Mental factors impacting on performance.

1. Mental Factors
Impacting on Performance

2. Mental Factors
• Mental Toughness
• Focus
• Decision Making
• Level of Arousal
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/olympics/17665951 - Michael
Johnson - Importance of Mental Factors
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlFRZmUmaYI&list=PLMn5YXz
QucSErB06UeE_JmjXQoh04De3o&index=1 - Micheal Jordan –
Importance of Mental Factors

3. Mental Toughness
• Mental Toughness is the ability to consistently perform at
the top of your skill level and talent regardless of the
competitive circumstances.
• A mentally tough athlete will:
 Have an unshakable belief that they can do
something
 Stay focused in big moments
 Cope well with pressure
 Never give up (even in challenging situations)
 Be able to control emotions such as anger and fear

4. Mental Toughness – Positive
Examples
• In 2013 Andy Murray became the first British male winner
of Wimbledon for 77 years. There was huge expectation on
him to win. His created a lot of pressure that Andy had to
deal with.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQPa5YbPrSs
• In 2005 Liverpool demonstrated real mental toughness in
order to come back from 3-0 down to AC Milan in the final
of the Champions League and win the game on penalties.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uV5xpweO62c

5. Mental Toughness – Negative
Examples.
There are many examples of athletes who were unable to
cope with the pressure placed on them and “choked”. The
following links give examples of athletes that displayed poor
mental toughness.
• http://observer.theguardian.com/osm/story/0,,641727,00.
html
A famous example of player displaying poor mental
toughness is Jean Van de Velde who went into the last hole
with a 3 shot lead to try and win the British Open.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkOf8Ic3LP4

6. Mental Toughness Tasks
• There are many reasons why a performer may feel pressure.
List as many of them that you can come up with.
• In groups discuss what you think the differences between a
performer who is mentally tough and performer who is not
mentally tough are. Feedback your thoughts to the class

7. Mental Toughness – Impacts on Performance
Negative – Poor mental toughness Positive – Good mental toughness
• Panic and unclear thinking that
that will lead to bad decision
making.
• Thinking clearly and making
good decisions for the situation
• Feeling your muscles tighten
which will cause poor execution
of skills
• Remaining calm and relaxed in
order to execute skills well
• Performance level dropping
below what you are capable of –
sometimes well below!
• You performing to the top of
your level in demanding
situations.
• Lack of effort or giving up if
things get tough.
• Confidence even when in tough
situations which will help an
athlete to bounce back.
• Allowing distractions to interfere
with your performance and
reacting negatively.
• You being able to focus on what
is important and dealing with
keeping it together in pressured
situations

8. Focus
• Focus is the ability to devote you full
attention to the task at hand, tuning out
distractions.
• The ability to focus is among the most
important traits you can have as an athlete.
• Top athletes are able to focus on what
matters in order to be successful and ignore
everything else that doesn’t.

9. Focusing on “What Matters”
• Within every sporting situation there are various elements
that require an athletes attention and could be considered
“what matters”.
• The “what matters” will be different for each different
situation but will generally include:
• Tactics you are using to improve your chances of success
• Movement of game object e.g. judging the flight or spin of the
ball.
• Actions of your opponent.
• Actions of your team mates.
• Ensuring technique is performed precisely
• How external factors such as weather may impact
performance.

10. Distractions
• A distraction is anything that prevents you from focusing on what is
relevant (what matters) to performing well.
• Two distinct types of distractions exist. External and Internal
distractions
• External Distractions (The environment you are in). Includes:
• Weather, Equipment, Opponent, Noise, Crowd, Visual distractions, The
Score
• Internal distractions (What is going on inside your head). Includes:
• Thoughts about what other might think
• Thoughts about outcome and impact on result
• Thoughts about issues from outside of the sport e.g. relationship issues

11. Focus - Impacts on Performance

12. Examples- Positive
• Despite the many distractions that Usain Bolt had to deal with
in the lead up to his 100m and 200m races at the 2012
Olympic Games he was still able to focus fully on what was
important for him in order to win the races.
• What distractions do you think Usain Bolt has to deal with
when performing?

13. Examples - Negative
• An excellent example of what can occur due to poor focus is
described in the YouTube video below where the fate of Dan
O’Brien an Olympic gold medalist in the Decathlon at the 1996
games attempts to qualify for the American team so that he
can participate in the 1992 Olympic Games.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NakaBM7wmdY

14. Decision Making
• Decision-making is the process of choosing what
to do in a performance from a range of options
and then putting the decision into practice.
• Within any sporting performance there are a
huge number of decisions that a performer will
make that will have a huge bearing on the
success of the performance.
• When performing (and in life) any time you do
anything you have made a decision.

