Image: DALL-E

Oh F*&k, swearing at my Garmin, Will Make Me Faster.

Swearing with the potential to offend has improved physical performance during short and intense tasks requiring strength and power. While the exact mechanisms remain unclear, research by Washmuth, Stephens, and Ballmann suggests that swearing can positively impact physiological, psychological, and pain-related responses.

Why Swearing Works

The self-titled mini-review highlights several ways in which swearing may enhance performance:

• Physiological Effects – Increases in heart rate, blood pressure, and skin conductance suggest a heightened state of arousal.
• Psychological Effects – Swearing can reduce inhibitions, potentially leading to greater physical exertion.
• Pain Modulation – Increases in pain threshold and tolerance may allow individuals to push through discomfort during exercise.

how Much Swearing is Optimal?

The study discusses different dosages of swearing, including the choice of words, intensity, frequency, and overall quantity. Although habituation to swearing’s performance benefits has not been empirically studied, desensitization to swearing in other contexts suggests that overuse might reduce effectiveness.

Practical Considerations

Swearing represents a low-risk, inexpensive, and effective strategy to improve physical performance in acute settings. However, its offensive nature may limit its real-world applicability. Further research is needed to explore the long-term effects of swearing on performance and whether habituation diminishes its impact over time.

In short, a one-off curse at your Garmin could make you faster.

How Garmin Can Capitalise on the research

I have some genius ideas for Garmin that will probably implement in the next beta cycle.

However, Garmin already has a way to implement this. You could tweak the hydration/fuel alerts. Instead of a periodic reminder to sip your go-to sports drink, you could get a periodic reminder to should your favourite or most effective swear word.

Perhaps the best idea would be for Garmin to leverage the new audio-quality microphone on Fenix 8 to work subtly differently alongside the strobe light or cadence metronome. Imagine using a hotkey to turn on the strobe-speaker with 1 minute to go to the finish line. F***,  F***, F***, F***, repeated very loudly and rhythmically until you press the stop button, will probably make you faster simply because you want to get to the end more quickly to stop embarrassing yourself.

On a serious(ish) note. I obliquely talked to Wahoo about this with their new Wahoo ELEMNT Ace digital bell. Unlike the Garmin Edge 1050, Wahoo said it was possible to hack the ACE and add your own audio file to replace the manufacturer-supplied bell sound. I pointed out that whilst my humour would stretch to having a foghorn sound as the new bell, others might simply have the audio ‘Get out of the f&^&%ing way’, which I’m sure we all agree would be funny the first time but irreparably damage the reputation of every cyclist everywhere thereafter. Don’t do it (I looked on the ACE to try to hack it but couldn’t figure out how).

Take out

Maybe a one-off profanity is worth trying to knock a second off your 5K PB in that final sprint, or maybe adding an extra 2.5kg on your bench press is worth it. Try it; other than permanently ruining your chances with that girl on the next station over, what have you got to lose?

what do you think?

And, yes, my usual rule about no swearing is removed for this one, virtually any comments welcomed below. However, I’m not sure that my spam filter will like it. Fill your boots; it’s W*&£$*g Wednesday.

It’s just a bit of fun. I don’t beat up old grannies, hit children or invade neighbouring countries. I’m nice, really.