​Question: "Are there mental warm-ups we should be doing in addition to physical warm-ups?"

Yes.

I love this question. 

Think about the purpose of a physical warm-up: to prepare your body for whatever you're about to ask it to do...train, practice, or compete. We know - and have normalized - the fact that our bodies need some deliberate preparation to perform optimally. 

Funny thing is, while most of us acknowledge that our minds also need to be ready in order to perform optimally, we haven't normalized that our minds also need deliberate preparation.

I have two opinions/approaches/recommendations on both physical and mental warm-ups that I'll share first. Then I'll dive into a few strategies to try.

First, your physical warm-up should be what you need as an individual player to get your body ready. I know most teams have specific team warm-ups with running and plyos and mobility and stretching. All of that is good. And, each individual athlete, if they want to perform at their best, has to know which of those exercises in which order at what intensity is right for them. 

My opinion is that while teams can/should run some element of a structured physical warm-up for those who need it, they should also be open to athletes who say "I need something different." 

I insert this opinion on physical warm-up within the 'mental warm-up' post because ultimately, being ready physically can have a big impact on our mental readiness. Allowing individuals the time and space to do what they need to do to be ready is one small step captains/coaches/leadership can take to improve the mental performance of their athletes.

Second, your mental warm-up should be what you need as an individual player to get your mind ready. While I would say the vast majority of teams still don't incorporate deliberate mental warm-ups at all, I would also say those that do often miss the mark. Largely what I've seen is captains/coaches/leadership taking the same approach as they do to physical warm up: asking everyone on the team to do the same mental warm-up at the same time. This is usually imagery of a highlight reel, talk to your pump-up buddies, or breathe/meditate. 

While these are three great go-to strategies, the trick is in encouraging individuals to customize their warm-up to incorporate them when needed (which I'll discuss more below). Now let's talk about how to improve those mental warm-ups or create them from scratch.

#1: Know your end state: what physical/mental/emotional state are you trying to create with the warm-up. I wrote a series of posts on this topic called so that I could tease-apart the details and help people understand how to identify their ideal state. "Switch On"  Part 1 and Part 2 deal with identifying your ideal state and you can find those posts here and here. The general idea is: you have to know where you're trying to go if you want to get there on purpose. 

#2: Develop/discover how to get there: Some athletes really like having a set routine you do the same way every time. Some athletes have bits and pieces they incorporate as needed. Some athletes discover what they need day-by-day. Interestingly enough, the world of sport psychology is rather polarized on this issue: some say you need a set routine and some say you don't. My approach is that you have to know you...How you get to your ideal state is up to you. "Switch On" Part 3 is largely about discovering and developing what you need to be mentally ready. Hint: it takes some work so you'll find most of what you need in the "Journal Work" section.

#3: Have a variety of strategies to introduce or try: Different strategies produce different results. And, sometimes a strategy that worked before doesn't work in a particular moment and you need another option. Below is a short-list of strategies to try.

• Warm-up with others who want a similar energy level and mindset. Some people need to be hyped-up and bouncing off the walls to be mentally ready. Some people need a more zen-like state to be ready. A common issue on teams is lack of understanding of this concept. Those with a high-energy level often 'judge' those with lower energy as "not ready." Those with lower-energy may 'judge' those with higher energy as "not focused." Recognizing and validating these differences by allowing people to warm-up with those who need a similar energy level will help everyone get to where they need to be.
• Imagery. There are a variety of ways to use imagery for mental warm-ups and they all require practice so you are sure you can control your images (they do what you want them to do) and that you can incorporate multiple senses (not just sight, but sound, touch, taste, feel, etc.)
  • Highlight reel: create a mental movie of your best plays ever and replay it anytime you need a boost in energy or focus.
  • Mental Reps: create a mental movie of you doing the basic things with immaculate accuracy. Throwing, catching, cutting, etc. This is a way to get extra reps without wearing out your body.
  • Purpose: create a mental image or journey that reminds you of your why: the reason you play, the reason you train, the reason you're willing to push yourself to your physical limit and put yourself out there emotionally.

 

• Focused Breath. Like imagery, there are a variety of ways to incorporate focused breathing into a mental warm-up.
  • Calming down: This is probably the most common use for breathing. We recognize energy/nerves are too high and we need to bring ourselves down. Insert focused five-count breathing here. This is probably most useful at the end of a warm-up as the game is getting closer and nerves may be increasing. Click here to link to another quick useful post on this topic.
  • Amping-up: Believe it or not, breathing can also help you amp-up when you don't quite have enough energy. The trick here is that instead of a five-count or longer breath in and out, you're actually going to deliberately shorten your breath with quick inhales and exhales. *NOTE: do not do this for more than a few breaths at a time!* And, for maximum impact, pair this with some imagery.

