I can't claim to be a football fan, but the World Cup sucked me in. I even started reading about it and was struck by relevance to mountain biking of some of the psychology the team has been using. It's the spin you put on it When Delle Alli was asked if he was nervous about the semi final with Croatia, he said "excited, not nervous". Think of how different a place that puts you in. If you get on your bike in a state of nervousness, then you will probably tense up, you won't

Visualising success is something many athletes do to enhance their performance. They visualise a previous best performance, a training sessi