Integrating Mental Skills- Part Three
If it's not relevant, we won't have engagement
Yesterday, I discussed the overarching mental framework of essential subjects that every athlete, regardless of their sport, should be familiar with. Now, it's crucial to delve deeper and examine the sport-specific demands. This is key to making our work directly applicable to the athletes we are working with.
The first question I ask is, “What mental demands will the athletes face, and how do we meet those demands?”
To help this process and answer the question above, I typically divide the sport into three categories
Sports where you predominantly initiate movement
Sports where you predominantly respond to movement
Endurance sports
These are not black-and-white categories. For example, in many sports, you respond to movement most of the time. Still, a few individuals will initiate movement (goal kickers and line-out throwers in rugby, free throws in basketball, and penalty kicks in football). In contrast, in a sport like golf, the athletes initiate movement 100% of the time.
Why make the distinction?
For athletes who initiate movement, the mental demands can be particularly challenging. They often have time and space for unhelpful thoughts and emotions to invade their minds. At times, these thoughts and feelings can be so overpowering that they disrupt their trained ability to function. This is when we observe instances of 'choking' or experiencing the 'yips'. As a provider, it's essential to assist them in developing a plan and process to manage this. It's clear that the demands dictate the content.
The demands are different for sports, where you react to movement. You might need to be able to stay calm in the midst of chaos and make precise decisions. Other times during a game, you might face massive physical demands and need to function with clarity under significant fatigue. You may operate in a complex game system where clarity in your role is critical for success.
For endurance sports, you face long periods of repetitive action that require concentration. As the physical demands are often extreme, there is a regular temptation to lower your intensity or, in some cases, stop the activity. These thoughts may be present for hours on end, and the athlete will need to have a plan to navigate these waves of pain, doubt, and frustration.
The final aspect of delivering relevant content is addressing position-specific needs. While you might have 10-20 athletes on a field at any given time, their mental challenges are often unique to their position. There are numerous examples of this in every sport; the role of the provider is to collaborate with the athlete to identify these demands and work with them. This principle of specificity creates relevance for the athletes as they perceive their mental performance needs are being
WHY IS THIS RELEVANT?
The integration of the mental performance work will significantly depend on the relevance of the content presented. If the athletes don’t believe it helps them meet their mental demands and play better, they will not engage in the work. My previous research showed that providers who failed to understand needs and create relevant content did not impact the team’s performance.