by Thomas Kurz
At the end of the previous post I asked how–besides directing endurance training–one can use the knowledge about the tripod position in sports such as ball games and martial arts. I got this excellent answer from Brendan:
“From my background in martial arts, I would always like it when an opponent assumed this position during a break from sparring or a match, as it conveyed my opponent had run out of gas. Equally, I always avoid adopting the same position for exactly the same reason–it is a big boost psychologically to know your opponent is exhausted. On team sports you would pick those players adopting this position to run the plays at.”
Can someone elaborate on Brendan’s observations and his idea? For example, how about pretending to be fatigued? Are there any risks for the pretender?
Tripod position
This is a good and useful insight. Let me take a look at the other side of it. One concern might be whether the opponent is pretending in an attempt to lower your guard and trick you into attacking with your favorite technique, to which he or she has a solid counterattack. Here their mental game offers an entry to a tactical solution against you. Alternatively, if you are the one using the tripod position to pretend being exhausted, you may just boost the confidence of an opponent who otherwise could be timid. In either case, make sure you have a really good sense of the opponent’s capability. This will advance your own mental game in service of your physical and tactical strengths as well as help you read their mental and tactical moves against you. Although you should not turn your match into a chess game with overly complicated thinking, situational awareness enhanced by your knowledge of the opponent is a must in high-level training, sparring, and competing.
Artur Poczwardowski, PhD, CC-AASP
Professor
Graduate School of Professional Psychology
University of Denver
apoczwarATduDOTedu
I’ll always remember how Lance Armstrong faked fatigue during stage 10 of the 2001 Tour de France.
This TV footage shows it best. Search for YouTube Tour de France Greatest Moments – Part 1/5 or video id kuQ_58zcyfs and skip to 5 minutes 22 seconds.
Simon McDonald
I used to fake fatigue often during 1500 m races in school. I’d allow myself to fall behind, sometimes to last place, and wait for the leaders to slow and then zoom past them when they weren’t looking.
I have found that faking the physical symptoms of fatigue, such as labored breathing or showing poor body mechanics in order to fool an opponent, made me feel fatigued. Rather than to fake fatigue itself, I have found it more successful to make tactical decisions that fatigued riders make and thus get others to act in a way that provides an advantage to me.
To make it clearer:
Bicycle riders who are genuinely fatigued make choices that show weakness. This may mean falling back in the group or being slow to react or fail to react at all to increases in the pace. In general they become more defensive in their tactics rather than offensive.
If I choose to follow defensive tactics and react slower than I am able–“faking” weakness of response rather than faking the physical symptoms that someone would look for–I am more successful, since stronger opponents want to take advantage of that by being less cautious with how they ride, thereby wasting energy.