Category: Sports Science Stuff

Rest for Performance And Mental Health

Rest is one of the more interesting areas in sports psychology. There is actually very little agreement on what exactly we mean by ‘rest’ (a true working definition). And although there is growing scientific evidence that rest, as we define it, is a key ingredient for performance consistency, there’s still considerable debate about just how much and when.

There are a couple of essential points to clarify at the beginning of an article that focuses on the concept of rest. First, we have to acknowledge that rest is not the same as sleep. For it to count as rest, you need to be awake; otherwise, it’s a different thing! If you’re resting and fall asleep, you switch from one type of process to another.

Another crucial aspect for us to acknowledge is that rest is not always easy for many high-performing individuals. If you logically think about this, it makes complete sense.

Rest Is Hard For Many Elite Performers 😬

Individuals who excel in their particular sport or performance area often do so because (in part) they tend to be uncomfortable with stillness and downtime. They fill their waking hours with all sorts of things that can make them far better at their particular sport than the other 99% who partake in it.

I stopped counting the number of individuals I’ve assisted since I began working as a sports psychologist in 2005, but it must now run into the thousands. It is common for many of our sport psychology clients to struggle with finding a level of calmness and rest, due to the high ratio of “doing” and “improving” time.

If you’re reading this and you’re like that, then rest assured, you are in the majority. As is the case with many mental training techniques, we aim to harness the beneficial aspects of natural occurrences while minimising any negative aspects. This is an excellent example of trying to do that. Of course, we want our clients to be “busy little bees” when it comes to preparation, but what if this goes too far?

Burnout Central – That’s what

Like an electric car, humans are designed to go, rest, go, rest and not go, go, go and go some more.

The research suggests that the younger you are, the more likely you are to be able to get away with this to some degree, but it is far more important to schedule a certain amount of rest.

For those who are extremely time-poor, resting is a simultaneous activity to some form of active recovery. I don’t mind the idea of my client watching a Netflix show whilst at the same time doing some very gentle stretching exercises. Especially if this means that they do both rather than one, or even worse, neither 😬.

If you need a helping hand with this, then step one is to complete one of our four MTQs here, which will assess the impact of the amount of rest you have or lack on both mental toughness and mental health.

A Better Definition of Rest

That brings us to the question of what exactly we mean by rest. If I were on a committee tasked with developing a universal working definition, I would opt for something like this.

Rest is the human state in which the individual is awake but not attempting to achieve anything.

This is a fundamental idea because if we focus too much on the concept of stillness, we would miss out on the possibility that, for example, a leisurely walk is often very restful for many individuals. However, as a qualified psychologist, it needs to be relaxing if it has no purpose, no objective, and no goal; therefore, it can simply be a period of respite between two quite contrasting sessions geared towards productivity.

It is tempting to list a whole range of activities that my clients have often suggested when I insisted that they include some form of rest in their weekly schedule. The issue with this and why I’m going to resist the temptation to list anything here: what one person finds genuinely restful, another person finds anything but.

Start with some Really Simple Mindfulness

For those who are genuinely uncomfortable with scheduling a certain amount of rest into their week, a reasonable place to start is by following a mindfulness audio guide. There are hundreds available online, but I’ve included below one that I created in 2023, which is free and does a pretty good job. It’s 11 minutes, and you can download your own copy, so you are not dependent on being connected to the Internet to listen to it over and over again 😇.

How Much Rest and When

To conclude, it is only fair for me to offer some insights into the amount of rest that is likely needed and how often it should occur. I liken this question to one about how much sleep is the right amount. Although I’m always tempted to answer this question with “as much as possible”, the fact is that we now know that for virtually every human, less than seven hours per night and more than nine hours per night is problematic.

Here are my tips on Rest as a Key Ingredient to Optimal Performance.

1. Try to have one, ideally two resting blocks per day.
2. Schedule these in, like other activities, otherwise they can vanish in the fervour of your productivity.
3. Be mindful of individual differences. Some people will find socialising restful, others may need to be alone.
4. As you approach a competition, the amount of rest (in terms of duration and frequency) you need increases.
5. Finally, if in doubt, too much rest is probably a better planning error than too little.

