Lizzie Brown and Mark Webber at the Porsche Human Performance Centre
There seems to be an obvious parallel between eventing and racing car driving – two sports that are fast, dangerous and very exciting, even if the horse power involved in each varies slightly. So when New Zealand eventing rider Lizzie Brown was recently invited to participate in the Get Racing Fit 2014 training session at the Porsche Human Performance Centre at Silverstone she jumped at the chance to check out her fitness against some of the best racing car drivers in the world, including Australia’s Mark Webber.
The course held at Silverstone once a year is a unique opportunity to work closely with world class drivers in a small, select group to discover just how to get the most out of your body and mind for the coming season. For the rest of the participants, who were all male, the ‘season’ is the coming racing car season but for Lizzie it was a chance to check her fitness, both mentally and physically for the coming championship year of eventing
The activities during the weekend were made up of seminars, Q&A sessions and practical workshops and topics covered included optimising physical training, nutrition and hydration, recovery and managing the demands of a hectic race weekend.
Lizzie, who works with a trainer three times a week and tries to do regular swimming exercise, was very already aware of how important fitness is to her success and jumped at the chance when one of the organisers, who had read about her in an Eventing magazine interview, offered her a place on the highly sought after weekend of training. She made sure that she was up to the task by preparing well, especially as she knew she was going to be the only female
“It wasn't difficult being the only female” says Lizzie “Because I was quite fit I kept up with them and even beat them! It had given me real focus to my winter fitness programme so I had been working had towards it.
The training I had to do wasn't modified at all from the standard racing driver training that the rest of the group were doing but even so, it was all really relevant. Even odd things like improving grip was useful for me holding reins but mostly it was standard fitness testing like running and cycling - general fitness and core strength applied to what I'd do anyway”
The Australian born Mark Webber who now resides in the UK is famous as the one of the world’s top Formula One racing car drivers who drove for the Red Bull team from 2007-2012. His Twitter name is @AussieGrit which is appropriate - his motto is “To achieve a really big goal you need to prepare for it. Adjust your life. Apply yourself. Just go out and do it”. It is easy to see how a world class eventing rider such as Lizzie could relate to that
“I took a lot away from the weekend” she says “Obviously things such as the nutritional talks and general information but also Mark Webber himself. It's always inspiring listening to a legend at the top of any sport. He spoke about dealing with crashes and coming back from those by building confidence again lap by lap. Similar to us!
The biggest thing was how physically strong and fit Mark is and how he values his fitness highly and it's one of his real strengths. When he goes into a race he knows he is 100% fit for the job so he is not fighting tiredness during the race and can get on with the job”
Lizzie is now going back monthly to the Porsche Human Performance Centre at Silverstone for testing and to work with some of their trainers. This 25 year old rider, who overcame difficulties when she first moved to the UK to win at Boekelo last year, knows that she needs to be in peak condition for the important year ahead and is on the right track to get there
Hear our interview with Lizzie in December 2013
Lizzie and Henton Attorney General on their way to a win at Boekelo
