The covid-19 pandemic and governments’ initiatives to control or stem its impact have brought us face-to-face with a level of control and stress we have probably not experienced in our lives. In Australia, we are encouraged to take exercise but also follow ‘social distancing’ – staying away a prescribed distance from others outside our homes. Children are banned from playgrounds because equipment surfaces cannot be disinfected. Gyms are closed for similar reasons. What does this mean for exercise, and more particularly training for athletes? Sports competitions of all kinds, of course, are largely in abeyance while we wait for changes in social controls and the resumption of organised sports. But meantime, athletes face special challenges in managing their training programs to maintain their fitness and readiness, and in a mindset that remains positive. A recent story in the media – one of many – was on policing social distancing. A young woman athlete, in track and field, wanted to observe social distancing, but also to continue with her training, which involved running a standard distance on a sports ground or oval. To ensure social distancing, and because many walkers and others in parks worry about the spread of the virus through exhaling joggers and runners, she drove to a sports ground where there was ample scope for her to train without limiting herself or others. She was obviously disappointed to be approached by a (woman) police officer, who told her this was not approved exercise, because she was too far from home (a distance not clearly stated). She was allowed to continue her lap but was instructed to then return home. This is one of many such instances where the rules may not be clear, or may not be understood, or the rationale behind them does not bear close scrutiny, however supportive we are of the overall intent. In this case, the athlete, given presence of mind – and also willingness to take a risk in arguing with a police officer – could rightly have pointed to this as part of her ‘work’ (work is permitted), because she is indeed a professional athlete and without maintaining a program she will be disadvantaged in that employment. By way of comparison – and this is controversial – hairdressers have been allowed, even encouraged to continue in their employment, even though social distancing is clearly impossible. At almost the other end of the scale, a government-funded program to support exercise for diabetes sufferers provides weekly or biweekly sessions with an exercise physiologist, usually in small groups, to craft individual programs for enhanced movement and flexibility, together with advice on how activity can help in diet management and better health. Inevitably many of these programs cannot for the time being be offered in groups – group activities generally are discouraged or disallowed. One creative answer to this has been to run such sessions for individuals in a virtual group, using a platform such as Zoom or Facetime. Recordings and DVDs can also add alternatives. Here the challenge of motivation is of a different kind. Under the eye of a physiologist, the range of movement, rate of exercise and judgement of capacity can all be assessed. Those participating, once they attend, feel an obligation to complete the exercises. Is this sustainable in the same way if they do so at home, especially if they must rely on ‘distant’ record instructions? Governments in Australia have been very good so far in using social distancing to manage infection rates. They have also been good in encouraging exercise as a legitimate part of continuing life quality and a benefit for good health. What has been harder is projecting a sense of motivation – other than community survival, with an underlying message of fear. If your first message is “Stay home”, how can you motivate people to exercise when implicitly the main message is to limit your more extensive movement to avoid risk? Walking the dog is approved exercise – only if you walk the dog locally. Running around the oval is approved, if you get there close by. There has been growing interest in longer-term psychological health effects of such distancing. Motivation comes into play here. We all need to be creative in drawing on reserves of motivation and resilience to continue this important part of our lives and health. For athletes at any professional or serious level, this is an especially challenging time. For those of us out walking at a slower pace and perhaps a little wary of those heated, exhaling bodies rushing past us – hopefully at a good distance – ask, won’t we want to see them perform at their best when all sports resume? Answers are not easy here, but reflection on motivation may – should – lead us to a broader understanding of others’ needs and the importance for all of us to use our inner resources to their best level. This is a story in progress… Background D Yuhas. 2012. Three critical elements sustain motivation. Scientific American 1 November, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/three-critical-elements-sustain-motivation/

