Players and coaches throughout Gaelic games have recognised the importance of addressing the mental aspects of preparation for performance. Mental skills associated with reaching your true potential can be learned in the same manner as any technical skill. Through mental skills training you can gain a competitive advantage.

Conditioning your mind is teaching your mind to think in a certain way that will allow you to perform to your true potential when you take the field. Mental conditioning involves a number of different strategies, some that take place before the game and some during the game itself.

Strategies that will allow you to perform at your peak can include:

• Goal Setting
• Relaxation
• Blief/Self-Talk/Performance Enhancement (Winning Thoughts)
• Mental Rehearsal/Visualisation
• Re-focussing (methods of managing mistakes and down-time)

Goal Setting

Goal setting is the process of outlining targets or objectives. These targets are usually sport-specific goals and can be long term - winning the league - or short term - score 3 points from 6 shots during a practice game. Goal setting can be a particularly powerful motivating tool for teenagers as it can:

• Focus attention on the target
• Increase the effort and intensity
• Encourage persistence and practice over time
• Promote the development of problem solving skills

The coach can play an important role in setting out goals for an individual player or a team. By helping the player or team set goals there is a commitment from both sides towards realising the goal.

Write down the goals, and placing them in a prominent place, helps to reinforce the commitment entered into when the goals are set down. The coach should recognise that the targets should be challenging and achievable but also flexible, as the aim is to challenge the player to achieve the goal, not provide an impossible task. By providing regular feedback, the coach can further challenge the players to achieving their goals. Shorter term goals are better for some teenagers as often they will not be able to realise how they are progressing towards a long term goal. This can result in a loss of focus and reduced motivation.

Goal setting is a smart move for any coach who wants to develop the self confidence of their players, increase motivation and achieve a higher standard of performance. To help you to remember the key principles of goal setting, coaches need to think SMARTER:

Goals should be

• S pecific - indicate precisely what is to be done. Avoid being vague or open to interpretation
• M easurable - you should be able to quantify your goals
• A ccepted - goals must be accepted to be achievable. If players feel that a goal is unrealistic or unattainable they will not buy into the process
• R ecorded - write down your goals. Make a contract with yourself or your players
• T ime constrained - set time limits for each goal
• E valuated - monitor your progress regularly.
• R eversible - If injury or illness affects your goals, allow yourself time to re-evaluate them

Relaxation:

Relaxation is all about the ability to control the anxious feelings that are natural in the build up to a game, or at an important time during the game.

Before the game it is important to monitor your players for signs of anxiousness. Physical signs of a player suffering from over anxiety include players having an increased heart rate, increased muscular tension, difficulty sleeping or eating. The signs of a player being anxious may not always be seen physically. Psychological signs of anxiety can include a reduction in confidence, players not being able to focus on their work, or the game ahead, a player suffering from negative thoughts – feeling `not up to it`. By picking up on these signals early, it is possible to turn these negative thoughts and emotions around to create a positive environment.

Strategies to aid relaxation can be short or long. Short strategies can be used on the bus going to a game or in the dressing room a few minutes before the game. Longer strategies are used when there is more time, and can form the basis of post training relaxation, or specific relaxation sessions in the build up to important games.

Relaxation Strategies:

Progressive Muscular Relaxation>>
Autogenic Training>>

Meditation

Self-Talk:

Negative thoughts and feelings can creep into even the most confident player, before, during and after games. Everybody uses an internal monologue every day, whether that be in work, at school or during training or a game. Talking to yourself can be either uplifting or detrimental. Self-talk will affect your moods, behaviours and ultimately your performance on the field. Key words, sometimes called power words, are words or phrases thatmake you feel good and help you to focus and relax. Using power words is positive self-talk.

Key words can be identified either as a team or individually – they may form part of a teams mantra or a phrase that is used to motivate the team. On an individual basis, key words can have a large impact on the performance of each individual player – often when on the field there can be a feeling of isolation that might not be seen in the dressing room where players are together.

Key words are an integral part of Refocusing while on the field of play.