Mental Blocks In Sport

In this article, we will explore the concept of mental blocks. Specifically, the kinds of mental blocks that we commonly encounter in a sport and performance context. Without a doubt, some sports are likely to produce more mental blocks than others. Which ones? Those that require manoeuvres such as gymnastics, surfing, and all equestrian sports, to name a few. For the rest of this article, I will use gymnastics as the primary example.

This is what the situation typically looks like when we discover the mental block. A young gymnast is preparing for a major upcoming competition. For the uneven bars, she is confident about the whole routine except for The Def (see below).

The Def (bars)

Description: The Def is a Gienger release move with an extra full twist. In simpler terms, the Def is a skill completed on the uneven bars where the gymnast releases the bar, completes a back salto layout with one and a half twists (540°) before catching the bar again.

In the mind of this hypothetical gymnast, The Def is a mental block. It’s a skill that is so challenging that she can barely imagine being able to do it in training, let alone in competition.

So, how do we know it’s a mental block as opposed to a different type of block? Is it enough to take this athlete’s word for it? Not really.

What are the other kinds of blocks?

The main ones are physical and technical blocks. A physical block occurs when the body prevents the skill from being executed at this time. This might be due to injury or the athlete’s physical size. Think about a junior basketballer who wants to dunk the ball. She knows how, but is just not tall enough (yet) to get anywhere near the ring.

A technical block, on the other hand, occurs when an athlete currently lacks the “muscle memory” to execute a specific skill. A great example of this is when, in golf, a few years back, they allowed long-handled putters. For the non-golfing readers, this is a putter (used on the green) that is much longer than normal ones. The technique required to use this new type of putter differs from that used for a standard, shorter putter.

Many players tried it, encountered technical issues, and then reverted to the old style.

Finally, We Have Mental Blocks

Or maybe we should call them genuine mental blocks. A genuine mental block occurs when the performer genuinely believes they will be unable to perform the skill. And it’s this belief, and nothing else, that is actually getting in the way of them doing it.

Therefore, there are no physical or technical reasons why they should be unable to perform this skill. One of the most compelling pointers that it’s a mental block is if the performer has already done the skill in the past. 

Let’s go back to our example of the gymnast. If she has executed The Def before but can no longer do so, this suggests a mental block.

Some sport psychologists may want to investigate whether there is a reason for this. Was there a nasty fall once? Maybe she saw another gymnast try and fail? Perhaps someone has told her it’s impossible. Personally, I prefer to spend the majority of the mental conditioning time on helping them overcome the mental block.

And these suggestions, below, are likely to be the same regardless of the cause. And remember, there is not always a cause. This is mainly due to the limited time we have without our sporting clients. On average, via our monthly approach to consulting, we spend between 90 and 120 minutes “in session” with our clients per month. So, it’s not that we are uninterested in the causes of things (such as mental blocks); it’s that we don’t have time to really delve into them.

Baby Steps 

Baby steps refer to simply breaking down the skill into smaller, more manageable parts. Of course, this is usually the domain of coaches, but not all coaches are mentally astute. 

Competence (in actions) precedes confidence (a feeling) is the key here. Competence before confidence means that an athlete needs to be able to do something competently before they can feel confident. In other words, telling them “you can do it” is not very effective. Taking baby steps is a great way to overcome mental blocks. If done correctly, there is never a significant leap in difficulty.

For example, let us imagine that The Def is a 9/10 in terms of perceived difficulty. What does a 7 look like? And 5 or 3? Once these have been established, the gymnast can then return to the number at which they feel competent. Let’s say 4/10. With some patience, they can then work their way slowly up through the numbers. Do not, under any circumstances, jump from a 6 to 9 for example.

Separate Actions from Thoughts from Emotions

Another way to overcome mental blocks is by realising that actions, thoughts and emotions are not the same. By this, I mean separating actions, feelings, and thoughts into different types of stimuli. This can be done away from training to start with. Through processes like Really Simple Mindfulness, anyone can learn to observe their emotions and thoughts and therefore not let them stop specific actions from taking place.

As some of my clients are aware, I often demonstrate this during sessions. For example, I will ask them to tap their head whilst saying to themselves, “I am tapping my thigh”. Once the athlete understands that their actions are genuinely independent of their thoughts and emotions, they can utilise this knowledge in training. Using the current example, this means accepting that thoughts such as “I will never be able to do this” are fine. Feelings of panic are to be accepted, and they don’t have to stop you from taking the first step (literally).

