Mental Preparation - The Key Factor for Consistent Performances

By Rhonda Revelle, University of Nebraska

Adversity is guaranteed in athletics. The most consistently successful athletes are those who learn skills to handle adversity through compensating and adjusting to ever-changing circumstances during competition. Mental preparation and skill development enables an athlete to maintain this consistency even when external conditions are inconsistent.

Mental preparation and physical preparation are the same in that they are both skills that need to be constantly sharpened in order to become a consistently high level performer. Athletes understand the need for ongoing physical practice, but sometimes don’t quite grasp the how’s and why’s of mental training. As a coach, one of my biggest responsibilities is to have the athletes understand the correlation between preparation and consistency of play.

Athletes enter college often times without giving much thought to mental skills. In talking with them about the mental game, they just figured either someone “had it” or “did not have it.” We not only let them know that everyone can “have it” but it is a skill that needs to be trained just like any other skill and ultimately, it is the responsibility of the individual to develop her own talents.

Our program embraces the idea that a strong mental game makes for more consistently high-level performance…..especially in a sport like softball where it is slow moving and there is a lot of time for the mind to derail the body. The athlete is headed for trouble if the brain does not possess mental skills equal to the athlete’s physical skills.

Why? First, the body will follow the brain’s lead so if the brain is not properly focused and trained the body will still adhere to its signals. Secondly, from an emotional standpoint, a person has to have command over her emotions before she can have command over her performance. In both cases, the mind will inevitably be detrimental to the performance capabilities of the athlete. It is for this very reason that elite athletes project that mental preparation is from 50 to 80 percent responsible for their success.

We begin in the first semester with our freshmen and transfer students by putting them through a “mental training orientation” with our sport psychologist, Dr. Wes Sime. and myself. It is a weekly meeting for four to six weeks that lays down the foundation of our mental training system. The topics that are covered in our orientation are: Positive self-talk; Staying and Playing in the moment: The Elimination of Muscular Tension Through Proper Breathing, Relaxation Techniques; Imagery and Visualization; and Establishing Routines. Many of the ideas that we that we use in our program have been adopted from Dr. Ken Ravizza. Ken is a friend of mine, whom I have had the privilege of attending several of his seminars, working with him on a couple of projects, and gleaming information from him anytime I see him. He, along with Tom Hanson, has a book called “Heads Up Baseball….Playing the Game One Pitch at a Time,” that we use as a learning aid and workbook.

The entire team meets for mental training sessions when the second semester arrives and the season is just six weeks away. The topics vary depending on the maturity and personality of the group, but we always revisit taking responsibility for your won mental preparedness through breathing, muscular relaxation techniques and positive self-talk. I would call these areas the staples of our mental training program.

We approach our mental training just as if it were physical training. We believe it is a fundamental skill, to be practiced routinely within the practice setting. Just as with any other skill, the more it is incorporated into practice, the more natural it becomes to the game-day routine. For example, if a player makes an error in a scrimmage, we want her to go through the same routine of taking a deep breath, having three seconds to be upset, release the error, refocus on the moment, and “show me confidence.” The goal for any skill development should be to adequately prepare in practice. Baseball Hall of Famer Al Kaline said, “ I tried to practice the way I played. You can’t practice one way and then expect to do it differently in a game.”

You also cannot expect to do it differently for home vs. away contests, or early in the game vs. late in the game. The key to success in these situations is to follow your season-long routines, stay in the moment, keep your focus on the task at hand and thus keep distractions at bay. Don’t get me wrong, mental practice cannot substitute for the physical work, but all things being equal, the quality of the mental game is usually what separates consistently high-level performers with streaky athletes. In fact, systematic, and detail physical routines actually assist in a strong mental game. Athletes learn to trust their preparation, and therefore become more confident in their game.

About two to three times per season, to ensure that our team is “trusting its preparation,” we ask our captains to poll the team and find out what the players feel they need more of to ready them for competitions. Coaches routinely ask different groups (infielders, outfielders, pitchers, catchers, hitters) to take ownership of their preparedness by giving ideas for their practice situations. For example, if we are working on hitting the outside pitch to the opposite field in practice, and the athlete is beginning to experience some success, we illustrate the factors that made her successful so she can produce the actions more readily in games. Through daily rehearsals, slowed down and game speed versions, the athlete becomes more confident and better equipped to handle all types of situations.

We aim to treat every situation/team game the same regardless of where we are playing, the inning, or the impact of that particular game. We want to use the same familiar approach on opening day, as well as for the national championship game. We may talk specifically about the importance of success at home, or the significance of the conference season on obtaining a postseason berth, but we do not want to hype it up to the point that it adds unnecessary pressure. We speak the facts (not the emotions) of the situation, and then turn our focus back to the process of preparing for competition. Following routines, allows a team to stay confident and trusting of their preparation. It is best to keep the mental routine the same under all conditions. Orel Hershiser proclaimed, “It is best for me to forget about results and concentrate on execution” and Ken Griffey Sr. follows up with “If you have fun, it changes all the pressure into pleasure.”

“People who keep it simple the longest are the most successful,” states Kirk McCaskill, Chicago White Sox. Keeping it simple is a matter of working something long enough that it becomes simple. I like to refer to it as “mastery through repetition.” By working our mental game (breathing, positive self talk, visualization, etc.) in every situation in practice and games, the mental game should simplify itself. The players have taken responsibility for their mental preparedness and understand that it is a skill for which they control. Once they are in control of themselves, their trust in their preparation increases while their confidence improves, which ultimately leads the athlete to the goal of consistently performing at their potential.”