Mental Preparation and Imagery for Peak Performance
There’s a big misconception that to conquer the weights you need passion and anger. Research and personal experience disagree. If you’re prepping for a powerlifting meet, it’s time to train your mind.
LISTEN: Table Talk Podcast Clip — JM Blakley and Dave Tate Discuss Medit...
“Meditation is like a drink of water. You’re thirsty. You drink a little bit, and you feel better. Then you get thirsty again, and that’s what meditation’s like.” Meditation might not be a cure-all, but it can make a huge difference in an athlete’s performance.
Become 35% Stronger by Using Your Imagination
Research shows that you can actually get stronger just by visualizing that you are training. The best of the best athletes do it, so why aren’t you doing it, too?
WATCH: How to Build a Mind-Muscle Connection
The mind-muscle connection is a legitimate thing. What I’m sharing with you is real science – not “bro-science.”
It's Meet Day — Do You Shine or Crumble?
Why do so many people do so well in training but nosedive when it’s time to compete? Two words: Anxiety and self-doubt.
Championship Nature Series: General George S. Patton and James J. Braddock
Most historical figures aren’t single-faceted, and if your athletes truly connect with them, you can bring other aspects of them to light to aid them in their journeys. General George S. Patton leads by example and James J. Braddock overcomes opponents using visualization.
Becoming Elite and Beyond: A Journey from the Tiger to the Dragon
I think every sport benefits from incorporating the tiger and the dragon into their training or coaching in some way. For lifters and strength athletes on the path to progression (in strength and level of competition), this hits the nail on the head.
Intent Is Everything: Does Your Training Have a Purpose?
Working hard without intent is wasted energy, and what’s the use in that?
A Strength and Conditioning Program for Youth Figure Skating
This program is used for athletes ranging in age from 10 to 14 years and is based on specific goals in the primer, strength, conditioning, prehabilitation, and regeneration phases.
Visualization for Powerlifting: How to Train Your Brain for Big Gains
Sorry to burst your bubble. There’s really no such thing as 60 seconds to a huge PR. Training, whether it’s mental or physical, requires practice.
Killer Mentality
Killer mentality means doing whatever it takes to be your very best and being willing to put it all on the line when the time comes. You have to be able to block out all negativity and draw in all positivity.
Genetically Mental
Mental toughness and strength are no different than physical traits. They can be trained and improved, if you’re ready.
Mental Visualization to a Better Total
The body is limited but the mind is unbelievably more powerful. With positive mental imagery, you can take successful rep after successful rep with a weight you have never even touched.
How to Hit Your Biggest Bench at Your Next Meet
If you use this peaking plan and follow these tips, it’s not a question of whether or not you’ll PR at your next meet — it’s just a matter of by how much.
Peak Mental Performance Podcast — How to Use Visualization
In this episode of the Peak Mental Performance Podcast, Dr. Steve Graef, Counseling and Sports Psychologist for The Ohio State University Athletics, defines visualization and gives steps to use it to improve athletic performance.
How To Approach Warm-Up Weights
From the bar to 95 pounds, 135, and so on, you should get under the bar and treat it like it’s 400 pounds. How will you unrack that weight? How will you set it up? How will you pull air? How will you sit down?
All Together Now — The Psychologist
Today we will look into sports psychology. While the coach and the nutritionist are pushed into multi and interdisciplinarity even when there is not a proper structure for it, the same doesn’t happen with the sports psychologist.
The Week Before the Meet — Unstructured or Accounted For?
This is a time when your mind will start to play tricks on you. Are you mentally committing to the time off?
Confidence — What Separates the Elite from the Novice
Where is your confidence and what are you willing to do to strengthen it?
The 3 Steps of Practicing Visualization
Surpass your mental blocks and improve your technique by putting your mind in a better place with Cook’s Model of Concentration.
Visualizing a Lift: Part 2, Ritual Reinforcement
This is your only chance; how do you want this set to go down?
What to Do Between Sets
I’m sure you’ve witnessed people at the gym yapping away between sets to the point that their workout turns into a marathon.
Visualizing a Lift: Before, After, Here, or There?
Sports science has taught us that visualization electrically activates the corresponding muscle groups.
Psychology for the Strength Athlete
Using the power of the mind is a very underrated tool in today’s world of strength athletics.
