MENTAL PLANS: DEVELOPING MENTAL TOUGHNESS THRU SYSTEMATIC PLANNING

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MENTAL PLANS DEVELOPING MENTAL TOUGHNESS THRU
SYSTEMATIC PLANNING

• Damon Burton
• University of Idaho

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• What is mental toughness?

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DEFININGMENTAL TOUGHNESS

• Playing your best in any situation, even when you
  encounter problems, hassles, adversity or
  failure.

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• When is mental toughness
• at a premium?

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SITUATIONS DEMANDING MENTAL TOUGHNESS

• Playing on the road in front of a hostile crowd.
• Fighting illness or injuries.
• Suffering through a slump or losing streak.
• Confronting adverse playing conditions.
• Against difficult opponents.
• During really important competitions.
• When the situation is critical or the game is on
  the line.

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• What are the benefits of Mental Plans?

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BENEFITS OF MENTAL PLANS

• Create a Flow mindset.
• Enhance performance quality.
• Increase performance consistency.
• Promote mental toughness to deal with adversity.

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CREATING MAINTAINING THE IDEAL MINDSET

• Choking
• Diffident, stressed and anxious.
• Distracted or focused on outcome and product.
• Let thoughts get negative and intrusive.
• Lose poise and get overaroused.
• Try to control performance and make it happen.

• In-the-Zone
• Confident.
• Focus intently on key process cues.
• Keep thoughts positive and limited.
• Maintain poise and control arousal.
• Execute automatically and let it happen.

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THE FLOW MINDSET

• Unshakably confident.
• Totally focused on key performance cues.
• Optimally aroused or psyched up.
• Motivated to push your limits.
• Poised with a positive mental attitude.
• Performing automatically.

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• How do we create the Flow Mindset in practice and
  competition necessary to promote mental toughness?

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CREATING MENTAL TOUGHNESS

• Develop mental plans to deal with any situation.
• Work your plans to perform your best under any
  circumstances.

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MENTAL PLANS

• Systematic mental strategies to help athletes
  perform their best by attaining, maintaining and
  regaining a Flow Mindset.

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TYPES OF MENTAL PLANS

• Mental Preparation Plans
• Mental Performance Plans
• Mental Recovery Plans

DQ 5 Which type of plan do you feel is most
important?
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Mental Preparation Plans attain Flow mindset
Optimal Performance
Mental Recovery Plans regain Flow mindset
Mental Performance Plans maintain Flow mindset
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PRIMARY MENTAL PLAN STRATEGY

• One plan for both practice and competition.
• Make practice more like competition
• Make competition more like practice.

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MENTAL PLAN OBJECTIVES

• Attain a Flow Mindset (FM).
• Maintain that FM during practice and competition.
  
• Regain your FM if you lose composure.

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• What are . . .
• Mental Preparation Plans
• and how do they work?

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PURPOSE OF MENTAL PREPARATION PLANS

• To promote optimal performance by utilizing a
  structured personal mental warmup routine that
  creates a Flow Mindset.

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MENTAL PREP PLANS
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MENTAL PREP PLANS
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• What are . . .
• Mental Performance Plans and how do they work?

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PURPOSE OF MENTAL PERFORMANCE PLANS

• To promote optimal performance by helping
  athletes maintain their Flow Mindset throughout
  practice and competition and achieve their goals.

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PERFORMANCE PLAN ALTERNATIVES

• Standard plans
• Backup plans

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STANDARD MENTAL PERFORMANCE PLANS

• Goals you want to accomplish if everything goes
  perfectly.
• Action plans for focusing on and achieving goals.

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BACKUP MENTAL PERFORMANCE PLANS

• Plan for dealing with obstacles and roadblocks to
  stay in a FM and remain focused on achieving your
  goals.
• Plan for performing well by overcoming problems
  or things that go wrong.

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3 TYPES OF MENTAL PERFORMANCE PLANS

• Races or routines.
• Pre-performance or between-performance routines.
• Interactive sports.

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STANDARD RACE PLAN FOR 1500 METER RUNNER

• Chunk 1500-meter race into 3-7 meaningful parts
  (e.g., start, first 400 meters, middle part of
  race, last 400 meters).
• Develop goals and action plans for achieving them
  during each race segment.
• Identify cue words that trigger correct focus
  during each race segment (e.g., race start--
  explode push, let it flow!).

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400 METERS RACE PLAN
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PURPOSE OF PREPERFORMANCE ROUTINES

• Preperformance routines (PPR)s create consistent,
  high-level performance on repetitive, self-paced
  tasks such as free throw shooting, serving in
  tennis or volleyball, kicking in football, or all
  shots in golf, archery and shooting.
• PPRs promote FM, particularly focus, confidence,
  and trust so performance becomes better and more
  consistent.
• Consistent preperformance routines are effective
  because they allow athletes to trust their bodies
  and execute with greater automaticity.