And when you combine these two ideas, the result is often very effective.

As always, if you need a helping hand, please let us know.

Sport psychology and its big sister, performance psychology, are minefields when it comes to terminology. What I mean by this is that related terms are often and easily thrown around. Some of these words are more common than others. For example, ‘mental toughness’ and ’emotional intelligence’ are used and misused more frequently than ‘team unity’ and ‘flow’.

Those of you who are familiar with Condor Performance (the psychologists) will likely know that for a long time we have tried hard to define such terms. For example, we see mental toughness as an umbrella term that pertains to the mental side of sport/performance.

Emotions are, without a doubt, a part of this. Especially given how emotionally charged high-performance sport can be.

Some Recent Examples

Let me use an example to explain how confusing the associated wording can be.

Recently, on social media, I saw a screenshot of a presentation that contained the words “controlling their emotions under pressure”. It was a bullet point next to the phrase composure, one of “six keys to being resilient” (according to the slide).

I added this comment: “It is not possible to control emotions, only influence them. It is psychologically dangerous to imply you can”. I will not go into detail about the back and forth that took place after this initial comment, other than to say this. It would be handy if there were a census on how emotions work and what we mean by emotional intelligence.

With that, I will give my professional opinion and expand on my “it is not possible to control emotions” comment. As an applied sport psychologist, it’s not really my job to prove that the below is correct or scientifically robust. Having said that, at Condor Performance, we collect a vast amount of internal data as part of our mission to improve constantly. Some academics might argue that because our data is not converted into scientific articles and then submitted for peer review, it is meaningless. I will save my counterargument to that assertion for another time/blog.

Our Guide to Emotional Intelligence

First and foremost, we want to agree on what emotions are. They are feelings. Many of these feelings are enjoyable, like joy and excitement. Many are not that fun, such as fear, nerves and frustration. Then there is the feeling of not feeling anything at all – often called apathy. Some recent studies suggest there are 27 primary emotions that most humans experience. This “feels” about right. Especially if you remove the ones that sound like emotions but are actually thoughts (like worry, for example).

In browsing the list of these 27 emotions, I have picked eight as very common for athletes, coaches and other performers:

• Anxiety
• Calmness
• Confusion
• Envy
• Excitement
• Fear
• Satisfaction
• Triumph

With these in mind, we turn our attention to the question of what your relationship (as a person) is to these and other feelings. Is it useful to find the cause of your excitement (for example) so you can replicate it at will? Are strong feelings of anxiety and fear bad? Are they to be stopped like some emotional disease? Do we control our emotions, or do they control us, or neither of these?

This Is How I Explain It To My Clients

Emotions are just part of the human experience. Internal feelings are one of seven sources of information (stimuli) available to most of us most of the time. The others are sight, sound, smell, thoughts, touch and taste. All of these groups of stimuli vary in terms of their pleasantness. For example, drinking fresh and sour milk activates different taste buds, but both are taste sensations nonetheless. You can apply the same to all seven. We experience fear and excitement very differently, but both are emotions, nothing more, nothing less.

The first and most important part of being emotionally intelligent is just becoming better at noticing and experiencing different emotions. Yes, both the pleasant and the unpleasant ones. There are many ways to approach this, but a couple of rules can help ensure it’s effective.

😬 Don’t try to change the emotion directly.

Whether it be via mindfulness, meditation or moonwalking, your task is to “increase your awareness of your feelings with decreased judgment”. I often like to do this by going through all the senses so that there is no real difference between the internal two and the external five. This is one way to go about this:

Technology – Friend or Foe?

You can certainly use one of the myriad apps (too many now to list), but remember this. Mindfulness, like exercise, shouldn’t cost you anything. You do not need a gym membership to improve your cardio fitness. You don’t need to pay for the Premium version of an app to practice mindfulness. Even our “Really Simple Mindfulness” audio recording above is only really designed as ‘training wheels’ until you get the hang of it by yourself.

So becoming better at observing your emotions is the first part of emotional intelligence. But it’s not the only part.

