Raising Elite Competitors

ATHLETE TIP: Do This To Handle Pre-Game Nerves

January 10, 2023 Coach Bre Season 2 Episode 117
Raising Elite Competitors
ATHLETE TIP: Do This To Handle Pre-Game Nerves
Show Notes Transcript

Today's episode is all about pre game nerves. Having pre-game nerves is normal, but what should you do to handle this?


Our highlight for today's episode is a comment from one of our athletes in the community. Her name is Lynden, and she said,


"My biggest transformation has been my ability to bounce back from mistakes. This has helped me. Be more confident in my game and feel belonging. It also has shown me how to be a good role model. Be encouraging to my teammates. This program has helped me more than anything with my mental game. And I want to thank you guys for helping me."


Although Lynden was one of the participants of The Elite Competitor Program, she was the one who put in the work to get where she is right now. 


We only provide our athletes with the tools they need, and it's up to them to put them into the work. One of the tools we teach is learning to handle pre-game nerves, and that's what we're going to share with you today. 



What does having “pre-game nerves” mean? 


Having “pre-game nerves” is something that all athletes deal with. So if you are an athlete that gets nervous before games, you're feeling some things in your body, your heart's racing, maybe your stomach aches, you feel some digestion issues, your mouth is dry, or you're sweating, then that's normal, you’re having “pre-game nerves”.


And as uncomfortable it might feel like, it actually means the opposite.


This is your body preparing you to compete. 


It actually helps if you learn how to handle it. But when it gets overwhelming for you, that's when it starts to interfere with you being able to show up. 



Pressure is a privilege


This is something that I say all the time to my athletes. Pressure is a privilege. 


Pressure is a sign that you're ready and everyone gets to experience that. So embrace it and go out there shifting your nervousness into excitement. Take it as a sign that your body is ready!


See pre-game nerves as something useful instead of something to be avoided. 



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Welcome back to the raising unstoppable girl athletes podcast. I'm your host coach Bri and elite performance coach for female athletes. And I am so excited that you're here. This episode is for athletes. I am pretty excited because we're going to be talking about something that all athletes face and that is pregame nerves. So moms, if you're listening, this is definitely one that you can put on and the car on the way to tournaments and way to competitions, athletes. This is for you. Now, before I get into this, I quickly want to highlight an athlete from our community. So her name is Lynden. She recently came through the elite competitive program, which is our signature mental training program for female athletes. And she wrote something pretty cool. She actually just finished up the program and I asked her, you know, what was your biggest takeaway from everything that you just went through? She just went through 10 weeks of this mental training program. She said, My biggest transformation has been my ability to bounce back from mistakes. This has helped me. Be more confident in my game and feel belonging. It also has shown me how to be a good role model. Be encouraging to my teammates. This program has helped me more than anything with my mental game. And I personally want to thank you guys for helping me. I find my meaning and love for all my sports and helping me with my mental game. So Linden, I really appreciate you saying that, but I also just want to say that I'm so proud of you. You're the one that put in the work. You were the one that got the transformation for yourself, this ability to come back from mistakes, this ability to be more confident in your game. To be a good role model to be a teammate you put in the work. So awesome job. All right, we're going to get into this episode today for athletes. This is a quick tip. All right. Now, I will say that pre-game nerves, Preme anxiety is something that all athletes deal with all athletes at every level. So if you are an athlete that gets nervous before games, right? You're feeling some things in your body, like your heart's racing, maybe your stomach, you've got some digestion issues. Your mouth is dry. You're sweating. Your problems are sweaty. Maybe you're even getting to this place where like, You can't think straight, you get really irritable. Like you could get snappy. You're like, mom, don't talk to me before the game. That's normal. I want you to know right now, a hundred percent. And this is actually your body preparing you to compete. And when we get overboard, like when, when that gets too much, that's when it starts to interfere with you being able to show, come play, how you would normally play like in a practice situation. Okay. But what I want you to do right now is to have a little bit of a mindset shift around this nervousness in this anxiety. And here's why. Anxiety and I'm talking pregame anxiety. This is like this. You know, it's kind of like nerve, not that, not like. Clinically diagnosed anxiety. You may or may not have that outside of your sport. That's not what we're talking about right now. This is like just that nervousness and anxiousness that happens before you compete. Okay. Where you're like yeah, I feel really uncomfortable. I don't know if I want to do this, you know, You know the feeling. Okay. That feeling and excitement actually registered the same in your body. They feel the same. The only thing that's different is the meaning that you put behind them. And so oftentimes nervousness and anxiety as seen as bad and to be avoided from athletes like, oh my gosh, I'm feeling nervous. This is not good. Huh? I don't want to feel this way. When in reality. Anxiousness and nervousness are actually assigned that your body is preparing you to do something important. It's actually a sign that this competition matters to you, whatever you're about to do. And in fact, if you didn't feel that way, I would be a little concerned because whatever you're about to do likely doesn't matter. To you and big competitions or little competitions, or anytime you're going out and compete, it should matter. And so you should feel some of that nervousness, some of that anxiety in your body, you want to welcome that as a sign that you're ready to compete, instead of see it as something is bad because when you register it and you label it as bad and to be avoided, Here's what happens. Your potty is saying, well, this is what I'm supposed to do. it ramps it up, makes you more nervous. Okay. Makes you more anxious. And then that it gets to that place where you're potentially not going to play well, because you have too much of that going on in your body. So here's what you can do and said. As soon as you start to feel that feeling of nervousness, anxiety, freezer to play, you're going to take a deep breath and you're going to say. Ah, you're here. It's go time, something like that. You're here. That means I'm ready to play. Or like even greeting it, like, Hey nervousness, glad you showed up. That means I'm ready to go. Okay. And so seeing that and shifting your mindset to that feeling in your body as something that is essential as something that's needed as something that's actually going to help you play better. We'll actually help that feeling. Feel better and you can actually use that. To lay better out and whatever you're competing in. Here's another thing I want you to remember. Pressure. Pressure is a privilege. This is something that I say all the time to my athletes. Pressure is a privilege. When you feel that pressure. You know, you're going out to compete and it's like, you put in so much work, right? You put in the time you put in the reps, like this is your time to go out and just let it all out. Like go play. Right. Pressure is a sign that you're ready. Pressure is a privilege, meaning that not our athletes. Everyone gets to experience that. You have put in the work and especially if you're getting further and further, and maybe you're playing a bigger game. You have put in the time you have put in the the sweat, like you have, you've earned that pressure. You have earned it and so embrace it, embrace it and go out and see it as like, let's go anxiety, nerves. You're coming with me. Okay. I'm seeing this as excitement. My body is prepared. Let's go. So I want you to do that next time you feel about nervousness. You feel that anxiety label it be like, Hey, I'm feeling nervous. That means I'm ready to go. Here we go. All right. And see how that feels different when you go out and compete. See if that feels like it helps you a little bit. Because now you're seeing it as something useful instead of something to be avoided. All right, athletes. I hope that this was helpful. Again, I am coach Bri. I am an elite performance coach for female athletes. I will see you in the next athlete tip. Episode.