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This worksheet is the intellectual property of Condor Performance™ and permission is required by law (email: [email protected]) before reusing all or part of it in any way.
Mental Toughness (Metuf™) Training: Simplifying It
Simplifying It Useful Ways to Break Down
Performance, Mental Toughness and Effort
"The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on Our
Capacity for Processing Information" is one of the most highly cited
papers in psychology. It was published in 1956 by the cognitive
psychologist George A. Miller of Princeton University's Department of
Psychology in Psychological Review. It is often interpreted to argue that
the number of objects an average human can hold in working memory
is 7 ± 2. This is frequently referred to as Miller's Law.”
ii | P a g e
This worksheet is the intellectual property of Condor Performance™ and permission is required by law (email: [email protected]) before reusing all or part of it in any way.
Mental Toughness (Metuf™) Training: Simplifying It
Are you ready?
One of the most interesting and challenging aspects of human performance is that a lot of the key terms (such as the word ‘effort’) are hard to see and therefore often either poorly defined or not defined at all.
Metuf QUESTION:
What are the potential consequences of not having a clear understanding about what frequently used terms actually refer to?
Metuf TASK:
Now that we can see the obvious benefit of spending some time defining various key terms let’s start by thinking about 3 of the most common and their synonyms (different words with similar meanings).
Use the space below to define performance, practice and competition as well as trying to come up with as many synonyms for each. Finally, consider the pros and cons of how seriously you take each one. Definition Synonyms / examples
Performance
Practice
Competition
iii | P a g e
This worksheet is the intellectual property of Condor Performance™ and permission is required by law (email: [email protected]) before reusing all or part of it in any way.
Mental Toughness (Metuf™) Training: Simplifying It
Metuf QUESTION:
Now that we have agreed that the aim of competition is basically just to turn up, have a crack and enjoy it then our attention now turns towards the EFFORT that takes place before the competition starts. How do you currently break down your effort?
Metuf FACT:
Miller's Law (see first page) suggests that difficult concepts (such as EFFORT) might want to be broken down into about 5 categories. More than this might cause information overload and less than this might mean we leave some important areas out. Of course you can break down EFFORT in any way you want but make sure to
try and avoid categories that are confusingly similar. One way to do it is simply adopt the five pillars of modern-day sports science. Can you work out what they are using the clues below (the ‘i’ in each circle stands for ‘improving’)?
iPC
iTW
iLC iTC
iMT
iv | P a g e
This worksheet is the intellectual property of Condor Performance™ and permission is required by law (email: [email protected]) before reusing all or part of it in any way.
Mental Toughness (Metuf™) Training: Simplifying It
Metuf TASK:
The pillars themselves are too broad to be targeted for improvement so we need to break them down at least one more time before we can start thinking about using them to inspire better EFFORT. Start with Mental Toughness as these categories are fixed and will be
referred to from now as The Big Five mental targets. Can you guess what they are as well as how PC and LC might also be broken down?
New Word Alert
*T.O.T.I.W.B.E.A stands for The Other Thing I Want to Be Excellent At
iLC
iNut
iFun
iTOT*
iSle
iPC
iStr
iFit iFlx
iMT
iM
iC
iE iC
iC
“The Big 5”
Mental Targets
v | P a g e
This worksheet is the intellectual property of Condor Performance™ and permission is required by law (email: [email protected]) before reusing all or part of it in any way.
Mental Toughness (Metuf™) Training: Simplifying It
Metuf TASK:
The technical and tactical parts of your sport (performance type) can also be broken down into smaller parts but the way in which this is best done will depend on too many factors that we can’t predict (such as team sport or not, your coach – if you have one – and those around
you, your age, your level, your ambitions; to name the most obvious). Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to break down TC and TW into smaller, more manageable parts (but remember Miller’s Law):
Metuf CLUE:
Often these two pillars can be confused with one another or thought of as one. It might help if you think of Technical Consistency as “how to” do something (basically the biomechanics of the body movements) and Tactical Wisdom as “which, why and
when” to do something. If you have a coach then it might be worth asking them to help you with this part. If you don’t have a coach, then ask the other expert – the WWW!
iTW iTC
vi | P a g e
This worksheet is the intellectual property of Condor Performance™ and permission is required by law (email: [email protected]) before reusing all or part of it in any way.
Mental Toughness (Metuf™) Training: Simplifying It
Metuf TASK:
Synonyms and subcategories can be confusing so use the space below to define The Big Five Mental Targets and if you like try and break them down further in the space below the table.
Pillar Target Definition
MT Mental
Toughness
Motivation
Confidence
Emotion
Concentration
Communication
iMT
iM
iC
iE iC
iC
vii | P a g e
This worksheet is the intellectual property of Condor Performance™ and permission is required by law (email: [email protected]) before reusing all or part of it in any way.
Mental Toughness (Metuf™) Training: Simplifying It
Metuf FACT:
So far we’ve seen how effort can be broken down into 5 pillars and many more targets. Which of these targets warrants more of your time than others is highly dependent on individual factors (sport, timing, injuries, age and so so). When you have a clearer
idea of how to approach the 5 pillars for YOU and YOUR GOALS The Four Laws of Effort (below) can help you to the next step. Tick each one after you have read it and if you’re not convinced then maybe discuss it with your ‘people’.
1. Improvement is never ending – you will never reach the finish line and
be “good enough” to then move onto something else
2. The number of ways to improve is unlimited but the time we have in order to get better is very limited
3. Improvement is best achieved through the focus on training and
practice which basically boils down to EFFORT
4. Effort is fundamentally a combination of Quality and Quantity into the areas you are targeting for improvement
Metuf QUESTION:
Going into more detail regarding Law 4, how would you measure / judge the Quality and Quantity of effort and what about the interaction between the two?
Metuf FACT:
Whereas QUALITY (how good the effort is / choice of practice task) wants to be as high as possible QUANTITY (how much effort in terms of ‘time spent trying’) wants to be neither too much nor
too little. This is sometimes called The Goldilocks Effect after her famous story of trying to find the right balance in terms of bed size and porridge temperature (amongst other things).
viii | P a g e
This worksheet is the intellectual property of Condor Performance™ and permission is required by law (email: [email protected]) before reusing all or part of it in any way.
Mental Toughness (Metuf™) Training: Simplifying It
Qu
alit
y
Metuf TASK:
If the goal of effort is for us to have the “right amount’ of the highest possible quality then for each type of effort we’re aiming for the ‘holy grail’ on the below. Now plot the right amount of some average quality practice as well and far too MUCH of some very high quality effort.
Metuf QUESTION:
What do you notice about these above two difference practice blocks? Which is “better”? What would you have to do to each in order to get it closer to the Holy Grail?
Metuf TASK:
Now repeat this exercise but this time using your effort / practice / training and let us know how you get on.
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Quantity