The second part is about realising that although you can never control your emotions, you can sometimes influence them. And that choosing to do this might assist with what you’re trying to do (achieve, etc).

For example, you might decide that you would like to feel as calm as possible before competitions (exams, performances, etc). In your attempt to influence this (NOT CONTROL), you might design a pre-competition routine that is full of tasks you find relaxing. With practice (repetition), the likelihood of you feeling calm the hour before kick-off or tee-off will increase. But real emotional intelligence comes with knowing that there will never be a guarantee (synonym for control) that you will feel calm and relaxed.

Real Emotional Intelligence is Acceptance

And not even here are you trying to change your emotions directly. If you relaxation tasks are actions (preferable) then you’re really influencing your preferred pre game actions and hoping they make you feel calm. This is very different from trying to calm yourself down.

How do we deal with this? We’ve just noticed these unexpected feelings alongside all the other sights, sounds, and thoughts of the situation. Which, if you’ve been doing this on a daily or weekly basis (see above) as part of your training, will be child’s play.

For those of you who stumbled across this article in search of an applied definition of emotional intelligence, then copy and paste this.

“Emotional intelligence is the ability observe and label your own human emotions and to know when and how to influence them”. 

Gareth J. Mole, Sport Psychologist @ Condor Performance

If You Need A Hand

You can now book a 20-minute Google Meet with one of our fantastic New Enquiries Officers using this link. Pick a date and time when you’re free and use the time to explain more about how we can assist you with the mental aspects of your performance. At the same time, Tara or Lizzie will give you a quick rundown of exactly who we are and how we go about our 1-on-1 sport psychology consulting. Want to get started right away? They also know which of our Sport and Performance Psychologists have availability to take on new clients and which are currently waitlisting those interested in working with them.

What Exactly Is White Line Fever?

What exactly is white line fever? It may be a common sporting term in Australia, but it requires a brief explanation beyond our shores. White line fever is a concept whereby an athlete either intentionally or inadvertently switches on when stepping over the white line.

If there is no white line (e.g., in ice hockey), then it’s the closest equivalent. Overall, the term suggests that it is advantageous for the athlete. In other words, they can click into a highly competitive process-oriented mindset regardless of what is happening outside that white line.

There are hundreds of historical examples of white line fever, but the one that always comes to my mind is Shane Warne during his tumultuous years (1994, 1998 and 2004). As you can see from the below expert from this 2005 Independent article, Warnie used it to his advantage when many others would have crumbled:

“And yet his success on the field is merely the counterpoint to his excess off it. Some sportsmen talk of white-line fever, the phenomenon by which even the most placid character is overcome by a desire to hurt his opponents as soon as he enters the field of play. For Warne, the fever coincides with a sense of release from the turmoil of his private life. On the field, he is Shane Warne, all-time legend. Off it, he is a warts-and-all human being just like everyone else. Little wonder the refuge of the cricket pitch allows him to perform so well even when everything else seems to be falling to pieces.“

Why Fever?

Although it has nothing to do with sports, the original term, White Line Fever, comes from a 1970s movie about an angry truck driver. Don’t believe me, watch the trailer below:

After that, some sports journalists probably started using it, and it stuck!

I’m Not Sure Of The Fever Part

Many sports here in Australia have a white painted line marking the playing area. For athletes who typically love clarity, this is quite a nice trigger, as there can only be one precise moment when they are inside the white lines.

Without too much creativity, it could easily be expanded to virtually all other sports. For golfers, it would be the golf course, for combat sport competitors, it would be the ring, etc.

The fever part is more curious. The origin probably comes from its original use, a clue given by the above expert from The Independent.

For more physically confrontational sports like rugby league, rugby union, ice hockey, and AFL, the word fever was likely used to describe those with a healthy dose of overcompetitiveness. But for most other sports, you’ll agree that the word fever probably takes this concept to the dark side. 

If we were creating the term from scratch, we might call it white line focus instead.

White Line Focus

Whatever the label, the mental skills on the table remain similar and potentially very beneficial. As academics become more aware of the benefits of athletes being equally focused on well-being as they are on performance, we risk losing some of those highly sport-specific mental skills.

From a sports psychology point of view, we are talking about pre-performance routines.