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PREPERFORMANCE ROUTINE COMPONENTS

• Relax your body and remove unwanted tension.
• Adjust your arousal to its optimal level,
• Utilize a confidence cue.
• Create a positive, stress-free and productive
  mental attitude using a thought cue.
• Use multisensory imagery to experience successful
  performance.
• Execute automatically using feeling cues.

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TOM AMBERRY FREE THROW PRESHOT ROUTINE

• Step 1 relax your arms and legs by taking
  several deep knee bends while clinching fists and
  shaking them out and set feet square to the free
  throw line.
• Step 2 bounce the ball 3 times using the
  inflation hole as a focus cue while bouncing the
  ball deliberately.
• Step 3 put your thumb in the channel with your
  index finger pointing at the inflation hole while
  boosting confidence by imagining the perfect shot.

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TOM AMBERRY FREE THROW PRESHOT ROUTINE

• Step 4 elbow in the shot pocket while imagining
  perfect touch and feel throughout the shot.
• Step 5 use an initiation cue such as cocking
  your wrist to automatically initiate the shot by
  bending your knees while keeping your eyes on the
  target.
• Step 6 repeat cue word nothing but net.
• Step 7 execute automatically, following thru
  completely with your hand in the cookie jar.

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BETWEEN-PERFORMANCE ROUTINES

• For sports where there are regular breaks in the
  action (e.g., tennis, volleyball, football,
  shooting, archery, field events in track, etc).
• Goal is to employ a 3-step process to ensure that
  the down time between plays, points or trials is
  used productively deal with previous performance
  and effectively prepare for upcoming performance.

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3 STEPS FOR BETWEEN-PERFORMANCE ROUTINES

• Step 1 React develop a composed reaction to
  previous good or bad performance to remain
  emotionally stable.
• Step 2 Relax and Reflect learn from previous
  performance without dwelling on mistakes.
• Step 3 Refocus and Ready cue a preperformance
  routine to refocus on the task at hand and get
  ready to perform automatically.

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NEBRASKA FOOTBALL BETWEEN PLAY ROUTINE

• Goal -- maximize responsibility self control.
• Step 1 Ready signal caller uses ready to
  focus players attention totally on the call and
  the next play. For example, offensive players
  review their assignment and the snap count.
• Step 2 Respond automatic execution reinforced
  daily in drills and scrimmages.
• Step 3 Refocus review the completed play,
  learn from it, put it behind them and focus
  attention on the next play.

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STANDARD INTERACTIVE SPORT PERFORMANCE PLAN

• Beginning of each quarter or half.
• End of each quarter or half.
• Against the press.
• After a run of points.

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BACKUP INTERACTIVE SPORT PERFORMANCE PLAN

• When officials make a bad call.
• When opposing fans become rowdy.
• Following a turnover or major mistake.
• When the coach yells at you.
• When opponents get a run of 3 or more baskets.

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BASKETBALL PERFORMANCE PLAN
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• What are . . .
• Mental Recovery Plans and how do they work?

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PURPOSE OF MENTAL RECOVERY PLANS

• To help athletes regain their Flow Mindset during
  practice and competition when they totally lose
  their composure.

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WHEN YOU MAY NEED MENTAL RECOVERY PLANS

• Prevent hassles.
• Non-ideal conditions.
• One-sided and/or poor officiating.
• Physical or illegal play.
• Poor early performance or critical mistake.
• Sub-par overall performance.

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MENTAL RECOVERY STRATEGIES

• Initiation cue (e.g., clap your hands).
• Relax physically.
• Identify new goals.
• Counter negative thoughts and develop a
  constructive perspective.
• Image new objectives.
• Trust bodys ability to execute automatically.

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BASKETBALL MENTAL RECOVERY PLAN
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IMPLEMENTING MENTAL PLANS

• 1. Write out each plan in as much detail as
  possible.
• 2. Use imagery to rehearse each plan.
• 3. Try out plan in practice and refine.
• 4. Employ plans in low-stress competition.

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IMPLEMENTING MENTAL PLANS

• 5. Evaluate plans effectiveness to
  develop, maintain, and regain Flow Mindset
  before during competition.
• 6. Refine and extend plans based on
  evaluation.
• 7. Continue using, evaluating and refining
  plans until satisfied.

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EVALUATING MENTAL PLANS

• Did you stay focused on your process and
  performance goals?
• Did you develop and maintain a Flow Mindset?
• State in which you perform best rather than
  feel best or most comfortable

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ULTIMATE IMPACT OF FLOW MINDSET

• Put mind on
• automatic pilot.
• DONT THINK! -- JUST REACT!