Help your athletes show up focused and ready to perform, no matter what race day throws at them. Our online course “Race-Day Mindset,” gives you a complete playbook for coaching the mental side of performance. You’ll learn how world-class coaches and experts—including Dr. Brian Butki, professor of sport psychology at Colorado State University, and coach Grant Holicky—equip athletes to perform their best under pressure.
Explore how to:
- Build personalized Race-Day Cognitive Plans that structure focus zones, cue words, and contingency scripts to keep athletes composed when races get chaotic.
- Teach visualization routines that prime the mind and body for success, using sensory detail and realistic “what if” scenarios just like elite coaches do.
- Master visualization: Use visualization and imagery drills to make athletes’ minds race-ready—complete with sensory cues (the hum of tires, the smell of embrocation, the sound of the start gun).
- Reframe anxiety: Guide athletes to reframe anxiety as excitement and recognize their personal “sweet spot” emotional zone—the Individual Zone of Optimal Functioning (IZOF)—for peak performance.
- Manage pain: Coach athletes through six science-based ways to deal with pain, including self-talk scripts, mental focus anchors, and control strategies that transform discomfort into data.
- Apply plug-and-play cue lists and reflection prompts to help athletes build routines, track mental performance, and stay adaptable under race pressure.
Every lesson includes practical guides, language you can use with athletes, and frameworks you can immediately bring into your next pre-race meeting or group ride. Whether you coach juniors, pros, or weekend racers, this course reveals how to turn mental chaos into composure—and tension into flow. You’ll come away ready to help athletes feel prepared, focused, and fully in control when it matters most.
How to Enroll
All USA Cycling courses are offered exclusively through USA Cycling’s online learning management system at learn.usacycling.org.
Questions? Contact Suzy Sanchez, Director of DEI and Membership Programs, at ssanchez@usacycling.org.
