The point in coming back for missed gates

What is the point in making our athletes come back for a missed gate?

One could say that it is the right thing to do, and that is absolutely true. Developing the habit of being on top of every detail of the training process is always a big chunk of the path to a steady improvement. At races, athletes who come back for a missed gate show not only determination and tenacity, but also humbleness and respect for the course and the spectators, and this is something they appreciate and value. That makes two reasons to do it, one internal and one external.

Nevertheless, I'd like to dig further and give a deeper reason. By instinct. Or even better, to take advantage of what the instinct can tell us to do and guide us into a better decision-making in the future.

Fábio Scchena Dias Rodrigues, who is always coming back for one more. (Foto of Ettore Ivaldi)

Our survival instinct is configured to avoid risk situations and to economize energy. When our ancestors had to manage risk, those who choose the least risky possible outcomes tended to survive more often, and were able to pass their genes, thus this prevalent trait became a behaviour of the majority of the population. But, what does all that have to do with slalom?

Coming back for a gate is tough, sometimes even dangerous, some it's not even possible. It is a matter of choice. If an athlete misses a gate and his only reaction is to shrink his shoulders and continue down the course, this pattern will eventually get interlocked in his paddling format, and his subconscious choice next time that a gate gets hard. 'Paddle down as fast as you can. Don't do an extra effort, don't risk more than necessary, nothing happened in the past because of missing gates.' However, if every time that an athlete misses a gate, he comes back, paddles up, goes into a hole for it, even has to paddle through gates... all of that is surely going to consolidate his behaviour in this kind of situation. The subconscious doesn't want to get tired, doesn't want to risk, so by always attaining, and the hardest the better, the paddler is going to be conditioned. He is going to be lazy about missing a gate, so he is going to do the impossible for not missing it in the first place and avoid coming back. 

From this point of view, one could consider this like using fear and laziness in our side.