Excellent pre-performance routines—like the ones we typically help our clients with—should have a small element of flexibility built into them, including, for example, the time before and maybe just after stepping over the line.

In other words, although it is a great idea to develop highly repeatable actions for when the action in the middle begins, there is no point in having such a routine if it all goes out the window when you step onto the big stage.

Nothing Works For Everybody

With this in mind, I recommend that the performers I work with absorb some white line fever (focus) concepts into their pre-performance routines. One of sports psychology’s most exciting and challenging aspects is that nothing works for everybody. In other words, we must always exercise caution when dispensing general advice. For this reason, even when working across the entire sporting team, we typically recommend doing so individually, where budget permits.

These one-on-one conversations try to find one or two concepts to help the athletes focus. Emotions can be very handy, so thinking about making your family proud might be ideal. But you might be naturally emotional in competitive situations, so you’d benefit more from internal verbal reminders about the things you influence most.

Whatever you do, remember these two facts. First, you can’t 100% guarantee any thought or feeling, so consider this mental skill a bonus rather than a requirement for your performance consistency.

Second, it is often easier to be guided by those specifically qualified in this area, like us. Contact us if you need help.

Sleep and Performance 101

Do you know what LeBron James and Roger Federer share in common? Aside from being two of the greatest athletes of their generation in their respective sports, they both prioritise sleep as a critical component of their training plan. Roger reportedly sleeps for 10-12 hours a night, while LeBron is said to sleep for 8-10 hours plus take naps.

Now while we wouldn’t know that their athletic success is due to their sleep habits, likely, their ability to perform at a high level for a long time consistently (both had had professional sporting careers spanning 20+ years) has been supported by the importance they have placed on getting plenty of good quality sleep. While training, nutrition, and recovery techniques get plenty of attention in athletic circles, quality sleep remains a secret weapon in optimising performance, preventing injury, and accelerating recovery. And as demonstrated by LeBron James and Roger Federer, their commitment to sleep might be the performance advantage that helps you elevate your game.

Why Sleep Matters for Athletes

Physical Recovery Happens During Sleep

During deep sleep, the body goes into repair mode. Growth hormone is released, muscle tissue is rebuilt, and energy stores are replenished. This process is cut short without adequate rest, leaving athletes more vulnerable to fatigue and injury.

Cognitive Performance and Reaction Time

Sport isn’t just physical—it’s mental. Sleep deprivation has been shown to slow reaction time, impair decision-making, and reduce focus. For high-speed or strategic sports athletes, this can mean the difference between winning and losing.

Injury Prevention

Research has found that athletes who sleep fewer than 8 hours per night are at significantly higher risk of injury. Poor sleep affects coordination, increases stress hormone levels, and disrupts motor function.

Mood and Motivation

Lack of sleep can contribute to irritability, anxiety, and decreased motivation, which can impact training consistency and competitive edge. It can also diminish our mental well-being, affecting athletes inside and outside of sport.

How Much Sleep Do Athletes Need?

Most adults need 7-9 hours of sleep per night, yet many struggle to consistently attain this recommendation. The modern world we live in, particularly environmental and lifestyle factors such as bright artificial lighting, smartphones, overheating our houses, noise pollution, and streaming services designed to keep us watching “just one more episode” before bed, all conspire against us when it comes to getting adequate sleep. Further, even when people can get 7+ hours of sleep per night, the quality of sleep is often poor, leaving us tired, groggy, irritable, and unmotivated the next day. Sleep disturbance is a big issue for everyone, and athletes, it can be detrimental to performance.

Athletes may need even more sleep than non-athletes, with 9-10 hours per night beneficial for recovery and performance, especially during intense training periods. Yet research consistently demonstrates that athletes often struggle to get 7 hours of sleep per night. In addition to the lifestyle and environmental factors mentioned previously that can affect sleep for adults, athletes face additional challenges that may impact their capacity for sleep. Late-night training sessions or competitions, early morning training sessions, travel, and performance pressure can also compromise an athlete’s sleep. Further, athletes often struggle to get sufficient sleep at night before a competition due to anxiety about the upcoming performance. Fortunately, with some committed action and practical strategies, sleeping habits can be improved, and you too can prioritise your sleep just like Roger Federer and LeBron James.

