Physical training is important for a race driver to ensure he is fit to handle his machine. However, the mental preparation is also essential into honing a world champion.
We take it for granted that a good racer will inherently have quick reflexes, impeccable reaction times and to a certain extent, good memory.
Not every driver has above average mental ability but they can improve it to acquire this skill.
In between driving various race cars around the Yas Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi, I met Dr Riccardo Ceccarelli of Formula Medicine, who specialises in studying, measuring and improving a race driver’s mental and physical ability. He put me through a series of different exercises to evaluate my mental ability.
If engineers head to university to gain a degree in Engineering, then Formula Medicine is the equivalent for a race driver.
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| Staying focused: A file picture of Finnish driver Mika Hakkinen of McLaren-Mercedes during the qualifying session of the Formula One Japanese Grand Prix. An F1 driver has to cope with the physical and mental stress that comes with the job. — AFP |
Stress is something we all have to deal with everyday. But it’s fair to say that the stress levels of an F1 driver are way higher than any of us regular folk on a Sunday afternoon.
In order for a driver to absorb the stress and still race well, it’s important for him to control his heartbeat.
I was asked to lie down and close my eyes. My baseline heartbeat was then measured, and over the span of 90 seconds, I was asked to maintain it. Sounds simple?
Well, I thought so, too.
But just closing my eyes and thinking about maintaining my heartbeat stressed me out and it increased.
How do I know that?
Every time my heartbeat increased higher than my baseline, it would trigger music. The goal was to then relax, lower your heartbeat and wait for the music to stop.
I couldn’t believe how difficult this was for me.
The pressure of hearing the music and then trying to relax to make it stop stressed me out even more.
As my heartbeat increased, so did the volume of the music. By the end of 90 seconds, I think I only managed some 20 seconds of silence.
With the knowledge that I was easily stressed out hanging over my head, I headed to the computer where five separate exercises would measure different aspects of my mental ability.
To be honest, the exercises seemed more like primitive computer games. The first had two red and blue balls bouncing around a screen with a red and blue circle.
When the red ball passed though the red circle, I had to push on the red button and similarly, for the blue.
This really tested my ability to concentrate, but not as much as the next exercise.
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| Sanjeev playing a seemingly primitive computer game that is used to evaluate a driver’s ability to handle stress. — Photo courtesy of ESPN-Star |
For this, I had a right button and a left button. On screen, the words of various different colours would appear.
If the text and colour matched, that is to say, if the word “Green” came up and was in green text, then I would have to press the true button, which was constantly changing between the left or right button. Confused? Well, so was I.
It was mind boggling how I just could not register if a text matched the colour fast enough and then figure out if I needed to push the left or right button. I have never felt so dense in my life.
The other exercises were slightly better, possibly because they measured reactive times, like watching five red lights change to green and measuring the time it takes you to press a button as soon as it does.
Or pressing a brake button to get your car to stop as close to a finish line as possible – an essential skill during pit stops.
Even being slightly off the mark could mean the mechanics would have to reposition themselves and hence waste time.
The final exercise was a memory test where five racing related items would flash up on screen and disappear.
As they reappeared one at a time, I had to press either true or false, as to whether the item was correct and appeared in the right order.
All in all, it took almost two hours and by the end of the exercises, my brain felt like it had run a marathon. I was strangely on a buzz but felt drained at the same time.
Someone described it as mental fatigue.
We often assume that a Formula 1 driver needs to be in tip-top physical condition to win a race but being mentally fit to handle the pressure, stress and concentration level is also a prerequisite.
Many drivers often incorporate such exercises into their workout routines to hone their mental skills.
Suffice to say that at the end of it all, my evaluation showed that I had below average mental ability.
But given that I was benchmarked against other race drivers, I didn’t feel so bad.
Well, at least that’s how I comfort myself.
> Sanjeev Palar is a presenter for the popular motorsport magazine show Engine Block. Catch more of his motorsport adventures every Monday at 10.30pm on STAR Sports.
