Chinese athletes typically use psychological skills training (PST) to maintain the quality of preparation and achieve peak performance. Before and during the 2008 Beijing Olympic and Paralympic Games, a team of 32 sport psychologists provided long-term PST and psychological counselling for the Chinese Olympic team to help athletes address issues of self-confidence, concentration, emotion control, goal-setting, competition routines, burnout, anxiety, personal communication, and group cohesion. Of the 51 gold medals won by the Chinese Olympic delegation, 47 (92%) were won by athletes and teams who had worked extensively with the sport psychologists.
Elite sport performance/Mental training/Mental training
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Build a mental training program
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We are now moving into the final module of the course where you have the opportunity to create a mental training program for a fictional elite athlete. A mental training program (sometimes called a psychological skills training) is often developed by a sport psychologist to assist an athlete or team to improve performance.
To create your mental training program you will need to apply the knowledge you have developed in the course thus far. You have been introduced to a number of psychological factors that are regarded as important in elite sport, and have been provided with several examples of strategies that may help to bring out the best in an athlete or team.
The task
Your task is to develop a mental training program for an elite athlete. A number of athlete personas have been created to describe some of the characteristics of the athletes and the issue(s) that they face. Personas are often used in marketing and other industries to describe potential customers. In the context of this course on elite sport performance they are used to describe hypothetical athletes. Eight athlete personas have been created from a range of sports.
A summary of each athlete is presented on the navigation panel below and each has a link to the full profile to download, containing more details about the athlete, and including a scenario and a mental training task for you to complete.
You are asked to do the following:
- Choose one persona from the list below and download.
- Complete the task identified on the persona, which includes creating a mental training program for the athlete. Upload as a Microsoft Word or Apache Open Office document.
- Upload your mental training program below. The program will be shared with others on the forum for constructive feedback.
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Zhang Li-Wei, Sport Psychologist
How to write the mental training program
Your mental training program should include the information under the following headings:
- Name of athlete. Provide the name of the persona for whom you have created a mental training program.
- Identification of the issue(s). Identify the nature and perceived cause(s) of the presenting issue(s).
- Psychological processes. Provide a brief overview of the psychological processes involved e.g., problems with anxiety and control of arousal.
- Intervention(s). What steps do you suggest to address the issue(s) and promote improved performance. Consider using some of the strategies that have been discussed in this course, those described in Secrets of Asian Sport Psychology, or any others than you choose.
Athlete Personas
Read the personas and download one of your choice.
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Denise Flowers – Hurdles
Denise is a 110m hurdler who represents the Birchfield Harriers athletics team in Birmingham, United Kingdom. She is powerful sprinter with a natural hurdling technique and has been a member of the Birchfield Harriers (a premier UK athletics club) since her teenage years. During that period she has raced in the British Championships six times, finishing third in her event in 2007.
At an earlier stage of her career she was considered capable of moving to international level, but her career has been blighted by a persistent hamstring injury.
She has recently returned from 18 months away from the sport to have a baby and is training for the British Athletics Challenge Series. Her training has been going well, but her coach feels that she is still holding back from her best performances.
Download persona and task -
Kenji Ito – Snowboarding
Kenji Ito is a talented freestyle snowboarder who is keen to make a great leap forward in his competitive career. He has competed in a number of local competitions including winning the 2013 Saj Hokkaido Halfpipe Championship. Last year he entered the national half pipe championships for the first time and finished a disappointing fifteenth. At the time he blamed his equipment on a poor finish, but came to realise that this was him making excuses.He is now training hard for the next championships including attempting to execute a triple cork in the halfpipe, one of the toughest tricks in snowboarding, which even the great Shaun White has been unable to execute. He is not there yet but believes that he can do it if he trains hard enough.
He is balancing his training with running a production company which produces snowboarding video footage. It is at time stressful work and he is beginning to feel very tired.
Download persona and task -
Lucy Branch – Gymnastics
Lucy is a gymnast with over ten years competitive experience. She specialises in the floor routine and has represented her state of South Australia in the last two Australian Gymnastics championships, finishing 20th and 11th respectively. In 2010 she became South Australian champion, but has been unable to convert that success at a higher level.
Although, a dedicated trainer, she is increasingly finding it more difficult to balance work commitments with her training regime and therefore putting pressure on herself. She is training hard for the next Australian Championships with a new routine which includes some tricky choreography to be mastered. She believe this new routine will help her get into the top 10 for this year's championships.
Download persona and task -
Akil Rao – Archery
Akil Rao represents the Services (SSCB) archery team and is also a captain in the Indian Army. In the army, he represented the Defence Academy and later his regiment in army competitions, finishing in medal positions in four army championships.His quality saw him qualify for the Services archery team in 2008 and in 2012 he was placed on the reserve list for the Indian Olympic team after an excellent domestic season. Unfortunately, he has not made the leap to international competition, but remains strong domestically and importantly still believes he can make the step up.
He is highly disciplined, generally calm and mentally tough. However, he is returning from a chronic shoulder injury (originally received during a military training exercise ) which took him out of the sport for 12 months.
He has received excellent medical and physio care, and has made a good recovery, but the team coach is questioning his readiness for competition.
Download persona and task -
Ellie Raymond – Tennis
Ellie has a tennis scholarship at Tulane University. Her natural talent in tennis was recognised at an early age in her home city of Baton Rouge where she won her first junior tournament aged 12. During her junior career she was ranked in the top 3 girls in Louisiana and qualified for the USTA National Championships at G18 and G16 grades, although never getting past the first round.
Her game is built around accuracy as opposed to power. Her serve is effective in terms of putting the returner off balance, but her ace count in most games is below average. Her ground and short game is extremely solid although again she struggles to overpower opponents in long rallies.
She won an NCAA endorsed tennis scholarship at Tulane University (a Division I varsity athletics program) where she represents the Green Wave tennis team as a rookie. The new season is about to begin.
Download persona and task -
Abdullah bin Suleman – Soccer
Abdullah bin Suleman. Is a first year professional playing in the Malaysian Premier League. He is a tenacious central midfielder with superb distribution skills. He has been selected to represent Malaysia at international U19 level on five occasions.In training he has shown excellent effort at Kuala Lumpa, however the Head Coach believes he is not developing quickly enough to be a first choice member of the squad. In particular his communication skills are underdeveloped and he is not yet gelling with other players in the squad. His coach also thinks that he is not yet adapting to life at a professional football team.
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Wang Jie – Golf
As an up and coming golfer on the PGA Tour China, Wang Jie turned professional three years ago. Wang Jie is educated as as a qualified civil engineer and graduated from Zhejiang University of Science and Technology four years. During that period he was an impressive amateur golfer, qualifying for the Asia-Pacific Amateur championship in 2011 albeit not making the cut.He gave up a lucrative engineering job three years to turn professional and is now in his third year on the PGA Tour China. After some excellent top ten finishes he now wants to push on with his career and move up the rankings.
He has a powerful, if sometimes wayward drive and an excellent short game around the green. His putting remains a weakness. His earnings on the PGA Tour China supports him and his family and he also has income from other investments.
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Donna Katona and Kata Baros – Rowing
Donna and Kata have recently come together as a new rowing partnership following the retirement of Kata's previous partner. They have been training ahead of the new season with their first regatta in four weeks time. Both rowers have excellent technique but are currently inexperienced as a pair.The pair's coach is concerned that their training times are below standard so close to the start of the season and is considering switching their boat positions. Despite both rowers having excellent technique, communication between the two rowers is poor and in the coach's opinion this is having a huge effect on performance.
Download persona and task