Tips for Better Sleep and Recovery

1. Consistency is key: Sleep loves consistency, so try to sleep and wake up simultaneously every day, even on rest days. A consistent sleep schedule helps our body’s internal biological clock remain regulated, improving our sleep quality.
2. Create a sleep-friendly environment: Our brains evolved from our prehistoric caveman ancestors, so we must create our sleeping environments accordingly. Cool, dark, and quiet rooms promote better sleep. It also pays to have a clean bedroom, as clutter can create stress, which can inhibit our capacity for optimal sleep.
3. Use your bed only for sleep: Our brains love association. And one of the best associations we can develop for ourselves is between bed and sleep. To help optimise sleep, we want to spend as much time as possible while sleeping in bed. This means that we don’t want to use our beds as a place to scroll on our phones, watch TV/movies, study, or work.

More Tips …

1. Wind down properly: Just like you complete a cool down after a training session as part of your recovery, a pre-sleep routine can help you wind down and signal to your body that it’s time to rest. A hot shower or bath, soft lighting, journaling, reading, gentle stretching, deep breathing, and relaxation exercises can all be practical activities to help us relax and promote rest. Mindfulness exercises and/or meditation can also be helpful.
2. Don’t try too hard: As athletes, you push yourself, work hard, and exert maximum effort. It’s what we do to get the best out of ourselves and achieve our performance goals. However, when it comes to sleep, trying too hard makes things worse, not better. We can’t force sleep. So, relax in bed and let sleep come to you.
3. It’s okay if you don’t sleep well the night before a competition. We get nervous about things that we care about, so it is normal to feel some anxiety prior to a competition or performance. As important as sleep is for optimal performance, humans are more resilient than we think. In the short term, performance does not suffer if you don’t get adequate sleep. Remember, one night of bad sleep won’t undo years of training and preparation. 

Final Thoughts

Sleep isn’t a luxury—it’s a performance tool and critically important for human functioning, physical performance, cognitive performance, mental well-being, and recovery. Whether you’re training for a marathon, trying to hit a new PR, or just want to feel more energised during your workouts, making sleep a priority can elevate your performance in ways no supplement or gadget ever could.

So, do your body and game a favour tonight and prioritise sleep. And if you need a helping hand, get in touch today.

Who is the best person for me to work with to improve the mental side of my performance? 

Like the proverbial “How long is a piece of string?” (exactly double the length of its half), this question doesn’t have a universal, clear, and agreed-upon answer. 

Listen to any post-match press conference. You will universally hear about mental preparation, focus, motivation, attitude, dealing with pressure, resilience, and many other things related to mental preparation and the processes involved and required for elite performance in the most demanding competitive environments. 

So, if we accept the premise that the mental side of performance is essential and that improving it leads to more consistent and better overall performance, the question then turns to how to do this and who can help us. 

Disclaimers And Recognitions

As a fully registered and endorsed sport psychologist with Condor Performance in Australia, I’ll be biased towards sport and performance psychologists over others. I’ve tried hard to be fair to all groups/professions mentioned here. 

My mum loves reading Choice product reviews, so in honour of her, I’ve tried to use a similar approach for each group involved, with pros and cons for each.

There is always a range of abilities in every group. There are people in each group who are outstanding at what they do and offer; equally, there are those who are not. The descriptions here are general, with no references to specific individuals.

Many of the observations come from my experiences meeting, working with, and seeing clients, athletes, coaches, parents, etc., who have worked with people from various groups. 

While in this article I’ll speak about athletes, this also applies to coaches, teams, performers, or anyone in a high-performance/pressure position, such as CEOS, corporate board members, surgeons, traders, armed forces or anyone else who sees themselves as or wishes to become a high performer. 

Who Is Out There?

The number of people and organisations eager to work with athletes is mind-blowing. For easy comparison, I’ve grouped these individuals into these general groups:

• Parents and coaches
• Ex-players
• Mentors
• Mind coaches
• Psychologists with no specialisation in sport and performance
• Sport and Performance psychologists (such as those at Condor Performance) who have undergone specific additional training and higher learning focused solely on sport and performance work. 

