Data and Instinct: The Real Formula for High Human Performance

Last Sunday at the 2025 Italian Grand Prix in Monza, Max Verstappen made a decision that went against the grain. While the engineering team and predictive models leaned toward a higher downforce setup, Verstappen trusted his own feel in the car and pushed for a lower-downforce rear wing.

“In the end, I’m the one sitting in the car and feeling certain things,” Verstappen explained.

That choice driven by instinct, gut, and years of experience paid off spectacularly. Verstappen not only set record-breaking pace, he delivered a dominant and, to many, unexpected win.

This moment is more than a sports headline. It’s a vivid example of what happens when human instinct and skill combine with data, rather than being overshadowed by it.

Data vs Instinct is a False Choice

It’s easy to frame Verstappen’s Monza decision as a clash between instinct and data. But the truth is: it was never one or the other. The win came from using both.

Formula 1 is one of the most data-driven environments on the planet. Simulations, sensors, and predictive models shape every choice. And yet, in the decisive moment, it was a human call that unlocked the breakthrough.

For Red Bull, Max is the human expert they must depend on. For you, in your own life and career, that expert is you.

The real breakthroughs come when data and human instinct meet, when your lived experience, perspective, and gut sense give meaning to the numbers.

That’s not just a business truth. It’s also the foundation of high performance living: combining measurable insights with your own instincts to create momentum in work, health, and life.

How Coaching Is Measurable

When people think of coaching, they often imagine long conversations, abstract reflections, or vague encouragement. It can feel “soft,” intangible, and compared to a business dashboard or a Formula 1 data feed impossible to measure.

And that reputation has done coaching a disservice. Because the reality is very different.

High performance coaching is not about endless talk or fuzzy ideas. It’s about measurable performance in real life:

• How much energy do you actually have every day?

• How focused are you on what matters most?

• Are your actions moving you closer to your goals or just keeping you busy?

• How are you showing up in your relationships, your leadership, your work?

These are not abstract questions. They can be tracked, measured, and improved. Just like a Formula 1 team measures tire wear, fuel consumption, or lap times, you can measure your clarity, energy, productivity, influence, and courage.

But, and this is where the Verstappen lesson comes in, the numbers are not the full story. Coaching also honors the human input: your instinct, your perspective, your lived experience of your own life. Because you are the one “in the cockpit” every day.

When we combine both, data that reveals patterns and instincts that give meaning, the results stop being vague. They become tangible, practical, and life-changing.

A Science-Backed and Universal Approach

The most powerful breakthroughs happen when data and human instinct work together. That’s as true in coaching and personal growth as it is in Formula 1.

In my own life, and in the lives of my clients, I use a science-backed approach to build clarity on performance:

• We collect practical, measurable insights: energy levels, focus, productivity, recovery, and alignment with goals.

• We balance those insights with human instinct and perspective: gut feelings, lived experiences, personal values, and the subtle signals your body and mind give you every day.

Each strengthens the other:

• Data helps to reveal blind spots and patterns you might not see yourself.

• Instinct and experience bring context and meaning to the numbers.

• And sometimes, instinct goes further, providing new, unexpected input that the data isn’t showing yet (or isn’t ready to capture). That’s exactly what Verstappen did at Monza, and it paid off massively.

And this isn’t just theory. The same principle applies everywhere:

In business

• Organizations use dashboards and KPIs, but leadership judgment and experience decide what action to take.

In personal life

• Wearables can track sleep, recovery, or focus, but only you can decide whether your life feels joyful, aligned, and intentional.

Whether you’re chasing a championship, leading a company, or simply aiming to live with more energy and purpose, the formula is the same: data + instinct = high performance.

The Conclusion: High Human Performance = Data + Instinct

High performance is never about choosing between data or instinct. It’s about learning how to integrate them, letting each strengthen the other.

At Monza, Red Bull had all the data in the world. But it was Verstappen’s instinct, built on years of experience, sharpened by feel, and backed by confidence that transformed that data into an unexpected, dominant win.

In business, the same is true: organizations that rely on data alone miss the nuance and creativity of human judgment. And those that rely only on instinct miss the clarity and patterns that data provides. The breakthroughs happen when leaders use both.

And in personal life, the principle is just as powerful. When you combine measurable insights about your energy, focus, and habits with your own instinct, perspective, and values, you unlock a way of living that is not only more productive, but also more joyful, more intentional, and more sustainable.

That’s the essence of my high performance coaching and how I live my own life. Science-backed, measurable, and practical. But always human. Always honoring instinct, gut, skill, and experience.

Because in the end, just like Verstappen in Monza, you are the one in the cockpit. The data can guide you, but only you can feel the track beneath you and choose the line that leads to your own breakthrough.