In this final installment of this series, we will explore the psychological aspects of training, focusing on how an athlete's mental state as it pertains to the task influences performance, goals, and objectives within a strength and conditioning program. Understanding the connection between cognitive processes, arousal levels, and external stimuli is essential for optimizing training and performance outcomes.
Understanding Psychological Factors in Training.
Athlete's Focus and Performance:
An athlete’s focus, the complexity of their movements, their arousal levels, and external factors all significantly influence their performance and training goals. In motor learning, experts study how these elements interact and affect how skills are learned, retained, and transferred to different contexts. For strength and conditioning coaches, understanding these interactions is essential to create effective training programs.
Arousal and Performance:
Optimal Arousal Levels:
Different tasks require different levels of arousal. High arousal is beneficial for short, maximal effort events like powerlifting or strongman competitions. Conversely, lower arousal is crucial for complex tasks such as shooting sports, archery hunting, or ultra-endurance events.
Physiological Indicators:
Arousal can be assessed through physiological responses such as increased heart rate, sweating, muscle tension, and other symptoms like nausea, shortness of breath, and dizziness. Heart rate is a reliable indicator, with specific ranges correlating with performance changes.
Heart Rate Performance Impact:
115-120 bpm:
Fine motor skills start to deteriorate. Fine motor skills in sports involve the precise and coordinated movement of small muscles, particularly in the hands and fingers, often in conjunction with visual and cognitive abilities. An example of fine motor skills in sports is:
Archery
String Release:
In archery, the precision with which an archer releases the bowstring is a prime example of fine motor skill. The archer must carefully control the small muscles in the fingers to release the string smoothly and consistently.
Aiming:
Holding the bow steady and making fine adjustments to aim at the target also involves fine motor control.
Arrow Nocking:
The process of placing the arrow on the bowstring, known as nocking the arrow, requires careful hand-eye coordination and precise finger movements.
145-150 bpm:
Complex motor skills begin to decline. A special operations soldier often performs tasks requiring complex motor skills, integrating multiple movements with precision, strength, and situational awareness. An example of complex motor skills in this context is:
Urban Combat Operations
Room Clearing:
Involves a series of coordinated movements, including entering a room quickly, scanning for threats, and making split-second decisions. This requires coordination of legs for movement, arms for weapon control, and eyes for threat identification.
Breaching:
The act of breaching a door involves physical strength to use breaching tools, fine motor skills to handle and place charges or tools correctly, and the ability to coordinate timing and movement with team members.
Shooting While Moving:
Engaging targets accurately while moving requires a high level of coordination between the legs for movement, the arms and hands for weapon control, and the eyes for aiming and situational awareness.
Communications:
Using hand signals or radio communication while performing other tasks involves the integration of fine motor skills with cognitive processing to ensure clear and effective communication under stress.
170-175 bpm:
Major decrease in cognitive processing, peripheral vision, depth perception, and auditory function.
1. Room Clearing
Example:
A special operations soldier enters a room to clear it of potential threats. This involves moving swiftly, scanning for enemies, and coordinating with teammates.
Impact on Operation Ability at High Heart Rates:
Cognitive Processing:
Elevated heart rates can lead to tunnel vision and slower decision-making, making it harder to identify threats quickly and accurately.
Peripheral Vision:
Reduced peripheral vision can cause the soldier to miss potential threats or obstacles on the sides.
Depth Perception:
Impaired depth perception might result in misjudging distances, potentially leading to improper engagement distances or tripping over obstacles.
Auditory Function:
Diminished auditory function can hinder the soldier's ability to hear commands or threats, reducing overall situational awareness.
175+ bpm:
Activation of fight-or-flight response, irrational behavior, and loss of gross motor skills. At this point most people become completely unable to perform and become a liability.
Strategies To Help Athletes lower Their Arousal levels.
Get in Better shape. Improving the aerobic energy system enhances athletic performance by increasing cardiovascular efficiency, optimizing oxygen utilization, and enhancing lactate clearance, which collectively delay the time it takes to reach high or maximal heart rates. These adaptations allow athletes to perform at lower heart rates for a given intensity, resulting in sustained performance, quicker recovery, and reduced perceived exertion. By training the aerobic system, athletes can maintain high levels of activity for longer durations, recover faster between efforts, and reduce the overall strain on their cardiovascular system, ultimately leading to improved endurance and performance across various sports.
Stress Inoculation. Stress inoculation helps athletes perform better under high arousal levels by gradually exposing them to stressors in a controlled manner, allowing them to develop coping mechanisms and resilience. This process enhances their ability to manage physiological and psychological responses to stress, such as elevated heart rates, anxiety, and pressure. By simulating high-pressure situations during training, athletes learn to maintain focus, make better decisions, and execute skills effectively despite increased arousal. Over time, stress inoculation builds confidence and mental toughness, enabling athletes to perform optimally in competitive or high-stakes environments where stress levels are naturally elevated.
