These thoughts on clutch performance are from Spencer Wood Icebox Athlete Sports Performance Resources. Click that link to see his Mental Toughness Edge website. There are some articles on mental training and other resources as well.

According to a study based on professional athletes in the NBA, NFL, and NHL, the following eight traits were found to constitute the ultimate athlete:

1. Ability to work hard and sustain intensity.
2. Competitiveness.
3. Athletic ability.
4. Sacrifice for the team.
5. Coping with criticism, failure, and success.
6. Clutch performance, poise, and focus.
7. Ability to execute game strategy.Passion
8. for the sport and commitment to excellence.

Five of the above traits are mainly mental attributes.

There isn’t a coach in America who would say that mental skills and toughness isn’t critical to clutch performance. But how many coaches devote fifty percent of their time developing mental skills?

Misconception that mental skill and toughness only need to be worked on if there’s something wrong.

We must give our athletes an actual skill set to work on. A crisp definition of what is expected.

Mental Toughness = The Four C’s:

1. Composure.
2. Concentration.
3. Confidence.
4. Commitment.

What happens to the brain under stress?

Perceived threat leads to a fight or flight reaction.

1. It’s important for our athletes to realize that this process is common.
2. Not too many athletes are going to acknowledge they’re nervous.
3. Take time to talk with your athletes about what happens to your mind and body in clutch situations.

Four things occur in clutch situations:

How does this effect performance?

Emotion Arousal (EA):

1. Coming out of the locker room before a game, or coming out of a key timeout in a clutch situation, an athlete’s emotional arousal level increases.
2. As emotional arousal increases, performance potential increases. However at a certain level, emotional arousal reaches a level where performance potential is maxed (as identified by the dotted line in figure 1).
3. Once this level of optimum emotional arousal is passed, performance potential tanks.

4. Different players may perform best at different levels of emotional arousal.
5. Some young coaches pride themselves on their ability to jack up their team without knowing that two of their studs may play better at a level two or three of emotional arousal.
6. Ray Allen for example seems to perform best at a very low emotional arousal level. You could have a player with an emotional arousal level of three who looks like they don’t even care.
7. There is nothing on Earth that you should let take you out of your optimal arousal zone.

Determining a player’s optimal EA level:

1. It is critical to ask the athlete what EA level they think they perform best at.
2. Ask your athletes to think back to the three or four best games of their career, and there will be some continuity to the level of arousal they were at during those performances.
3. Also challenge your players in practice. Manipulate their arousal levels and see at what level they perform the best.
4. Don’t confuse arousal level and intensity. Intensity must always remain high for optimal performance.

Maintaining optimal emotional arousal

1. There is a big difference between finding a players emotional arousal level and maintaining that level.
2. Once an athlete has identified their level, teammates and coaches can help the player reach that level before a game
3. It is up to the athlete to not let anything take them out of their optimal emotional arousal zone.

Mistake Management:

Take out the trash:

These thoughts on clutch performance are from Spencer Wood Icebox Sports Performance Resources.

Click the link below to see his Mental Toughness Edge website. There are some articles on mental training and other resources as well. Mental Toughness Edge

Developing a Mental Skills & Toughness Training Plan of Action

By Spencer Wood

Ask any athlete, coach or sports fan ‘of all the athletic attributes, which is the most important?’ Even the most casual athlete, coach or sports fan will provide an answer that in some way relates to the mental toughness, potential and power locked away in our mind. Yet, for so many coaches and athletes, unlocking the incredible athletic potential and power held in our minds is sometimes as much a mystery as it is a source of constant heartache and frustration. Many teams and individual athletes know what it feels like to bring their ‘A’ game against one program one day, and then almost unexplainably, they bring their ‘C’ or ‘D’ game against the very next program. Even worse, for those athletes who have experienced a major performance or skills slump in a big game or even over the course of a season – the frustration can feel like a slow death. Unfortunately, far too many coaches and athletes know this feeling all too well. For the progressive coach the response to these challenges is more than just extra running or longer practices.

While extra running, longer drills and additional conditioning can build certain aspects of mental toughness, and under a select few conditions may be suitable response for a lack of effort, games are not always won or lost because of a lack of effort. Games are often won or lost due to a lack of execution vs. lack of effort. The smart response then is to develop a mental skills and toughness training program that pinpoints the particular components of mental toughness that resulted in a lack of execution FOR EACH ATHLETE. Better still, coaches who proactively put such a plan in place before the start of the season will experience greater consistency and a significant competitive edge.

So how does a coach and team begin to implement a mental skills and toughness training program for clutch performance? It has been said that “sometimes things do not go according to plan because a plan did not exist in the first place.” For mental skills this plan begins with an honest assessment of each athlete’s mental skills and toughness strengths and weaknesses. But what kind of mental skills and toughness traits should you assess? While a seemingly endless stream of words and phrases can be used to broadly describe mental skills and athletic toughness traits, a useful summary traces each of these traits to one of more of the 4 C’s of Peak Performance – Composure, Concentration, Confidence and Commitment.