15. Decision Making - Examples
When participating in an activity you are constantly making
decisions. Some examples of the decisions you make are:
• Where you take a shot from? How realistic are your chances
of scoring?
• The amount of power to put in a pass, when to make the pass
and where to put the pass.
• Choosing what technique is most appropriate for the
situation.
• Whether to pass the ball to a team mate or try to dribble?
• When to make a supporting run and where to move to.
• What side of the attacker you should be on when defending.

16. Lionel Messi – World 2014
Watch the following two clips of Lionel Messi and compare the decisions that he
makes
Watch this short clip of Argentina v Switzerland
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDbyzzohSA8
• In the first clip what decisions does Messi make?
• What impact does each of the decisions he makes have on the performance
• What is the outcome.
Watch this clip of Messi v Germany in the final
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHpg8SguExM
• How does his decision making in the 2nd clip compare to that of the first?
• What do you think might have led to Messi making this poor decision?

17. Decision Making Tasks
1. What might a performer consider when choosing a
decision?
2. When performing, list what factors you think might cause a
player to make a bad decision.
1. What impact will consistently making bad decision have on:
i) The Performer
ii) The Team

18. Level of Arousal
• Level of arousal is the level of excitement, stress, nervousness
and aggression you feel as you get prepared to participate in
an activity.
• Level of arousal can be thought of as how “up for” the
performance a performer is.
• The graph on the following slide shows the relationship
between arousal and performance level.

19. Arousal and Performance

20. “In the Zone”
• When performing athletes try to ensure that they are at the
optimal (the best) state of arousal. This state of arousal is
known as being “in the zone”
• Different athletes may require different levels of arousal to be
in the zone i.e. one athlete may be more laid back whereas
another may appear more intense
• Watch the build up to the 2012 men’s 100m Olympic final to
see how the different athletes try to get into their zone.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2O7K-8G2nwU

21. “In the Zone” – Positive Impacts
The table below shows some of the characteristics of an athlete who is
performing “in the zone”.
The following YouTube clips are athletes talking about the being “in the
zone”.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wl49zc8g3DY - Kobe Bryant
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uR0hJm6ky_I - Sam Torrance
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHEuRJmAo9Q - Sally Gunnell

22. Under Arousal
• Under arousal is when an athlete is not “up for” the
performance sufficiently.
• Potential reasons for an athlete being under aroused could be:
• Not an important game/performance/competition
• To used to the situation
• Lack of challenge – Against a weaker opponent
• Tiredness/fatigue/illness/injury

23. Under Arousal - Impacts
• Being under aroused when performing can result in the following:
• Sloppy performance of skills with uncharacteristic errors.
• Lack of effort in situations e.g. not chasing back to help your team
defend
• Poor focus during performance
• Poor decision making due to not being fully engaged in the
performance.
• Slow reactions as not fully engaged and alert.
• Poor level of motivation
• Under arousal is often the reason for favourites being upset in
competitions. The following link gives examples where upsets have
been caused probably due to the favourite struggling to get “up for”
the performance.
http://www.thedailytouch.com/matthew/top-10-greatest-sporting-
upsets-2/

24. Over Arousal
• Over arousal is too “up for” a performance. This may happen
when a performer places a very high level of importance on a
performance.
• Over arousal can result in an athlete becoming anxious,
panicking, acting rashly and becoming over aggressive.
• What examples can you think of of an athlete being over
aroused?
One athlete might see a particular
situation as very important whereas
another athlete may not think that
situation has the same level of
importance.

25. Impacts of Over Arousal
Anxiety Aggression
• Internal distractions - negative thoughts
and self doubt result in a lack of focus
• Acting rashly without consideration of
impact of actions
• Loss of confidence may result in indecision
and the athlete playing too safe.
• Committing fouls and getting into
disciplinary trouble
• Muscle Tightness – reduces athletes ability
to perform skills effectively
• Arguing with others – referee/team
mates/coach
• A sense of panic and feeling rushed will
effect clarity of though and negatively
affect decision making
• Taking too many risks during the
performance – not playing the percentages
e.g. always going for the killer pass. (poor
decision making)
• May result in worry and fear. Could cause
sleeplessness in lead up to performance or
the athlete may look to avoid the situation
• Trying too hard
• Trying to do too much for the team
and not sticking to their particular
role.
• Using too much energy early on and
tiring during the performance