Peak performance is a phrase that is used widely by athletes, coaches, and sport psychologists to describe the level of performance to which athletes should aspire. It is considered to be the best performance an athlete can achieve. When I came out of graduate school that is the goal to which I wanted my athletes [...]
Performance slumps are one of the most common, yet mysterious, phenomena in sports. Typically viewed as unexplained drops in performances, slumps are a source of concern for athletes and coaches. Despite its visible place in the collective psyche of the athletic community, little is known about the causes or cures for performance slumps. As a [...]
A difficulty with dealing with mental preparation is that it is not tangible or easily measured. Unlike assessing your physical strength with weight lifting or your speed with a stopwatch, mental skills can not be directly assessed. Mental Edge Profiling helps you identify your psychological attributes to assist you in achieving your best performances. Think [...]
Aspen is full of highly motivated athletes who participate in many summer sports, particularly endurance sports such as cycling and running. These athletes have a variety of aspirations that may range from running in Boogie=s five-miler on July 4th to riding in the Leadville 100. But being motivated is not enough if you want to [...]
Whenever I ask athletes how important mental preparation is, compared to physical and technical preparation, to achieving their competitive goals, everyone says either as or more important. But when I ask them how much time they devote to their mental preparation, they say, “little or not time.” Athletes in all sports spend many hours each [...]
It’s late October and you’re heading into the holiday season with feelings of dread rather than cheer. You may have been pretty good about eating healthily and working out regularly, but you know that November and December are different. You’ll be busy with holiday parties which means eating more. To make matters worse, it’ll be [...]
Over the many years that I've been working in the field of sport psychology, I have championed the benefits of mental training for sports to thousands of athletes. This work has ranged from talks to junior programs to ongoing consulting with individual athletes and teams. As many of you know from my dozens of articles [...]
Here's a great article about Rafael Nadal in which he describes struggling mentally this year on the pro tennis tour. Roger Federer also discusses his mental difficulties. For most people, it's hard to imagine that such such gifted and experienced athletes who have had so much success in their careers could, for example, lose confidence and get [...]
A truly eye-opening and painful article in The Atlantic describing how many coaches are the real bullies in school and, by extension, youth sports. Moreover, this abusive behavior is applauded by many parents who see this treatment as character building. These parents have seen too many so-called inspirational movies (such as the recent film Whiplash about [...]
I was recently interviewed by Isaac Byrd, a former NFL player. We talked about sport psychology and the mental preparation for sport. Might be worth a listen.