The 4 C’s of Peak Performance

Together, these “4 C’s of Peak Performance,” Composure, Concentration, Confidence, and Commitment – work like a model of a 3 leg stool. The first 3 C’s of Peak Performance – Composure, Concentration, and Confidence are like the legs of the stool. Lose one or more legs and the integrity and balance of the stool is compromised. Translation – our performance suffers. And the 4th C of Peak Performance – Commitment – is the seat or platform of the stool that takes our weight and sustains us. No commitment or motivation, no stool. Each of these 4 C’s of Peak Performance profoundly affects the others. Developing tremendous composure allows us to better perform our concentration skills. A composed athlete who is able to effectively concentrate whenever necessary, will be a confident and highly effective athlete. And finally, a fully committed athlete will have harnessed the necessary drive and motivation to passionately pursue their mental and physical potential – committing to the necessary physical and mental training, maximizing their composure, concentration and confidence, and striving for Peak Performance. The “4 C’s Stool” diagram illustrates this Peak Performance Model.

4 C’s of Peak Performance

The Peak Performance Assessment examines current levels of practice and competitive composure, concentration, confidence and commitment, in addition to a number of other factors that can profoundly affect each of the 4 C’s of Peak Performance. These questions are scored on a scale from 1-10. A score of 1 = a “strongly disagree/very low” score. A score of 9 = a “strongly agree/very high” score. A score of 10 is a very rare “near perfect” score and should only be used sparingly. Encourage each of your players to complete the Peak Performance Assessment with complete honesty. Great athletes are great because they work on their strengths AND their weaknesses.Only complete honesty will allow your players to objectively identify these strengths and weaknesses before they are able to effectively improve these skills. The coach should also complete an assessment on each player, and should be compared with the player’s self-assessment in a one-on-one meeting with each player.

Any question with a score below a 7 should send up a ‘red flag’ and you should strongly consider working on this weakness with the athlete in question and turning the weakness into a future goal for improvement.

Developing a mental skills and toughness training plan for your team will certainly involve a time commitment. But this critical skill set will add a new, challenging and fun component to your practice schedule. In addition, the more you continue to train your team’s competitive mental muscle and refine your player’s mental training skills, the closer you will come to your team’s real potential. The pay-off in consistent peak performance, individual player improvement and your overall win column can be significant.

IMO, one of the most important life lessons coaches can teach their athletes is the lesson of refusing to make or accept excuses. I have assembled some quotes in this article that I hope will help as you work with your athletes to eliminate the use of excuses in your program.

Excuses allow us to stay in our comfort zones.  But for growth and improvement to take place, we have to move out of our comfort zones.  By refusing to accept the option of making an excuse, you hold your athletes accountable and force them to move out of their comfort zone to complete the skill, drill, play, workout, or whatever your objective is–and then take responsibility for the results.

If your athletes know that you will not accept excuses, they are more likely to strive to find a way to succeed through perseverance and extended effort rather than giving up on themselves and their teammates too soon by taking the easy way out of looking for an excuse.  Many times, we find success on the other side of simply making one more intelligent effort.

A No Excuse team rule also teaches the lesson of not being afraid to accept failures and defeats and not feeling the need for rationalizing with an excuse.  Setbacks and mistakes are a part of the improvement process, and as such should not be feared, but rather learned from.  No one can learn from mistakes if they offer an excuse because they are attempting to cover up the mistake rather than embracing the opportunity to learn from it and get better.

I hope that you can find a few words in here that you can apply to your program!

Excuses are the nails used to build a house of failure. ~Don Wilder and Bill Rechin

Don’t make excuses – make good. ~Elbert Hubbard

He who excuses himself accuses himself. ~Gabriel Meurier

Several excuses are always less convincing than one. ~Aldous Huxley

Maybe you don’t like your job, maybe you didn’t get enough sleep, well nobody likes their job, nobody got enough sleep. Maybe you just had the worst day of your life, but you know, there’s no escape, there’s no excuse, so just suck up and be nice. ~Ani Difranco

How strange to use “You only live once” as an excuse to throw it away. ~Bill Copeland

Don’t do what you’ll have to find an excuse for. ~Proverb

No one ever excused his way to success. ~Dave Del Dotto

Excuses are the tools with which persons with no purpose in view build for themselves great monuments of nothing. ~Steven Grayhm

And oftentimes excusing of a fault. Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse. ~William Shakespeare

A lie is an excuse guarded. ~Jonathan Swift

Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anyone else expects of you. Never excuse yourself. ~Henry Ward Beecher

Whoever wants to be a judge of human nature should study people’s excuses. ~Hebbel

There is no such thing as a list of reasons. There is either one sufficient reason or a list of excuses. ~Robert Brault

We have more ability than will power, and it is often an excuse to ourselves that we imagine that things are impossible. ~François de la Rochefoucauld

Difficulty is the excuse history never accepts. ~Edward R. Murrow

Pessimism is an excuse for not trying and a guarantee to a personal failure. ~Bill Clinton