 

• Timing. This speaks largely to the personalization of mental warm-ups. In team settings, I most often see the last 2-5 minutes of warm-up devoted to mental preparation. While that's a good time for some people, it might not be the right time for others. Some people might want time before or in the middle of warm-up to get their mind right. To individual athletes: you are responsible for you; know what you need and know how to communicate that to your leadership in a constructive way. To leadership: understand your athletes are different, and as much as possible, allow time and space for athletes to get themselves mentally ready.

Finally, as always...Train your mind like you train your body: Warming-up physically for a competition isn't the first time you've warmed-up physically. You physically warm-up for training and practice as well. So my question is, are you mentally warming-up for each of those events as well? If not, start there. Try these strategies in practice first to see what works best for you.


Let me know what questions you have from this post. And, this list of strategies is nowhere near complete. Please feel free to comment on our FB page with the mental warm-up strategies that work best for you, especially if I didn't cover it here!

-Petra

I’m going to start today with a true story from my own athletic career.

I had a teammate on my college soccer team who, before every game, would turn up the music in the locker room and jump around like she was at a punk rock concert. As she got more and more pumped, she would jump and bump into people on purpose, get in their face and shout something like, “C’MON!! GET PUMPED! AREN’T YOU PUMPED?! I’M SO PUMPED!”

It sounds funny, but it’s true.

Whenever she would do that to me, I’d hardly respond. I’d give her a light chuckle and a bro-like hug and say, “Yeah, yeah…I’m pumped. I’m ready.” Each time I responded this way, she’d remember that I like to keep a lower energy and she’d go bouncing off like Tigger to someone else.

You see, the energy she needed to be at the top of her game was super high - quite literally bouncing off the walls. The energy I needed to be at my best was much lower – a reserved intensity. Were we both ready? Absolutely.

But there’s three important lessons to this story:

1. Not everyone on a team needs the same level of energy & emotion to be ready or switched-on. This is critical for both coaches and teammates to understand. Often we judge the readiness of others based on our own idea of what ready looks like and if they don’t meet that standard, we assume they aren’t ready. This goes both ways: if you’re a high-energy person, you probably assume those with who are quiet and keeping to themselves aren’t pumped up enough. Or, if you’re a lower-energy person, you probably assume those who are chatting and joking and bouncing off the walls aren’t focused enough.
2. You are responsible for knowing the level of energy and emotion that’s right for you. If you’ve been following along, you discovered/identified this in the last post Switch On – Part 2.
3. You are responsible for getting yourself to that ideal level of energy & emotion on command. Often players assume that the team’s warm-up is designed to get everyone ready to play. Indeed, that is the purpose of a warm-up, but I would argue that each individual player still has to do some individual preparations during that warm-up time to be fully ready. This doesn’t mean you abandon your team’s warm-up to do your own thing, it’s more about the way you approach warm-up mentally to get what you need.

​The essence of today’s post is:
​what do you need to do/think/feel prior to game-time to get there?

As usual, shout out with any questions or comments. I know a lot of us have Regionals coming up this weekend…If there’s anything I can do to help with your mental game last-minute, let me know! If you’ve got a question, it’s likely someone else does as well so I am going to try to run some Q&A on the Facebook page: www.facebook.com/performancecolorado.

Happy planning & happy playing!
-Petra

This blog isn’t about me telling you some magic formula or inspirational words that make you mentally tough and a better player. This blog is about the work you’re willing to put in to get better. I remind you of that because today’s post is comprised mostly of activities and questions that you have to complete on your own. The more deliberate you are about this process, the better able you’ll be to perform at the top of your game more often – but it’s likely going to take some time and effort on your part.
 
If you're still ready, take out your journal because today's post is almost all journal work!

This blog is devoted to helping you, the Ultimate player, develop the mindset, mental skills and mental toughness you want and need to perform at your best when it matters most.

Let's get started.

We’ve all been there - in that moment where we needed to be performing at the top of our game and we just couldn’t make it happen. It might have been at a tryout, a game against a rival team, the semi-finals of a tournament or the game-to-go to Nationals. Wherever it was for you, I’m guessing it wasn’t fun. I’m guessing it was frustrating and confusing.

​You might be wondering why I’m starting on such an awesome note.

The reason is this: those moments when our performance matters most tend to come toward the middle or end of the season. And too often, we (as players and coaches) don’t think about the impact of our mental game on our performance until that moment - the one when we need to perform and we can’t. Sometimes, even if we know the importance of the mental game, we rarely take the time to train it properly and deliberately from the start of the season.

What you’ll need to start training:

-A journal. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy, but it should be something durable - something that can withstand the treachery of living in your Ultimate bag. Why? Because training your mind requires entering your mind, reflecting and doing something with what you find. You’ll want a place to keep notes and track progress.

-Hunger & humility. I’m excited to be your guide and your coach, but this entire process is really up to you. Be wary of those offering hacks or quick tricks to enhance your mental toughness. There is no shortcut and there are no hacks. Training your mind requires the same commitment, effort, and work as training your body. I’ll give you questions to reflect on, exercises to practice, and prompts to think about, but the progress you make depends on the work you put in. The work we do here together is about cultivating sturdy and effective habits.