Visit any amateur motocross race meet and you will soon discover that this is a sport for all ages. It’s not unusual to have three generations of a family competing in the same event. Of course there are many different classes for the various age brackets, skill levels and engine sizes.

There are specially designed miniature motorcycles for the youngsters, sometime as young a 4, who hang around these family oriented, motorsports functions. These bikes are called “the fifties,” named for their 50cc engines. That is a small, .05 liters. Compare that to the one-liter plus engines in big street bikes. These minis have automatic clutches and only one gear, so the contestants must race in the same gear they take-off in. This makes it much less complicated for the little ones to master.

And master it they do. It is absolute amazing the way these first, second and third graders as well as some pre-schoolers dive deep into the turns at blistering speeds and jump high in the air over man made obstacles. Over rough and rutted ground they seem to glide like riding on a super highway. It’s not a follow the leader sport by any means. Hot competition is usually the order of the day with sometimes as many as 40 youngsters challenging each other for the coveted first place trophy.

Yes, this is the kid’s part of the sport and like other little-league types of events the parents get very involved. In fact the little-league syndrome is alive and well in youth motocross. The parents seem to covet the win more than the riders. So much so that many of the moms and dads spend enormous sums of money to insure that their little one has the very best equipment and training. They all seem to have the dream that their child will grow up to be a National Champion and that will certainly be worth all the time, effort and expense.

Training is a must if the kiddo is to be competitive. There are riding schools, private racing lessons and even mental training for these miniature, motorized gladiators.

Billy Junior was one such eight year old and his parents were typical. He had attended the very best riding schools and had taken countless private lessons, but his progress was slow to say the least. The next step was the mental training.

A surprisingly high percentage of motorcycle racers have ADD or ADHD. The loud noise along with the extreme action and high excitement seem to have a special appeal to youngsters with these conditions. Little Billy, as his family called him had been diagnosed as having ADHD during his first grade year. His condition was so extreme that without medication he was somewhat of a disruptive force in the classroom.

When he and his dad went for his first mental training (hypnosis) session Billy Junior had not taken his medication. He never took it when he raced and since this was about racing his parents figured it best to present him as he would be on race day. Maybe this was a good idea because the therapist did get to observe Little Billy’s condition.

But that is all that happened. Putting it mildly “He was wild”. He was so hyper the therapist could not get him into hypnosis. This is rare, because pre-teens and even teenagers are usually great hypnosis subjects.

After a few attempts the hypnotherapist told Big Billy, Billy Junior’s dad, to bring him back in a few days and be sure that the youngster had taken his medicine before hand.

Three days later they returned to the therapist’s office. This time Little Billy was very laid-back. The medicine had done its job. He went into hypnosis easily. The session went very well. As the pair left the hypnotherapists office Big Billy likes to report he had feelings that “nothing had changed.”

That was on a Wednesday afternoon and their next race was on the following Saturday evening. When Billy Junior and his family arrived at the track it was apparent to everyone that something was different about Little Billy. He was laughing and playing with the other kids a usual, but his attitude had changed. Big Billy said he couldn’t put his finger on it, but Little Billy seemed calmer and more confident. Later that evening that clam, self-confidence translated into Billy Junior’s best racetrack performance ever.

Two weeks after his first hypnosis session Little Billy returned for session number two. Once again he had not taken his medication, but the session went as planned with no problems.

The next two Saturday nights saw Little Billy’s performance steadily improve. He was finally showing the skill that his parents had always felt was there. Little Billy was running toward the front of every race and even winning occasionally.

Four weeks after his first hypnosis session Billy and his dad went for the third and final session. Billy had not taken his medication. As a mater of fact he was no longer taking any medicine for ADHD because he wasn’t demonstrating any symptoms of the condition.

It was another two weeks before the therapist got any report from Billy Junior’s family. When word finally came it was a tearful personal visit from his mother. She suddenly appeared that the hypnotherapists door unannounced one afternoon. She was all choked up when she tried to talk, but her message finally came through her crying. That message was a profound “THANK YOU”.

It seems that not only had little Billy’s racing reached the point of being a consistent winner, but also his whole life had changed. His teacher reported that he was a model student and she wished all of her students would undergo hypnotherapy.

The question now remains: “Did the hypnosis cure the ADHD condition or had Little Billy been misdiagnosed. Had his hyperactivity been the result of a medical condition or a fear-based nervousness that the hypnotherapy took care of?”

Perhaps in time medical science will discover the answer, but Little Billy was not the only one with a similar diagnosis to have experienced the same positive result from hypnotherapy. From all across the United States, The UK and Australia stories of this nature keep appearing.

There’s got to be something to it.

For more information on this subject you may contact Jack D. Rhodes, PhD of www.YourMentalGym.com • 5909 NW Expressway, Oklahoma City, OK 73132 • Phone (405) 397-6690

Author's Bio: 

Jack D. Rhodes, PhD is the founder, president and CEO of MFTI, Inc. (Your Mental Gym) formerly of Fort Worth, Texas, now located in Oklahoma City, OK.
He holds a Ph.D. in Behavioral Science from Chatworth College. He is a 1981 graduate of the Monaghan Hypnosis Institute where he received a Bachelor Of Science - Hypnosis degree. He did his post-graduate work in hypnotherapy with the late Dr. John Kappas of the Hypnosis Motivation Institute. In 1996 he received his National Certification as a Master Hypnotist.
More recently he has become a proficient practitioner of Energy Psychology.
He is a member of the American Academy Of Natural Health and a former professor of Hypnotherapy at the McDade Institute in Norman, Oklahoma. He has authored a number of textbooks on the subject of hypnotherapy. His articles on sports mental training frequently appear in national publications.
Beginning in 1988 his private practice was focused, primarily on working with young adults, teenagers and pre-teens for sports and/or scholastic improvement. However, in recent years he has expanded his practice to include a wide variety of adult problem areas, such as weight loss, smoking cessation, stress and anger management and other forms of personal development.
He has helped hundreds of people to reach their goals and improve the quality of their lives.
He is a lecturer and public speaker. For more than 40 years he has also been a professional motorsports announcer, specializing in motocross, arenacross and motorcycle flat track racing, working major events from coast to coast.
Jack Rhodes is also very active in the Heartland Rotary Club of Oklahoma City and The Rotary Foundation of Rotary International has named him a Paul Harris Fellow.