THEQuagraine

It’s a hard pill to swallow for many, to accept that they suck It sucks to suck, remember? I have listed a few points here, of ways I have tried to improve. Tomorrow I shoot down some dumb arguments related to success, because I’m tired of hearing them.

1. Self Confidence: Confidence is important in racing. Many times you are faster in practice compared to racing, because in practice nothing is on the line. In racing you can’t afford any mistakes, you are nervous, and if you aren’t confident, doubt creeps in, and you won’t perform at your best. Confidence pushes doubt to the side, and makes risks seem smaller or disappear. “I got this”. The best description of this I have found is what Tony Hawk says in the below video. Basically, you need to believe in what you are doing, and not thinking that you can’t or you will fail, etc. Think of a successful outcome, and it’s possible.

Driving more and racing more helps a lot, with confidence but you do also have to make a conscious effort to be positive, and to convince yourself, that “I got this” unless this is your natural way of thinking. A side note, and a true story. The 1st club race I won at OCRC in 2wd, where I beat clearly faster drivers than me, the last thing I said to my friend when he wished me luck was “I’m going to win this”. And I wasn’t joking. And then it just worked out. Confidence makes a difference, and that leads me to the next point.

Conclusion: My biggest problem has always been a lack of confidence, I know, hard to believe after I designed by own car and basically put 10 years of my life on the line to do this. I don’t think you need to be confident to do this, an idiot is sufficient. I have been actively working on giving less of a shit when it comes to failing or crashing, and focusing on positive outcomes. It’s work in progress, but it does make a difference. When Notch called me as being 1 second off TQ at Thunder Alley, I didn’t think oh no I better not make a mistake, I punched it and thought “Screw Adam Drake, I got this, he is all washed up anyway.” Your mental state makes a huge difference.

2. Religion: Is it a coincidence that many of the best performing people in pretty much any field that requires some sort of human performance are also deeply religious? Maybe the best example being Ayrton Senna? I think there is something to it actually. This is not a dig at religion, so try to stay focused and not hate me. In order to be religious, you need to be able to completely convince yourself of something that has no evidence, or logical explanation. In fact it has everything going against it, yet you need to be completely sure that you are right.  To do this, you need to think in a very similar way to when you convince yourself that you will be world champion, or you will be the best in the world, or whatever. Convincing your brain of something without evidence. You need to have faith. And in addition, not only are you thinking in a suitable way, you also believe that God is on your side, and if it’s meant to be it will happen. How is that for a confidence booster?

Conclusion: I clearly lack the capacity to be irrational. I have tried, but I can’t convince myself of something I think is not possible. I can fake it, but I can’t sincerely believe it. But what I can do, that many people don’t, is dream bigger than most. I can lie in bed and envision a future that most people would laugh at. That’s what I can do.

3. Virginity: It has been proven over and over that the fastest RC Car drivers are virgins. Recently a couple of the fastest have stopped being virgins, and it will be interesting to see if they can maintain their results compared to the other top performers who still remain in the virgin category. Another way to put this, is that when a vagina enters your life, your priorities change. It’s only natural, this has, and will continue to destroy many a man’s life. This is a very similar situation to getting older. “He is too old”, etc, no I don’t believe it. There comes a point in life when your faculties go all out of sync as you get old, but it’s not at 35 or 40. It’s much later than that. The reason many drivers slow down when they lose their virginity, and 30+ racers slow down even more, is because their priorities change. RC isn’t nr1 any longer, and that matters.

Conclusion: For the past year or so, I have been working on re-virginising myself. I broke up with my girlfriend last year, and I have basically been on a bit of a dry spell in an effort to get faster since then. Time will tell if this strategy of de-vaginaising my life is a successful one.