Mental Factors That Can Improve Your Sports Performance

Over the years, we have seen  increased interest in the psychological aspect of sports. This growing interest prompted psychology and sports professionals to ask the following questions: What psychological variables can improve your sports performance?

High-performing athletes claim that 90% of their success comes from mental training and ability. In professional sports, there are no major differences between athletes in terms of potential, training or physical ability. The decisive success factors therefore lie in the psychological realm.

It is clear that mental factors affect sports performance. This applies to elite athletes as well as anyone who participates in sports. Today we have evidence to support this idea. People who practice physical sports, whether they are professionals or amateurs, can benefit from developing certain psychological tools. The tools can help increase capacity and sports performance.

What psychological factors improve your sports performance?

We all know that regular exercise drastically improves our health. Studies also show time and time again that exercise is beneficial for our mental health, which contributes to increased attention, cooperation and self-confidence.

The psychological factors in sports and exercise that most influence performance are: self-confidence, motivation, emotional control and concentration.

• Motivation : This is important for any area you want to optimize your performance in. It is especially important in sports. Think of athletes who experience constant ups and downs, victories and losses. In their case, there is an inherent motivation and love for what they do, which usually helps them recover from a bad placement, a terrible throw or a much lower score than they expected.

• Concentration : Athletes also need to concentrate intensively. All actions, even the most simple or intuitive, require concentration. A poorly performed movement can lead to loss or injury. It can ruin months of preparation. Therefore, even an athlete with mediocre training is usually not distracted.
• Emotional control : Doing mental training exercises that help you control your emotions and doubts can make the difference between success and failure. When poor emotional control affects a practitioner’s performance, it is usually because the practitioner allows his emotions to affect his concentration.
• Self-confidence : Finally, confidence in your ability to successfully complete a task is an important condition for victory.

Mental techniques to improve your sports performance

Being a professional athlete involves a high degree of emotional commitment. Athletes must first identify and analyze their strengths and weaknesses. Then they can use personal techniques to improve performance and self-esteem. If they are not personalized, they can work against their purpose.

The techniques that athletes use most to improve their performance are:

• Attention control : both internal and external attention. Internal attention is when an athlete focuses on things that are happening in his own body (thoughts, inner dialogue, emotions and movements). External attention is when an athlete focuses on things outside of his own body.

• Setting goals : This helps athletes with a comprehensive overview of the work they have to do. They can also visualize what they need to achieve to reach their ultimate goals.
• Self-instructions : These are messages or short affirmations that we tell ourselves to help with motivation or concentration. It is important to use rational, positive, logical and realistic affirmations.
• Relaxation : A relaxing technique is any method, procedure or activity that helps to reduce physical and / or mental tension. It is meant to lower stress and anxiety and replace them with peace or quiet.
• Mental representation : Mental representations are symbolic ways of reproducing reality. Visualization is extremely powerful for both athletes and everyone else.

Finally, it is important to remember that sports (especially top sports) involve a lot of pain and suffering. And it is not only the pain that the exercise itself produces, but everything that comes from the indirect as well.

As a result, sport is a powerful teacher of resilience. Many of the psychological techniques that athletes use are those we can use in other very competitive and very demanding contexts.