist Marco Konings published a fascinating study on the topic two years ago and has meanwhile substantiated his findings with further tests. Konings primarily examined the effects of physical and mental fatigue on a duel or a competition. 

The scientist, now living in England, worked with trained cyclists who are familiar with racing situations and got them to cycle two four-kilometre distances at their maximum possible speed - once alone and once against a virtual opponent. As expected, the cyclists competing against the virtual opponents were considerably faster than those cycling alone. So far predictable. Konings and his colleagues from the University of Essex then went one step or pedal rotation further: they took a contraction sample from the leg muscles of each cyclist before and after the test. Using electrical stimulation, they were able to determine how much extra force was extracted from the muscles. 

This allowed them to measure peripheral and central fatigue: how much weaker is the muscle as such after each completed distance and how much weaker is the impulse from the brain to the muscles? Konings and his team were able to demonstrate that central fatigue in the brain during the solo ride and the ride against a virtual opponent sank by roughly the same amount (only 1.5 percent difference). Things got exciting when it came to the peripheral, muscular fatigue: after the race against the opponent, it was seven percent higher than after the solo ride. This conversely means that a higher performance could be achieved when competing against an opponent. 

The hunting instinct in humans?

How is this possible? Some scientists refer to a kind of hunting instinct, which still lies dormant in us from the prehistoric times. And endorphins can also be brought “into play”, as they are always released for a relatively short time if we exceed our maximum loads. Figuratively speaking: we run or cycle at our maximum performance level when competing against a more or less equally strong opponent, are pleased about our performance and in the process release painkillers, which in turn deceive the body in the short term that it is currently being required to perform at a disproportionately high level. 

Another thesis is based on tests that were carried out during hard training units in different types of sports. According to this, metabolites send signals to the brain, which are interpreted as pain. The longer you can ignore these pain signals, the more power is released. And it is apparently easier to ignore the signals if you are chasing a real or virtual opponent - or they are chasing you. 

More racing situations in training

Whatever way you look at it: athletes are evidently able to perform better on a purely physiological basis when competing against other competitors who are preferably more or less as fast. This is something that we have in principle always known. The question that therefore arises is, what benefits can athletes draw from these findings? 

Those athletes who train either a lot or exclusively alone should, as much as they love their individual “privacy” when training, do competition or comparison units under racing conditions on a regular basis. This not only makes it easier to assess their real “competition fitness level” due to the presumably faster times but incorporating such units into their training will play an important role in improving their performance. 

The behaviour of the opponent plays a fundamental role in these comparison units. This is because a variety of factors – similar to those in a competition - will have a sustainable impact on the performance of the competitor. Konings and other sports scientists have thus come to the conclusion that “for a future exploration of the effect of opponents on the regulation of the training intensity”, it is advisable to understand the opponents in terms of their social achievements and character traits, etc. At the same time, the personal aspects of the athlete should be taken into consideration - because it also depends on manipulating external factors, such as their attitude and internal aspects such as the above-mentioned peripheral and central fatigue. 

In any case: competing with fast friends is by all means desirable, as they will not only challenge you but also forgive, should you be faster.

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