I’ve always been fascinated at how elite athletes say the game moves slower
to them. I’ve only experienced this twice and only once while playing sports
which, if you know how often I’ve played sports, is concrete proof that I’m
not an elite athlete and never will be. It was interesting though to feel
separated from the rest of the players on the field. Kind of like a Guy
Ritchie movie.
Anyway, I learned today that different species see motion at different
speeds also. The reason it’s so hard to swat a fly is because they see
motion four times faster than we do. Conversely, a turtle sees things much
slower which is one of the reasons they move so cautiously.
But it’s not the vision that makes a difference for the elite athletes. It’s
the way their mind fills in the gaps to allow them to make a decision at
their speed which is nearly always ahead of the defenders decisions making
speed.
This concept only works for activities that take place in real
time…sports, accidents, life threatening situations. The other time I
experienced this concept was during a car accident. I won’t go into the
details other than to say it saved at least one life and if I had taken the
time to think at normal speed it would’ve ended disastrously.
I think we all get in our own way when we try to be smarter than we need to
be. Sometimes we need to stop thinking and just do something.