Mental Skills Corner: Performing Under Pressure – It Starts in Practice!

by Ray Lauenstein

Jim Donnan, who writes about college football for ESPN.com, had a very good point in his column about getting the most out of spring football practice when there is a limit of 15 session and only three that allow full contact.  This article examines his point in light of incorporating MST (Mental Skills Training) into your practice.

Donnan pointed out the following:

”Teams are limited in terms of numbers because seniors have used up their eligibility and most freshmen will not report until the start of fall practice, and in an effort to curtail a growing number of injuries during spring drills the NCAA now limits teams to 15 practices, including only three full-contact scrimmages and limited contact in other practices. But these are good rules for both coaches and players  because they allow for a heavy emphasis on teaching and fundamentals.

One of the keys to emphasizing those fundamentals is applying pressure in every drill a team executes, naming a winner and maintaining competition in each situation. For instance, a team that needs work in two-point conversion situations may start and end every practice with the offense and defense going head-to-head on three two-point tries.

If a team was bad in the red zone, it could start every possession in one of its three full-contact scrimmages from the 20-yard line, or a team that struggled in third-and-long situations may run drills in which its secondary covers receivers without the benefit of a pass rush. “

– ESPN.com – posted 12/11/03

For you coaches out there who are enlightened enough to realize MST is a concept whose time has finally come, but who have yet to grasp just how to incorporate it, this is a good start.

According to Dr. Kay Porter, founder of Porter Performance Systems and author of The Mental Athlete (Human Kinetics Publishers) and a long time Sport Psychologist for the University of Oregon, most every football coach (including UO’s Mike Beloitti) she has ever met uses Goal Setting, a primary tool in MST, as a motivator.

Donnan’s advice makes perfect sense in a couple of ways:

1. Every team has development areas to work on, as does each sub-unit on the team (Offensive and Defense, position groups and the individual). According to Sport Psychologist Porter, the team goal of improving 2 Pt conversions would be broken down for each unit by the position coach, for example.

”A great exercise for position coaches to do is ask each player in his group to explain how his performance impacts the teams performance and the outcome. By creating some self-awareness on the part of the individual about what role they play, the natural tendency is to become more involved with their role in the outcome.  This athlete is aware
that his actions can be part of the problem or party of the solution.”

The team has a goal to improve 2 PT conversions, and each sub-group takes ownership of that goal by defining their contribution.

TIP:  Goals need to be visible to serve as a reminder, a learning tool and create accountability in the group. Does the unit you coach have clearly defined performance goals for the season and each game?      Naturally the outcome is to win but what about measurable things like turnovers, YAC, penalties, etc.  Make a poster grid of all your goals and put it on the wall. Remind and explain to your unit each week what the goals are and how important intense practices are to achieve them on game day.

Make sure goals are:

– Specific – Challenging – Realistic – Measurable

2. Situation Simulation – No matter how hard you get after it in practice, there is a difference from game day intensity…unless there is something to win!  The pressure Donnan speaks of is the pressure to win and if you don’t simulate it in practice, not all your athletes will respond well in a game.

Studies show that when we master things in relative isolation and then attempt them in a non-controlled atmosphere, performance falls off.  Had we learned how to drive a stick shift on a steep hill and not a flat road, the first time we faced a hill in live traffic would not have been such a disaster!  You get the point.

Pressure simulates game day and is more likely to get the speed of drills to the level they approach on game day, hence timing and execution are well rehearsed for game day.

Find ways to make your group work competitive.  This is usually pretty easy to do in football, but make it count by a tally of wins and losses in your mini-competitions.

Summary

For most of you, this is old hat – goals, pressure in all drills, situation simulation. But maybe you never realized it was part of Mental Skills Training?  If it works well for you, why not take it a step further and make sure all your coaches are on the same page in group drills and that each player has goals and an understanding of how what they do impacts the entire outcome of the team in a given situation.

By getting your players thinking about their involvement in the overall goal of the team, they are now an active participant in the outcome of the goal. The “Buy-In” is made much easier. Now you can incorporate other avenues of MST as you push players a little further along the path of “how does your behavior and performance impact the team goals.”

In a future article, we will follow-up with Dr. Kay Porter in more detail and outline the parameters of successful goal setting, and other Mentals Skills that help players and teams perform under pressure, manage anger, overcome failure and return from injury.

Please email me with questions or comments about this article.

 Ray Lauenstein is  a writer, speaker and author based in Boston, MA. Ray  has a master’s degree in Sport and Exercise Psychology and has coached
at the youth and high school level.