Parents and Coaches

Parents are the first and foremost influence on athletes developing their skills. The hope is that they are the greatest supporter they’ll ever have, but at the same time, this support can lead to blind spots and/or avoidance of truths that need to be told or addressed. Often, they have few skills in the sport, little training in instruction, communication skills, mental support, and good intentions, which can lead to issues later for the athlete.

There is also the danger of those horror parents for athletes that many of us can name. 

Coaches range from the weekend parent who helps out on their kid’s side to local representative coaches with minimum accreditation levels, up to the highest-level coaches of the stars. They typically have excellent knowledge of the sport and a passion for their athletes. 

Pros 

• High level of contact and passion for the athlete, good skills around the sport, and time available to understand the person.
• Depending on the level, can have brilliant support teams and systems around them and their athlete/s.
• Improving an athlete’s technical skills will often improve their mental skills. Think about the concept of Competence Before Confidence.

Cons 

• Significant variation in the levels of skills in and understanding of the mental side of performance
• Variable communication and interpersonal skills
• Highly vested interests in performance can impair judgment and decision-making, leading to decisions that are in the best interest of the coach or parent rather than the athlete.

Personal Comment 

Every athlete needs at least one of these involved, and at the elite level, many athletes will laud the coach’s skills as a mentor, teacher, and communicator. In short, the best coaches have the best people management skills and mental awareness. Interestingly, these same coaches also strongly tend to have sports and performance psychologists on their team, or they refer to themselves. Don’t take my word for it, take it from the current champions of English Football:

Ex-players, Mentors, Mind coaches

Ex-players are obvious. Mentors may be high-profile sportspeople from other sports or high-profile people from different areas, such as business, politics, or the armed services, who are now assisting athletes in dealing with the pressure of performance. Mind coaches can have many different names or titles, as there’s no universal term and no restriction to applying any description of themselves, except for the legally protected term of psychologist or sport psychologist. 

Pros 

• Ex-players and mentors bring lived experience of situations like those the athlete may face.
• Often, they have a narrow focus on which sports and areas they will or can work with, leading to a minimal number of athletes, so there is potential for greater one-on-one time with the athlete.
• There is often an obvious credibility with someone we know who has been there and done it themselves.

Cons 

• With no regulatory body or board, they are not accountable to anyone for their actions and have no ethical framework to which they are held. They often have no or little direct, accredited psychological training.
• This group is not regulated like psychologists. There is no insurance requirement, restriction on advertisement, restriction on testimonials, restriction on making guarantees to clients, an ethical framework they must adhere to, and no underlying explicit expectation to put the client’s needs first and do no harm.
• If they have pictures with athletes, or testimonials or endorsements from them on their website, or make grandiose promises like “results in one session”, then you can be confident they are not a psychologist.

Personal Comment 

I’ve met, worked with, and listened to many operators from this group who are skilled, knowledgeable, and excellent for their clients. Often, they will talk about their own experiences and highlight their work and what they’ve learned from their work with sports psychologists in their careers. They are now using that knowledge to help others. I have happily worked alongside these previously and still do currently, using a team approach to achieve the best results for the athlete. 

In my opinion, the good ones know where their level of knowledge and competence ends and defer to psychologists or other specialists when the client needs more than they can provide. 

Those in this group that I would not work with as an athlete tend to follow a couple of similar, consistent actions: 

• They tend to have one framework for how things should be dealt with, either through having only one method or system or using a “this is what I did when I…” approach. Then, if the athlete cannot fit within this framework, they often blame the athlete for being unable, unwilling, or not wanting it enough to succeed.
• They tend only to want to take on clients who are already well on the path to elite and seem to bask in the reflective glory of “their” athlete.
• They tend to ignore, avoid, or even shame individuals with personal problems that may impact their sporting performance. In doing so, they treat the person like they should be robots with their sport rather than human beings. 

Psychologists with no specialisation in sport and performance

In Australia and New Zealand, where all the current Condor Performance psychologists are based and trained, to become a fully registered psychologist, you must complete a minimum of 6 years of approved, supervised, and quality-ensured education before you speak to your first client independently. We are governed by a regulatory board that holds us accountable for maintaining standards of ethics, work quality, confidentiality and ongoing training to ensure the currency of knowledge. 