I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took an excuse. ~Florence Nightingale

We are all manufacturers – some make good, others make trouble, and still others make excuses. ~Author Unknown

One of the most important tasks of a manager is to eliminate his people’s excuses for failure. ~Robert Townsend

Success is a tale of obstacles overcome, and for every obstacle overcome, an excuse not used. ~Robert Brault

An excuse is a skin of a reason stuffed with a lie. ~Billy Sunday

Bad men excuse their faults; good men abandon them. ~Author Unknown

He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else. ~Benjamin Franklin

It is wise to direct your anger towards problems – not people, to focus your energies on answers – not excuses. ~William Arthur Ward

It is better to offer no excuse than a bad one. ~George Washington

We have forty million reasons for failure, but not a single excuse. ~Rudyard Kipling

The person who really wants to do something finds a way; the other person finds an excuse. ~Author Unknown

If you always make excuses to not follow through you deserve the weight of anxiety on your chest. ~Author Unknown

Justifying a fault doubles it. ~French Proverb

A man can fail many times, but he isn’t a failure until he begins to blame somebody else. ~John Burroughs

The best day of your life is the one on which you decide your life is your own. No apologies or excuses. No one to lean on, rely on, or blame. The gift is yours – it is an amazing journey – and you alone are responsible for the quality of it. This is the day your life really begins. ~Bob Moawa

Never ruin an apology with an excuse. ~Kimberly Johnson

I am always looking for mental toughness resources and just finished reading the Book “13 Things Mentally Strong People Don’t Do.”

The lessons are applicable to all areas of living a happy and successful life, including athletics.

A blog post on the was the precursor to the book has some thoughts on mental toughness for us to apply to our own personal and professional lives as well as to share with our staff and players.

~by Amy Morin, LCSW
AmyMorinLCSW.com

Mentally strong people have healthy habits. They manage their emotions, thoughts, and behaviors in ways that set them up for success in life. Check out these things that mentally strong people don’t do so that you too can become more mentally strong.

1. They Don’t Waste Time Feeling Sorry for Themselves

Mentally strong people don’t sit around feeling sorry about their circumstances or how others have treated them. Instead, they take responsibility for their role in life and understand that life isn’t always easy or fair.

2. They Don’t Give Away Their Power

They don’t allow others to control them, and they don’t give someone else power over them. They don’t say things like, “My boss makes me feel bad,” because they understand that they are in control over their own emotions and they have a choice in how they respond.

3. They Don’t Shy Away from Change

Mentally strong people don’t try to avoid change. Instead, they welcome positive change and are willing to be flexible. They understand that change is inevitable and believe in their abilities to adapt.

4. They Don’t Waste Energy on Things They Can’t Control

You won’t hear a mentally strong person complaining over lost luggage or traffic jams. Instead, they focus on what they can control in their lives. They recognize that sometimes, the only thing they can control is their attitude.

5. They Don’t Worry About Pleasing Everyone

Mentally strong people recognize that they don’t need to please everyone all the time. They’re not afraid to say no or speak up when necessary. They strive to be kind and fair, but can handle other people being upset if they didn’t make them happy.

6. They Don’t Fear Taking Calculated Risks

They don’t take reckless or foolish risks, but don’t mind taking calculated risks. Mentally strong people spend time weighing the risks and benefits before making a big decision, and they’re fully informed of the potential downsides before they take action.

7. They Don’t Dwell on the Past

Mentally strong people don’t waste time dwelling on the past and wishing things could be different. They acknowledge their past and can say what they’ve learned from it. However, they don’t constantly relive bad experiences or fantasize about the glory days. Instead, they live for the present and plan for the future.

8. They Don’t Make the Same Mistakes Over and Over

They accept responsibility for their behavior and learn from their past mistakes. As a result, they don’t keep repeating those mistakes over and over. Instead, they move on and make better decisions in the future.

9. They Don’t Resent Other People’s Success

Mentally strong people can appreciate and celebrate other people’s success in life. They don’t grow jealous or feel cheated when others surpass them. Instead, they recognize that success comes with hard work, and they are willing to work hard for their own chance at success.

10. They Don’t Give Up After the First Failure

They don’t view failure as a reason to give up. Instead, they use failure as an opportunity to grow and improve. They are willing to keep trying until they get it right.

11. They Don’t Fear Alone Time

Mentally strong people can tolerate being alone and they don’t fear silence. They aren’t afraid to be alone with their thoughts and they can use downtime to be productive. They enjoy their own company and aren’t dependent on others for companionship and entertainment all the time but instead can be happy alone.

12. They Don’t Feel the World Owes Them Anything

They don’t feel entitled to things in life. They weren’t born with a mentality that others would take care of them or that the world must give them something. Instead, they look for opportunities based on their own merits.

13. They Don’t Expect Immediate Results

Whether they are working on improving their health or getting a new business off the ground, mentally strong people don’t expect immediate results. Instead, they apply their skills and time to the best of their ability and understand that real change takes time.

You can see a portion of the contents of the book by clicking the cover of the book.