What Makes World-Class Athletes Successful?

What makes top athletes successful? Mike Robbins should know. He went to school with three top athletes and dated one of them...

I interviewed retired pro athlete Mike Robbins for my members at PeaksportsNetwork last week. Mike was drafted by the New York Yankees out of high school, but instead played for Stanford and the College World Series.

After college, Mike spent three years in the Kansas City Royals organization before an injury ended his pro baseball career.

Mike Robbins had an interesting take on what makes a top athlete tick. While at Stanford University, Mike dated Olympian Jenny Thompson and he knew classmates Alex Rodriguez and Tiger Woods.

Mike believes, as do I, that the top athletes in the world possess two mental abilities. These include (1) ability to focus at a very intense level, and (2) “The top athletes have a sense of they know they were going to win,” Robbins said.

Both Mike and myself agree that physical talent and hard work along will not make you a success. You must be able to execute under pressure. To execute your best, you must utilize a strong mental game to your fullest potential.

We brainstormed and developed a list of the top mental game strengths for success...

• Focusing at a high level in competition
• Knowing you have the ability to win – confidence
• Confronting your own fears and insecurities
• Transforming negativity and fear to work for you
• Mentally preparing yourself before competition
• Allowing your talent to shine with a strong mental game
• Authentically visualization of successful performances
• Your ability to take action under adversity
• Wanting the ball when the game is on the line

You can listen to the entire interview with Mike and OVER 70 other mental game audio programs as a member of my online mental training program at peaksportsnetwork.com. Jump on over and peak around:

http://www.peaksportsnetwork.com/public/10.cfm

If you are not taking action today, you now have the tools to take action to improve (or tweak) your mental game to its fullest potential!

Your Mental Game Coach,

Patrick J. Cohn, Ph.D., Master Mental Game Coach

p.s. Are you a Peaksports member? Receive 30 percent off retail of “The Confident Athlete” CD programs and get access to over 70 mental training audio programs, 6 mental toughness e-books, and over 500 pages of mind-bending mental toughness content:

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Sports Psychology: Do You Crave Approval?

One big challenge for many athletes today is the fact that they worry so much about what others think when they perform that it becomes a huge distraction.

I must first say that it is important to care about other people. However it becomes unhealthy when athletes worry too much about what others think of them to the point that it distracts them from focusing on the task.

In my work, we call this social approval or acceptance. It causes athletes to look for status from their peers in the form of respect, admiration, popularity, or wanting to fit in or be liked. Many people in today's society crave these qualities.

When you worry too much about what others think, you can't focus on what is really important - your performance! In addition, this mindset also causes you to avoid mistakes or bad plays - not a good mindset to instill peak performance.

I once worked with a young female golfer who I will call Lisa. Lisa lacked confidence in her game and wanted me to help her play with more confidence.

As we talked, it became clear to me that Lisa relied on other people for her confidence. If her playing partners did not say, “Good shot” to her after she hit a good shot, she would begin to think negatively about herself.

Her brain went into overdrive, and she assumed that her playing partners really did not like her because they did not acknowledge when she hit a good shot. She would think to herself, “I guess she does not like me or maybe thinks I am a crummy player,” and
then proceed to lose confidence.

In addition, she was afraid of embarrassing herself when she played in tournaments. Her goal was to not shoot a bad number or high number for fear of what others would say to her about her game. More importantly, what would they think about her as a person?

A word of caution! Be careful of making statements such as, “If I am a bad golfer today, I guess I am not a worthy person.”

Let's face it, many athletes want respect from their peers. But at the very least, you have to let go of what others may or may not be thinking about you when you compete. To get your head in the game, focus on what is truly important during your performance!

In my next teleclass, “Everyone is Watching Me! How to Stop Worrying about What Others Think,“ I cover the techniques needed to stop worrying about what others think to create a focused and mentally tough mindset.

This seminar conducted via telephone helps you to understand social approval and how to perform better.

To take advantage of this satisfaction guaranteed offer and to gain access to my step-by-step mental toughness program visit: http://www.peaksportsnetwork.com/. You can demo several mental toughness programs I have at my online mental training website.

Thank You,

Patrick J. Cohn, Ph.D.,
Master Mental Game Coach