Significance of Mental Preparation

Sports Psychology

Sport psychology helps you to understand many aspects of your performance. Sport psychology is the scientific study of the psychological factors that effects performance in sports. Sport psychology is a discipline that understands the mental obstacles that may stand in the way of reaching your goals. The principles in sports psychology are based on the mind-body connection. And, from the principles of sport psychology emerges the concept of mental preparation for sports. Rather than using sports psychology as a method to help a “problem athlete” the new norm is to addresses mental skills as part of the overall training for all athletes. The concept of mental preparation in sports truly took off in a big way only in the 1990s. And now, grapplers, combat athletes, wrestlers and martial artists everywhere are beginning to appreciate that the time devoted to mental preparation and mind training is well worth it.

Competitive events today attract grapplers and combat athletes of similar fitness levels and similar training regimens. Winning against an opponent as formidable as you, can be an uphill task. However, mental training is a competitive advantage that you can boast about. While your opponent may also use mental preparation techniques, the difference lies in how well individual athletes comprehend and apply these techniques, The better you are at applying these skills, the more advantage you will have on the mat.

There is a growing awareness among grapplers and combat athletes that there is more to the mind-body connection in effectively performing in the sport. Mental preparation can help grapplers and combat athletes overcome distractions, fears, negative thoughts, poor motivation and so on. The concept of mental preparation uses the principles in sports psychology to help you through an entire mind-training program. However, these mind-training techniques work best if they are regularly used and consistently applied. Also, the important first step is to recognize your low motivation levels, how stressed out you are, effects of distractions on your performance. Assertive and dynamic gamesmanship is the key to good performance.

Importance of Mental Preparation

We know that the mind directs our actions; that thoughts precede actions. To deftly handle your performance on the mat, mental preparation is the key. When you talk about a warm-up before a game or before an exercise routine/practice session, it no longer means just a physical warm-up. Warming up has to involve your thought processes, mindset and emotional state of mind, too. The manifold benefits of warming up mentally are as follows:

• It gives you confidence to face a tournament
• It help you gain control over your thought processes
• It focuses your mind in effectively managing routines during a bout
• It conditions the mind to be attentive and alert
• It helps you plans your moves to successfully penetrate an opponents defense; it helps you plan your own defense
• It helps you break out of mental barriers and fears that hold back your performance

Contribution of Mental Preparation to Overall Preparation

The question is often asked – Out of 100% what percentage can be attributed to mental preparation, physical fitness, practice, and technique? In other words, does mental preparation make any significant difference to your?

It is actually quite impossible to put a figure on it. A more consolidated outlook is necessary to understand the contribution mental preparation makes to your form. Each aspect of sports preparation – mental preparation, physical fitness, practice, technique – are the ingredients that go into making you an accomplished grappler or combat athlete. These three ingredients are all equally important, and the effective overlap or convergence of all three is the crux of delivering a good performance.

In short, all three aspects of training bring their own unique contribution to your game, and the convergence of all three is what he mind-body connection is all about. The issue is how well the three aspects of preparation overlap for a player. The more they overlap the better the performance can be.

Source: The Grappling Blueprint

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