Mental Rehearsal and Imagery

Visualizing an outcome before it happens or seeing yourself perform is another way to create success and set yourself up for victory. Everyone has the ability to rehearse themselves performing a skill, or a manoeuvre that would be key in a game situation.

When using imagery, a player will create images, like pictures or movies, that recreate their best performances or see their desired outcome. While imagining these scenarios, the player imagines every detail and the way it feels to perform the skill just the way they want to.

These images can be visual (images and pictures), kinaesthetic (how the body may feel, the feeling of the ball striking the Hurley, or the feel of the ball in the players hand), or auditory (the roar of the crowd from a successful free kick). The player can call up these images over and over, enhancing her skill through repetition or rehearsal, in the same way as skills are developed through practice. With mental rehearsal, both the mind and the body are trained to actually perform the skill imagined.

Imagery has an advantage over physical practice as it can be performed anywhere, anytime the player wishes. It is best to rehearse in a quiet, relaxed and non-competitive environment.

To begin an imagery session, it is necessary to start by relaxing - closing your eyes and focusing on deep rhythmical breathing. As imagery involves the use of all of the senses to create the most realistic imagery possible, you must incorporate clarity, vividness, emotion, control and a positive outcome into your imagery:

• Clarity - Make the images as vivid as possible, include the colour of the jerseys, the sliotar/football.
• Vividness - Incorporate as many of your senses as possible into your imagery so the scene is as clear and realistic as real life itself. Imagine the sights, smells, sounds and even tastes of performance.
• Emotion - Try to include emotional feelings in your images. Imagine the sounds of the crowd, how the activities make you feel - for example the feeling when you score a difficult free.
• Control - break down the image into small components and visualise those components. Your stance as you approach the ball, the pick up, taking the ball into your possession, evading tackles, releasing possession.
• Positive outcome - You should be imagining a successful outcome to all of the activities. If negative outcomes begin to enter your mind, try to recall a previous success.

Refocusing

Many players go into games with good psychological preparation and in a positive frame of mind, only for their game to be affected by stoppages in play or a set back. The idea that players can refocus during breaks in play, or in the time taken for a puck/kick out to be taken has developed importance in recent years.

Consider the following:

• A player makes an unforced error and is visibly upset at the concession of a score. The player continues to think about the mistake, causing it to dominate the remainder of his game. His team proceed to lose the game.
• A goalkeeper can have a lot of down-time (for example when the ball is at the other end of the field). During the extended period without play, the anxious goalkeeper can relax by repeating a key word several times. The goalkeeper remains calm throughout the game and keeps a clean sheet.

Positive refocusing skills were demonstrated by the goalkeeper and a lack of these skills was exhibited by the player who made the mistake. Using positive refocusing players can recover from mistakes, or make the best use of the time when the ball in out of play through injuries, frees or sidelines. Refocusing works by using cues (such as key words) in order to avoid a break in concentration resulting in a drop in overall performance.

Times during games when there is a prolonged periods of down-time are most prone to distractions – when the ball is out of play, if one team has returned to the field after half time before another, an injury. In many ways down-time can become more of an opponent than the opposition.

Mental strategies for refocusing:

• Positive physical responses. Players should hold their head and shoulders high after a setback. The `next ball` or `no problem, I'll get the next one` attitude will help a player refocus quickly.
• Relaxation techniques. For many players, games can be a very anxious event. Focusing on slowing the rate of breathing to trigger a can help a player to refocus.
• Develop visual and verbal cues. Key words, for example calm, or head up, or visual cues such as a psych up word or symbol printed on the forearm provide a practical way for players to begin refocusing.
• Mental rehearsal/Visualisation. Mentally rehearse the correct physical movements of the error, or a move that the player plans to make during the game. Mentally practicing proper skills or strategy can be done during sport down-time.
• Watch the stars. Videotape and take note of what the star players do during the crucial down-time periods, or in the minutes after they make an error. This can provide an example that may be modelled.
• Practice. Use all of the above techniques and practice them during training sessions to check which ones work for you.

Positive actions and positive thoughts during down-time allow players to recover an optimal mental state within a few seconds. The ability to refocus before each game situation can prove the difference between success and failure.