Breathwork. Breathing methods like box breathing, which involves inhaling, holding, exhaling, and holding each breath for a set count (e.g., 4 seconds each), can help athletes lower arousal levels before a stressful event by activating the parasympathetic nervous system. This practice reduces the heart rate, decreases blood pressure, and promotes a state of calm and focus. By regulating their breathing, athletes can manage anxiety and stress more effectively, leading to improved concentration, better decision-making, and enhanced overall performance. Box breathing helps mitigate the physiological symptoms of stress, allowing athletes to approach high-pressure situations with a composed and controlled mindset.
Movement Complexity:
Complex movements require higher cognitive efforts, slowing the learning process. Coaches should employ specific instructional methods that cater to the complexity of the tasks, ensuring athletes can efficiently acquire and retain new skills.
Impact of Complexity:
As movements become more complex, cognitive load increases, slowing the learning process and adding stress to training.
Skill Acquisition:
Skill acquisition involves applying motor learning principles, including attentional focus, learning techniques, and retention rates. Strength and conditioning coaches need to understand these principles to incorporate event-specific training methods that enhance skill acquisition and transfer.
How a Strength and Conditioning Coach Would Account for This.
Step-by-Step Breakdown for a Special Operations Soldier, Simplify and Segment Tasks:
Initial Training:
The coach begins by breaking down the room-clearing process into smaller, more manageable segments. For example, they may first focus on just the entry technique without a weapon, ensuring the soldier masters the footwork and body positioning.
Incremental Complexity:
Gradually, more elements are added, such as incorporating weapon handling once the entry movement is consistent.
Progressive Overload & Skill Acquisition:
As proficiency increases in individual components, the coach introduces more complexity, such as combining entry with weapon handling, and then adding communication and teamwork elements.
Stress Inoculation:
To simulate real-world stress, the coach might incorporate stress inoculation drills, such as timed exercises, background noise, or physical fatigue, progressively challenging the soldier's ability to perform under pressure.
Use of Mental Rehearsal & Visualization Techniques:
The coach teaches the soldier mental rehearsal techniques to visualize successful execution of each complex movement. This mental practice can improve cognitive processing and reduce anxiety, aiding faster learning.
Breathing and Relaxation Techniques:
Before and during training, the coach instructs the soldier on breathing methods like box breathing to manage stress and maintain focus. This helps lower arousal levels, making it easier to concentrate on complex tasks.
Feedback and Adjustments:
The coach provides immediate, specific feedback on performance, helping the soldier make real-time adjustments.
Video Analysis:
Recording training sessions for review can allow the soldier to see their movements and understand areas needing improvement.
Periodized Training Approach & Skill Development Phases:
The coach uses a periodized approach, allocating specific phases for skill development, conditioning, and cognitive training. This structured plan ensures balanced progression without overwhelming the soldier.
External Stimuli:
External stimuli, like the presence of competitors or evaluators, can elevate stress and arousal levels. Coaches should train athletes to manage these external factors, turning potential distractions into motivators that enhance performance.
Influence of External Factors: Competitors, teammate feedback, team dynamics, coaching cues, time clocks, scoreboards, and observers (such as cadre in SFAS or SFRE) contribute to event complexity and athlete arousal and stress.
Response and Adaptation:
Strength and conditioning coaches can help athletes adjust to these stimuli, respond appropriately, and use them to boost performance.
Strategies To Help Athletes Deal with External Stimuli.
Show up to your event prepared. Train until you can't get it wrong under various conditions.
Stress Inoculation. Perform the required tasks under similar conditions as game day.
Don't self select. That's not your job. You can only do the best you can, and if you follow point number one, this should take care of itself.
Conclusion
Throughout this series, we have explored various aspects of the needs analysis process, from task analysis and physiological demands to biomechanics and environmental factors. This final post on psychology emphasizes the importance of mental resilience and its integration into training programs.
Key Takeaways from the Series:
Task Analysis:
Understanding the specific demands of the sport or activity.
Physiological Demands:
Assessing the energy systems and physical requirements.
Biomechanics:
Analyzing movement patterns and joint mechanics.
Injury Prevention:
Identifying common injuries and implementing preventative strategies.
Environmental Factors:
Adapting training to different environments.
Psychological Factors:
Enhancing mental resilience and managing stress.
This series was not intended to provide all the answers but to showcase the comprehensive process we follow at Dark Horse Athlete when designing training programs. We hope it inspires you to think critically about your training methods and improve your program design.
Teaser for the Next Series
Stay tuned for our next blog series on "Athlete Analysis," where we will break down how we assess individual athletes or teams after conducting a needs analysis. This series will look into personalized training programs and the specifics of athlete evaluation.
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