Friday 19 August 2016

Racing drivers are superior humans to any Olympic gold medallists I can think of

The Olympics is on TV at the moment and we are all supposed to marvel at the super human efforts of all the athletes.

Fair play to them, but they are not a patch on what a regular cash strapped karter has to become if they want to succeed!

Here is what the young racing driver has to cope with that athletes don't.

1) The other guy gets a huge advantage from spending more money than you could ever dream of earning.

Usain Bolt doesn't run away from you because he just laid out ten grand on a pair of trainers yesterday and found an immediate 4 tenths.

Racing drivers have to live with this potentially devastating reality daily and motivate themselves to keep striving on.

2) You can do everything perfect as a driver, and the kart breaks

Athletes and drivers train hard and risk the possibility of physical injury.  But athletes don't face the possibility of losing everything because of a random chain snapping event.

Drivers live with equipment failure as a constant possibility that is totally beyond their control.

3) Danger

I don't remember the last fatality in an athletic event.  Even karters have to face the possibility of broken bones and pain, as well as fears of crashing.  We've all has at least one 'biggie'.

4) The racing environment

The 'at the track' racing environment is hard-core.  Athletics is run by very protective, psychologically aware coaches.  Racing drivers have no such luxury and do their competing in a very tough environment where generally nobody gives a monkey's how you feel - and in many cases the driver is blamed for everything that goes wrong.

5) Money

Yeah athletes struggle for funding but they can apply for government or lottery funding handouts to get by.

A racing driver has to find big money before they even put a wheel on the track, and they have to effectively become exceptional entrepreneurs to do so.  Nobody helps and nobody is giving money to racing drivers for nothing.


The racing world is the toughest environment I can think of full of unfairness and corruption alongside tremendous highs - and that is why it has the potential to develop very special people, who manage to use that environment to reach the pinnacle of human development.

My job is to help you develop the skill and tremendous resilience to thrive in the hardest game on earth.  Find out more at www.evenflow.co.uk