If they are working with clients rather than in policy or administration roles, they are generally trained to work with mental health issues in what we can call mainstream life circumstances. 

Pros 

• You know they are trained and competent as a psychologist
• They work under a transparent framework and are accountable for their actions
• Trained in dealing with people, relationships, pressure, grief, and mental health issues

Cons 

• Often, there is no or minimal training around performance enhancement techniques or theories.
• They may not understand the sporting environment, the associated pressures, or the motivations of those involved, including the established hierarchies in sports teams, clubs, and competitions.
• Psychologists wanting to ‘dabble’ in sports often underestimate the importance of passion and knowledge of specific sports. They incorrectly assume that the interventions to help a pro golfer perform under pressure (for example) are the same as those for a CEO. They are not!

Personal comment 

Like the other groups, I have worked alongside and met many good operators in this grouping. But I’ve also met many athletes who have worked with a general/clinical/health psychologist who tells me that “the psych was fine, but the solutions they offer aren’t relevant or appropriate for their sporting environment”. The athletes have also been frustrated with the psychologist’s inability to understand how their sport works, the language of the sport, or the unique problems of their sport. 

Psychologists generally aim to have clients do well in their world and cope effectively, but in sports, just doing well isn’t good enough. 

Sport and Performance Psychologists 

These professionals have completed the same 6 years of minimum training as other psychologists, but I have specialised in sports and performance work. This is either through specific university coursework, Master’s, and PhD programs that often lead to the legally protected term “sports psychologist,” as many of the Condor Performance team have, or via focused ongoing development after their initial general registration as psychologists and continued work in the field with ongoing supervision by highly experienced current sports and performance psychologists.

Regardless of the pathway, we are subject to the same government regulatory body that ensures ethics, quality, confidentiality, and focused continuing professional development in sports and performance work. 

Pros

• All the same pros as psychologists who don’t specialise in sport and performance
• Trained in numerous mental skills/performance enhancement techniques, along with mental health models, that apply to sport and performance, such as visualisation, self-talk, motivations, goal setting, etc – i.e. not one trick ponies and can switch approaches to match a client
• Understand that athletes are different from the “normal”, and being good isn’t enough when you seek to be elite.
• Understand the relationships within, the politics of, the pressure of, the sacrifices required, the dedication required, the expectations of self, teammates, coaches, and fans, and the language of high-performance environments.

Cons

• Confidentiality for clients means they can’t tell you who they’ve worked with, they can’t use testimonials or endorsements from clients, and they can’t make promises to potential clients—all of which can leave potential clients wondering if the sports and performance psychologist has credibility in their sport or situation.
• Not all sports psychologists work in mental skills (performance enhancement) and well-being.
• Given the number of sports out there, they may not be strong in your sport. Condor Performance can overcome this issue more easily than most, with more than ten psychologists with varied strengths and sporting interests. 

Personal Comment

Sport and performance psychologists are passionate about sport and performance, which often matches their clients. The environment they work in means that their relationship with clients and maintaining things like ethical boundaries can be a little different from that of a traditional psychologist. Not many conventional psychologists will join a client at their workplace. Still, a sport and performance psychologist will often want to get to the field, track, pool, course, and oval to see how things work for their client and truly understand their environment. Our knowledge for all our clients is expanded and enhanced through each session they do with any one client. I often bring knowledge from another sport or situation to a current client to help them understand and move them forward. 

Final Word

Finding the right person to work with can be overwhelming and confusing. But once you see them, they can make a difference to your overall performance. My advice would always be to consider what you are after and what you’re trying to improve for your sport. 

If it’s primarily technical or tactical issues, my first suggestion would be a coach, mentor or ex-player in your sport. But if it mainly involves, or even somewhat involves, the mental side of your game, such as preparation, routines, performance anxiety, confidence, and performing under pressure. Or suppose it’s personal issues off the field that are filtering onto the field and impacting your performance. In that case, I’d recommend fully trained and regulated experts in the mind who share your passion for improving your performance. 

After reading this article, if you’d like to receive detailed information about our 1-on-1 sport psychology services, please complete our Contact Form here, and one of our New Enquiries Officers will contact you to explain everything.

If, on the other hand, you are a psychologist looking for details on how to join our team, take a look at our vacancies page here instead.