Building Confidence Through Preparation
If I were to ask you to name a few people who exemplify confidence who would you say? For me it would be Kobe Bryant, Deion Sanders and Serena Williams; some of the most recognized and talented athletes out there.
But what makes them so confident in their abilities?
The answer — preparation!
While their natural abilities can’t be ignored, what they all have in common is the amount of preparation they put into their sports. Consistently practicing specific techniques to perfect their crafts and succeed in their sport. The hours and hours of preparation allow them to walk into any situation with confidence!
That’s what we are going to discuss in this article. The importance of preparation and how it can lead to walking into a situation excited and ready to compete or nervous and unsure of the outcome.
There are many ways an athlete can prepare themselves for a task. We’ll look at three:
- Physical Preparation
- Skill Preparation
- Mental Preparation
Physical Preparation
When it comes to physical preparation I am talking about an athlete’s strength, speed, power and conditioning. Increasing all these qualities are important if an athlete wants to be confident going into their sport. Putting in quality time in the weight room will lead to athletes seeing their strength increase which will lead to improvements in their power and speed development.
Adequate development in all these qualities through appropriate periodized planning can be a huge boost in building an athlete’s confidence! I mean, watch an athlete’s face light up when their squat increases 30lbs! The same goes for speed and power. When an athlete sees they are running faster in a 40 or jumping higher in their vertical they begin to see all the preparation and time that has been spent in the weight room pay off. This leads to feeling confident that they can outrun their opponent to score a touchdown, steal a base or out jump someone for that rebound or to block a shot.
Skill Preparation
The second is the athlete’s preparation as it pertains to their skill development. This would entail them working and perfecting specific skills that are important for them to be successful in their sport. For example, dribbling and shooting in basketball or throwing and catching in baseball/softball.
Dedicating time to consistently practice these skills is extremely important for an athlete if they want to be confident in their abilities. Think about it. If an athlete spends hours shooting free throws, how much more confident will they be when the game is on the line and they are called to sink the shots to win? The same goes for any instance in any other sport. Knowing they have prepared for that specific situation allows them to walk into it with confidence!
Mental Preparation
Up to this point we have discussed ways that athletes need to physically prepare for their sports. However, what about the mental aspect of preparation? What many athletes forget to do is to mentally prepare.
Most of the greatest athletes have specific techniques that mentally focus them for the task at hand. A lot of times this gets overlooked, but for athletes who understand the importance of it, it can give them a leg up on their opponents. At Performance Course, we have a simple yet effective way to help our athletes learn to mentally prepare themselves. We use the acronym P.L.U.S+.
This stands for…
Picture — Visualize success
Live in the moment — Focus on right now
U do you — Control what you can control
Self confidence — Trust in your preparation
+— Positive self-talk
We have had great success with using this to get our athletes to start to incorporate this into their preparation skills. By visualizing themselves sink the free throw or hit the ball when up at bat, they have increased their chances for success simply by getting those mental reps in before ever walking up to the free throw line or into the batter’s box. This alone enhances their confidence and prepares them without actually physically performing the task.
When it comes to being successful at sport, a lot of it can be enhanced through proper preparation and building confidence. While doing these things will not guarantee you will win every time. It will allow athletes greater confidence walking into a game, which can lead to greater degrees of success!
