Hi everyone!
Recently I've been taking notes on my behavior during contests (It can be some round here in Codeforces, Hackerrank or even at ACM-ICPC sub-regionals) and trying to come up with a way to setup my brain to perform well. Sad thing is: I get too nervous .
My first attempt in a competitive envoriment was in 2014, an Brazillian ACM-ICPC sub-regional (not a very intense envorioment as you may guess). I was there, me and my colleages. No hopes on getting a good place. Just for fun. Trying my best to prove something to someone, I don't know. For our surprise, we came in 4º out of 31 teams. That was a great result for our first try! But one year later, with other teammates (better ones, in my opinion!) and after one entire year of intense studying (I was definetly more prepared) we came in 5º place. I was personally devastated. I couldn't pass even the easy ones, my teammates helped a lot and basicly carried me entirely.
Also I'm on a streak of highs and lows on contests here. All of them I get the feelling that a can do better in the next one (which I do in some of cases and others ... not so much). The thing I noticed was: If some contests is really important to me and I have big expectations on my performance, I do worse than I thought. If not, I get my regular performance.. It seems that if I try to be calm and ready to do well and I fail 1 single time during the contest I get on spiral of failure that only seems to get worse. Like a paradox, if I force myself to do well, I do worse. Otherwise I do regular (most of the times).
PS: My latest results that prove this behaviour was the last contest of 2016 here. I wanted to start 2017 with the right foot and do well in this one and change my rank: Solved 1 out of 8. Joined this hacker earth contest with no hopes of getting a good place or even 2 questions right: Solved 3 out of 6...
PS2: And is not even about my knowledge barrier. Some questions I do naive errors or overkill questions. Or my mind is blocked during contest time and I can't solve an easy problem (I can solve it even after minutes out of contest area ...).
I can't be the only one, please!
Is this ever happened to you ? What did you do to overcome this problem ? Did you overcame this with time and patience or it was just a change in your mindset ?
Please share your thoughts and behaviours so me and other troublesome people can be as good as you are.
Sorry for the long post! Happy New Year !!
:-)
I think it is most important to find a balance between staying confident and staying humble. If you have a bad contest, remind yourself that you did worse than normal and that it doesn't mean you are a bad programmer. If you have a good contest, remember that you have to keep practising to be able to do well in every contest, not just get lucky in one.
I still struggle with the problem you describe of getting too nervous in contests which matter — when I participate unofficially in Div.2 I do well. But when it is rated I always choke and can't solve problems.
I think too many people seek rating and hope their skill will reach their rating. Instead, it is better to seek skill and let the rating match it. Please note that I give this advice although I am still guilty myself — I am far from perfect. :)
Thank you for your reply!
I think my problem is exacly that. The problem is I can't recover very well after a bad contest. The feeling of defeat hits me hard and I think I'll never be able to be good. I think I need to train my selfawareness and know what I can and can't do (yet), so when I fail I am not surprised. I dunno, maybe I need to get used to defeat and always look ahead with eager eyes and try to learn from my mistakes. And stop trying to match my rating with my skills and just let it happen, as you said.
Thank you!