The moment Yasui Makoto finished speaking, the Umamusume on the screen exchanged glances. Deep Impact gave a small nod, then spoke with cool composure, though her answer was not quite a direct one.
"Kita-chan... isn't ready yet."
"I won't deny what McQueen said. Compared to European and American training styles, a lot of the thinking here is... very hard to pin down."
"But this is the kind of training I received myself, and I've been to Europe too, so I know the difference. I can also understand some of the strengths in the philosophy here."
"For example—mentality."
"If I'm not mistaken, then Kitasan... probably still hasn't fully figured out why she runs in the first place, has she?"
After stressing that question, Deep Impact continued, "Of course, I'm not saying that failing to sort that out means you can't win races, and I'm not saying there's anything wrong with your training methods, Yasui."
"She just won the Arima Kinen. That alone proves that even without using the traditional approach, your methods still work—perhaps even better."
"It's just that, in terms you're more used to... understanding why you run..."
She paused to think.
"That should count as training on the cognitive level, I think? I specifically looked it up before. Some American papers mentioned it."
To be honest, even after talking with Kitasan Black, Yasui Makoto still did not really understand this idea of a "reason for running." But what came after that—that was familiar ground.
"Then we probably read the same papers," he picked up at once. "The ones in the field of cognitive neuroscience, though they also draw a little from humanism and psychoanalysis."
"At the core of those papers is metacognition. Roughly speaking, by looking back over your own past experiences, you can bring the id and the ego into alignment."
"And from there, build a new cognitive framework for understanding yourself, your opponents, and the race itself..."
Abruptly, Yasui Makoto stopped.
The Umamusume on the screen had all started looking dazed and glassy-eyed. Noticing that, he hesitated.
"Was I talking too fast?"
The Umamusume looked at one another for a moment. Deep Impact scratched her head and admitted awkwardly, "Actually... from the point where you started saying something-something neuroscience... I kind of stopped understanding..."
Yasui Makoto was speechless for a second. So basically you didn't understand any of it from the start...
Then Deep Impact hurried to explain, "And even though I read those papers, I kind of just swallowed them whole without digesting them. Based on my own experience..."
"I really can't understand why changing that cognitive framework would let someone win races, or perform better."
Yasui Makoto thought for a moment, then, like he was teaching Kitasan Black in class, began patiently, "Then let me use an analogy... no, wait, let me ask a question first."
He glanced around and casually picked up a pen from the bedside table.
"This pen has color, shine, hardness, weight... in short, it has all kinds of properties, right?"
Seeing the Umamusume on the screen nod in unison like elementary schoolers listening carefully in class, Yasui Makoto went on, "Now suppose you can't perceive any of that anymore. You can't sense its color, its shine, its hardness, its weight... you can't perceive any of its properties at all. Then does it..."
"...Still exist?"
That made all four faces on the screen fall into thought.
"I guess..."
Tokai Teio spoke first, hesitating. "Then it doesn't exist anymore, right? You can't perceive it at all..."
Mejiro McQueen thought it over, then shook her head. "I feel like... it should still exist, shouldn't it? I just can't explain why..."
Deep Impact and Orfevre did not speak. The former looked like she was quietly thinking it through, while the latter's eyes had already started spinning again.
Seeing that, Yasui Makoto stopped teasing them and answered directly,
"It still exists. At least in my cognition, it does. It's just that my ability to perceive it is limited, so I can't sense it."
Then he shifted the topic.
"Cognition—or consciousness—is the same sort of thing."
"So now I can make the analogy."
"You've probably heard that consciousness is like an iceberg. In ordinary life, we can only perceive the tiny part sticking up above the surface."
"But the part under the sea doesn't mean it isn't there. On the contrary—it not only exists, it matters."
"In training and racing, that unseen but important part of consciousness consists of everything you understand—and everything you don't yet understand—about yourself, about what you're good at and what you're bad at, about the track, and about your opponents."
"And more importantly, it means understanding those things actively—recognizing them actively."
He stressed that last part, and without thinking glanced toward the bedroom door, a faint smile touching his face.
"Take Kita-chan, for example."
"In the races she ran in the first half of the year, she could only really be aware of herself—really, only of running itself. Everything else she handled on instinct."
"Things like sudden changes during the race. Or her opponents."
"But once she starts hauling that buried part up out of the subconscious, she gains the ability to recognize all of it actively."
"And when that happens, she can not only control herself and command herself, she can go a step further and control the race and her opponents too—command the race and command her opponents."
"Of course, she still can't do it perfectly yet. But she's already started."
"And the first, most fundamental part of all this is exactly what I said at the beginning—"
Before he could finish, Tokai Teio's eyes lit up and she cut in, almost like she was blurting out the answer in class.
"I think I kind of get it now!"
"Back when I used to race—especially at the beginning—I just knew I had to charge forward, and if I saw an opponent pass me, I'd panic."
"Even if my Trainer had given me instructions beforehand, I'd forget them. I had no spare room at all to think about strategy, opponents, the track, or anything like that."
"But if I could pull all that up from 'under the sea' like you said, then I'd be able to respond better. Maybe I could even make use of my opponents' weaknesses."
"And I'd be doing that myself, actively—not just blindly following my Trainer's instructions."
"That's what you mean, right?"
Yasui Makoto could not help feeling surprised. He knew Tokai Teio—or rather, all the Umamusume on the screen—were geniuses, the sort of once-in-a-generation talents few could match.
But he had not expected Tokai Teio to react that quickly. From the sound of it, she had fully understood the line of thinking he was describing.
Before he could say anything, Mejiro McQueen nodded as well.
"If that is the case, then it really is just as Deep Impact said—or perhaps a more concrete way of expressing what people here call mentality."
"Once Kita-chan becomes aware of all those different aspects, she will be able to actively draw on all kinds of information in her mind."
"Once she completes that process, then in races she will no longer rely only on talent, instinct, and fixed instructions."
"She will be able to grasp the situation more fully, and more proactively."
Hearing that, Deep Impact opened her mouth, about to say something—but before she could, Orfevre, who had been silent this whole time, suddenly spoke up, eyes spinning and brows knit tight.
"Wait! I... um... even though I still don't really get what you were talking about just now..."
"Something like that... just thinking about it sounds exhausting, doesn't it?"
"Trying to think about all that while racing... can that really be done?""
The moment she said it, not only Orfevre, but Tokai Teio and the others as well were stunned, then all began frowning thoughtfully.
Yasui Makoto smiled.
"Don't underestimate the brain."
He tapped his temple, confidence in his voice.
"There are eighty-six billion neurons in here. In a single second, it can carry out operations on the order of ten to the sixteenth power, while utterly crushing any supercomputer in parallelism, energy efficiency, and adaptability."
"So in a sense, one part of the guidance I give Kita-chan is simply teaching her how to make proper use of the most complex information-processing system found anywhere in nature."
---
T/N: too big brained
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