The Mindset Of A Champion Blog

In a previous post, I discussed how much you should train and introduced the concept of overtraining with Olympic training anecdotes. I got quite a bit of feedback with one common question: How can I tell if I’m over training? From The Sport Psych Handbook, here are the physical and psychological symptoms you should look out for. Over course if you see these symptoms in your training partner(s) – let them know!

Overtraining - Don't do it!

Physical Symptoms Of Overtraining Read More »»

Today’s post is an inspirational half-time speech by Al Pacino in the movie Any Given Sunday. It needs no introduction. The YouTube video says it all – life and sport (football in this case) is a game of inches – whoever is willing to fight for those inches will win the game of life. Enjoy this courtesy of Andrew Powell of Montreal, Canada who forwarded this to me.

In a previous post I discussed the perspective of champions, what gives them the winning edge and ended with an example of Mike Tyson, promising to explain what’s happened after his championship years ended.

The word is accountability. In sport, competitors are held accountable to the sports rules, regulations and rankings. The higher the level, the more exacting and demanding the accountability becomes.

If you don’t hold yourself to that standard, guess what? You lose, you fall in the rankings, game over.

Accountability

It’s brutal and harsh. Read More »»

In a previous post, I discussed the concept of Competitive Performance Mentality. I got a lot of positive feedback from people saying that it was a simple and easy way to ‘extract’ themselves from the self-analysis process. Today’s topic is perspective. Champions have a different perspective than their non-champion colleagues.

Perspective is in the eye of the creator of that perspective!

3 Components Of A Champion Perspective Read More »»

I found this lying around a squash club recently, I don’t know who the author is other than his first name is Phil. I thought it was worth sharing because (1) it’s pretty good prose and (2) I respect people who put themselves out there for other people’s fun and enjoyment. Thank you Phil!

We all come to hit the little black ball
some like to smash it against the wall
Others are so gentle
using angles and the feel.

We extend our bodies beyond their range
and in the mornings feel quite strange
for when the feet first hit the floor
us oldies stagger in pain to the dunny door.

The game is played indoors from the sun
but rain, hail or shine we do have fun
squashies are all very sincere
at the end sharing a beer.

Squash players come from far and wide
on a court there is nowhere to hide
the swing of the racquet heralds the start
throughout the rallies they try and stay apart.

At the front a drop shot squatting so low
as the opponent races in they’re struck by a blow
line an invisible wall
they crash in and try not to fall.

You miserable cad they let fly
tears running down their cheeks they cry
“Let please” the appeal to the referee
that is cheating as it all wafts free.

We’ve all experienced it – being ‘in the zone’… What an incredible feeling it is. Today, I thought I would clarify a few things about the ‘zone’ or as experts call it, the concept of ‘flow‘ which I think was coined by Mihály Csíkszentmihályi, author of the book Flow. What you might not know is that flow is achieved when you experience a balance between external demands and internal skills.

Flow - Being In The Zone

When this relationship is 1:1 between difficulty and ability, the door opens and you can step into the flow. Because this is a balancing act, it’s a fleeting and rare experience. When the balance tilts with external challenges surpassing aptitude, anxiety is usually the result and conversely, when the balance shifts to your talent outpacing the demands made of you, you get bored, even sloppy.

You know you’re in the zone or flow when:

Read More »»

I have to be honest that I can’t believe they still allow this kind of intimidation to happen before a match, but that’s just my personal opinion. That being said, I think this an awesome example of how to get INTO the Mindset Of A Champion. I mean c’mon… How can you not want to GET GOING after watching this? This is classic neuro-associative pre-framing. All champions do it – whether they do it blatantly like this (externally) or internally within their own mind.

One thing is for sure – you have to get pumped up for your games, training and competitions – I’ll address this in future blog posts. There are several anecdotes that you’ll really enjoy!

I’ve blogged about Dr Malcolm Simons before. He is truly an inspiration, not just because he was a top world-ranked squash player, but because he lives his life with such an intensity and passion that is so rare. Anyway, the reason I am blogging today is because Malcolm sent me this e-mail several months ago and with his permission, I want to share it with you.

An element which distinguishes some of us from others is the capacity to focus, to resist distraction.  Once we have prioritised how we want to apply our resources of energy and time, we then identify the essential elements and hold them in focus in order to most efficiently and expeditiously achieve the projected outcome. While the process takes place, variations arise, as they do with all evolutionary, emergent processes.

Another distinguishing characteristic of successful people is to be flexible enough to allow reprioritization as these inevitable variations arise. Some have been hunched earlier, so they come as less of a surprise and therefore incur less resistance to review and change.  Others are unexpected, even unimaginable, coming from some space that is not on the stage on which we are currently strutting. The mental image that I hold is of the Galilean thermometer in front of me now on my desk. The indicative glass balls respond to variations as they arise, in this case primarily environmental temperature. They respond smoothly as they sense the destabilising change, then float quickly to the appropriate level, in the process rearranging the grouping of the other balls.

I have the existential experience of reprioritization on a now-by-now basis, such that the process is as fluid as the thermometer indicator changes. Once priorities are rearranged, the secret is then to implement the most appropriate changes required, again, to ‘most efficiently and expeditiously achieve the projected outcome’.

Another element to which you allude, and which is to be recognized and usually avoided, is to change a winning game. [Personal communication removed] There’s a developed skill in seeing one’s life in that sort of structure so that the occurrence of variations and the impact of those variations on achieving a winning game or in departing from a winning game, are most easily discerned.

Whatever the stage on which we strut, and whatever the accolades or brickbats that we experience, always remember that “life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

Words Of Wisdom that we can all learn from, thank you Malcolm!