For many athletes in many sports, the competitive season is now in full swing. In other words, the season is getting real and the competitions are starting to really matter! So, this is the time when you want to perform your best consistently. Yet, this is also a time when you may start to feel [...]
The race season is now in full swing with qualifying races underway for regional and national championship series. In other words, the season is getting real and the races are starting to really matter! So, this is the time when you want to ski consistently fast. Yet, this is also a time when you may [...]
Setting expectations for your children is an essential responsibility of being a sport parent. Expectations communicate messages to your children about what’s important to you and establish a standard toward which they can strive. But expectations can be double-edged swords. They can be a tremendous benefit to your children’s athletic and personal development or they [...]
In my last post, I introduced you to my Prime Performance System that acts as the foundation for my new 12-week online mental training program which I will begin offering on June 1st. In that post, I described the first of five mental areas—attitudes—that comprise my Prime Performance System and that I believe most impact [...]
Mitchell Gunn with permission There are two scenarios on race day that I hear frequently from the racers I work with and the coaches I talk to that are a source of immense frustration, poor skiing, and disappointing results. I’m going to discuss the first scenario in this article and the second scenario [...]
New York magazine just published a really unsettling article on perfectionism, expanding on my own notions on the topic. Let me state this clearly: Perfectionism is REALLY BAD! It may appear to lead to great success, but, to the contrary, it often results in a lack of true success and, more importantly, it will make [...]
Setting expectations for your young ski racer is an essential responsibility of parenting. Expectations tell your children what’s important to you and establish a standard toward which they can strive. But expectations can be double-edged swords. They can be a tremendous benefit to your children’s development as both ski racers and people or they can [...]
Mikaela has certainly put herself between a rock and a hard place. Let’s start with the rock, which is the expectations she has created from her remarkable successes she has had during her short, though illustrious, career. Mikaela has, over the years, built a veritable Mt. Everest of expectations for herself by so dominating slalom [...]
One of the first questions that I ask athletes and coaches I work with is: Should you compete like you practice or practice like you compete? By far, the most frequent response is: You should compete like you practice. This answer seems perfectly reasonable if you think about it. When you practice, you’re relaxed, feel [...]
Hey parents, are you ready for another roller coaster ride called a winter of ski racing ? Racers aren’t the only members of the ski racing community who experience the intense ups and downs of our sport; their parents do too. The fact is that it’s hard being a ski racing parent. You invest your heart, [...]