Confidence

[ScrmnDuc]

It may just be me, or this word is being used more here lately, so...

 

(1) How would you define confidence?

(2) How confident are you?

(3) How can you improve your confidence?

 

I'll start it.

1. My personal ability, training and trust.

2. Accelerating and turning around a 9 out of 10. Obtaining my correct turn entry speed around a 7.

3. Practice and training.

 

 

Jeff

[ANORXIC'51]

It took me nearly all of this past season to get back the mental confidence that I completely lost from a crash the previous Aug. started the year off with two 2days (Barber & Road America), and had about one and a quarter of those 4 days in the dry, so that didn't help. Next time on track was at BIR for my New Rider race weekend....first time back at that track since the crash, and not really back in tune with the bike yet. So you can guess how that went. Took until the final 2 trackdays to gain and build up my confidence to where most people had been telling me I was already at skill-wise.

 

1) My personal belief in my abilities and decision making skills

2) I can't put a number on it

3) Never stop learning. Training, reading, watching, learning.

 

-Christian

[ktk_ace]

Not getting into accidents/crashing while generally 90% ahead of the pack while riding on public roads.

[rchase]

It may just be me, or this word is being used more here lately, so...

 

(1) How would you define confidence?

(2) How confident are you?

(3) How can you improve your confidence?

 

1. Knowing and believing 100% in my equipment, training and ability.

2. Not very at the moment.

3. More track time, Better equipment and more training.

[lwarner]

Hmmmm:

 

 

(1) Knowing the outcome, a predictable result.

(2) How confident are you? Hahah, I've been a 10 when I should've been an 8 but I've also been a 5 when I should've been a 6... pick any number.

(3) How can you improve your confidence? Well, here I'm going to sound like a broken record but: by working on one thing at a time. An example would be someone who's never heard of throttle control coming to the school and finally making the bike stable (good TC) and experiencing increased confidence: when I roll on like this it makes the bike stable-predictable result.

For me lately it's been reference points, finding RP's in areas where I lack confidence has helped me recreate my line precisely or know when I err from it slightly... predictable result, it worked last time, I'm duplicating it precisely, I know the outcome to a great degree.

[ScrmnDuc]

Ah, ouch!!

Touche on #2 Lyle

[Hotfoot]

 

(2) How confident are you? Hahah, I've been a 10 when I should've been an 8 but I've also been a 5 when I should've been a 6... pick any number.

 

.

Hee hee, I can totally relate to that, GREAT comment.

[mugget]

confident

ˈkɒnfɪd(ə)nt/

adjective

feeling or showing confidence in oneself or one's abilities or qualities.

"she was a confident, outgoing girl"

synonyms: self-assured, assured, sure of oneself, self-confident, positive

 

I would define it just the same as the dictionary. But it's interesting that it can be either feeling or showing confidence... you can do something that demonstrates confidence, but you can also have the exact same confidence without having done anything at all & just sitting on your bum. For me that's where the danger can lie, so if I do start to feel confident I analyse the reasons why, to make sure that I have solid grounds for it. Or you could say that I always aim to be realistic, and ensure that my perceptions match as closely as possible with the reality of the situation.

 

As for how confident I am - I am 100% confident!

But you need to consider that in light of the above paragraph. I am confident in my current skill level, I know what I can do and I also know when I'm riding over my head. I'm also confident of what I need to learn and what areas I need to improve in.

 

How to improve my confidence?

I think I view confidence a bit differently to most people. I wouldn't say that I need to improve my "confidence", I don't doubt my current abilities or the fact that I can still improve and have more to learn. But when I think of the idea behind this type of question I would answer that I would improve by continuing to make sure that I have a realistic outlook. Making sure that my subjective observations match the objective reality.

 

I tend not to look at situations (say a particular corner that I want to go faster through) in terms of "okay, I'm confident I can do this, yep I can do it!" Rather I just try to look at it realistically. Maybe I really can't do what I want at that time, and that's okay if that's the reality of the situation. But that doesn't lower my confidence, actually that would probably increase my confidence because I've learnt more about my current skill level and found where I can improve. In the same way I don't look at faster riders and let it get my confidence down ("Oh man, I'm never going to be as fast as those guys!"). I would say that I don't gauge my confidence based on performance.

 

Like I say, I probably view this differently to most people - I'm not a super quick rider, but I would say that I have very high confidence. That's my take on it!