When training for an important competition, there is a huge amount of emphasis on physical preparation - but what about preparing mentally? A method that can help athletes mentally prepare for competition and enhance their focus, self-confidence and overall performance is Psychological Skills Training (PST).

PST involves techniques that an athlete consistently practices in order to enhance and maintain their performance. Primarily, PST is composed of four main components; goal setting, relaxation techniques, imagery and self-talk. Today I will be focusing on goal setting, explaining my role as a performance psychologist in helping individual athletes and teams set and achieve their goals.

Goal setting is at the core of psychological skills training to improve an individual’s motivation, productivity and attentional focus on a specific task. As a performance psychologist, I help educate athletes on how to develop, monitor and evaluate goals.

Firstly, I introduce athletes to the “SMART” acronym when settings goals, explaining that all goals need to be specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely. This is a major component of setting both short term and long-term goals for an individual to remain accountable for the goals they have set, as well as evaluating their goals to assess their progress.

The goal setting process is broken down into three different components comprised of process, performance, and outcome goals:

Process goals are the smaller steps an athlete takes to achieve their performance goals. They focus on the repeated execution of a specific skill or strategy during training that they the individual wishes to improve. By repeatedly practicing the skill, the individual is able to gain attentional control and improve their performance. For example, a process goal for a swimmer could be to practice not breathing out of the turn during the main set for the next four training sessions. After the sessions are complete, the individual would then evaluate this goal to establish whether they should adjust the goal to a more challenging process goal, such as practicing not breathing out of turn during prep set and main set for the next four training sessions.

Performance goals are the performance standards that athletes set themselves in order to reach their outcome goals. When setting performance goals remember that they should be aspects of your performance that you have control over. For example, a swimmer could set a performance goal of swimming 100M breaststroke in 1min 20s. If we refer back to the swimmer’s process goal of not breathing out of the turn, this goal is one of the steps to help them achieve their performance goal.

Lastly, Outcome goals are the end result that the athlete is working towards, for example, getting a gold medal at Nationals.

Some key points to remember when settings goals:

(1) Focus on the goals you can control

Focus on process and performance goals you can control instead of focusing on the outcome

(2) Write them down!

Individuals who write down goals are more likely to achieve them then those who don’t write them down Writing down goals help to monitor your progress

(3) Make them visible for you to read on a daily basis

Ensure your list of goals is visible for you to read them a couple times a day (especially before training/competition) to remind you of your objectives.

If you have any questions regarding setting goals, please email Serena at serenamacleodsportpych@gmail.com