The athlete as leader What is it about sport that can help an athlete become a leader  – even beyond their own sport, or indeed outside it? There are some fairly obvious aspects to sporting success that will help in any leadership role. Athletes must be determined, they need to understand and practise teamwork, they understand what their followers need, their chosen sport is likely to have layers of complexity and strategy, and they are certainly required to deal with pressure.* Other (and related) skills are decision making – often within tight timeframes, and coming up with winning strategies.** Not surprisingly, many athletes opt for a role in sports administration in their “retirement”. A brief survey of the mostly US-based athletes with later non-performance careers is heavily weighted in this direction. After all, they have ready-made contacts, they have established profiles, they have followers, and they can leverage the  skills and knowledge  acquired in sport to bring a deep understanding to their roles. One such athlete on the world stage, Sebastian Coe (Lord Coe), was an Olympic gold-medallist in the 1500 metres and setting a string of records in the 1970s and 1980s. He became a member of the British Parliament in 1992, where he remained until 1997, and became a ‘Life Peer’ in 2000. He headed his country’s bid for the 2012 Summer Olympics and chaired the Games Organising Committee. In 2012 he undertook a new role at his old university on its council, and in the same year chaired the British Olympic Association. This shows a consistent pattern for such an elite athlete, and no doubt the sporting world in Britain especially benefited. Closer to home, and indicative of traits in sports that can be much admired, the second man to break the 4-minute ‘mile’, John Landy, maintained a rivalry with Roger Bannister of Britain in the 1950s. He became especially famous for turning back in a race to help a fellow-runner, Ron Clarke, then going on to win the race himself ( see link for archival footage https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozZyfM5l9ws ) – this was widely seen as a demonstration of his strong character, but it was also a team action. He was a company manager, an admired public speaker, a naturalist, and for five years Governor of Victoria, a largely ceremonial role but one also with crucial symbolic leadership requirements. Dawn Fraser, a swimmer, Kirstie Marshall, an aerial skier, and Nova Peris, a hockey player and sprinter, all entered Parliament at state or federal level. All women with diverse characters, backgrounds, interests and sports, they were able to make an effective transition to the quite different pace of parliamentary life, and to demonstrate in that forum the traits of leadership and tenacity that served them well in sport. All had been Olympic medallists, and were able to translate the discipline that had required to community roles. Another who made the transition in a remarkable way is Imran Khan, captain of the Pakistan cricket team, and later his country’s Prime Minister (a role he still holds). Before he entered politics he embarked on a career in philanthropy, using his talents and his recognition to raise funds for hospitals. The list could go on for some time. These were not people without flaws – indeed, their characters and missteps seemed rather to make them more human but not to detract from their achievements. All of them could have chosen to stay in some other, more restful form of post-sport life, but the combination of skills they possessed came to fit them for more interesting roles in the community. They remained in public perception the famous athletes they had been, but they also became significant contributors in public life. Life after sport, then, can be very much valued, especially when it reflects the sports experience. * https://athleteassessments.com/why-professional-athletes-are-great-leaders/ **https://www.leaguenetwork.com/playing-sports-helps-child-become-great-leader/

So, you are a parent, or perhaps a coach, and you have an outstanding young athlete in your charge. Will they become that superstar you see on the world stage? It is natural to ask such a question – and to see what the chances are. And what you can do to change those chances – to maintain today’s great performance for the longer haul. One obvious answer is to specialize when young and focus on developing key and core skills. But the obvious answer seems to be wrong. Coaches in the US have reported that the best athletes by college or university level were those who had played three sports as children. It gets stranger. Children specializing in a single sport reported half as many again injuries as those who played multiple sports: in fact one study reported rates between 70 and 93%. As adults they had higher rates of inactivity. Even as children they quit earlier, lost motivation, and certainly didn’t enjoy sport as much.* One study drawn on by Active for Life reported that fewer than 1% of child athletes reached the elite in later years.*** That study also found that early specialization was damaging rather than success-promoting, and “early diversification is more likely to lead to success”. And to continuing in sport in later life. Another study – and this abbreviates its complexity and detail – recommended athletes and their coaches to “pace the race” in much the same way as they learn to pace themselves in any single event or competition. This needs to start with their training in adolescence.**** These do sound promising avenues, but even a more positive study from 2014** found that “only a third of international pre-junior athletes reappeared as senior athletes, confirming the difficulties of predicting late success based on early identification and selection”. For the ambitious parent or coach, and for the talented, emerging athlete, such figures make sobering reading. However, one consistent theme is that, despite the great interest in promoting elite athletes from their early years, the amount and depth of research into this has a long way to go. We are, then, rather short of answers, or at least the easy ones – if I do this, I will achieve that. Yet young elite athletes are a base for older elite athletes, though they may find themselves sharing the podium with other talents that did not emerge until later adolescence. We can look at all this positively. The recipe for success, if we can call it that, is to get your child into many sports, because that provides a range of complementary skills and capacities.* It is also more likely that they will enjoy the sport and continue with it in some way in later life. Will they be elite? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But they may have a better quality of life. * J O’Sullivan, https://activeforlife.com/what-elite-athletes-have-in-common/; and M Mountjoy et al. 2008. IOC consensus statement: “training the elite child athlete”. British Journal of Sports Medicine 42(3): 163-164 ** A Barreiros, A Fonseca, J Côté. 2014. From early to adult sport success. European Journal of Sport Science 14,  https://www.researchgate.net/publication/259825113_From_early_to_adult_sport_success_Analysing_athletes’_progression_in_national_squads *** N Jayanthi et al. 2013. Sports specialization in young athletes: evidence-based recommendations. Sports Health 5(3): 251-257. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3658407/ **** S Menting et al. 2019. Optimal development of youth athletes toward elite athletic performance. Frontiers in Sports and Active Living, https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fspor.2019.00014/full

How do they react? Athletes – by definition – are used to experiencing good health and good performance. Reaction to injury or illness is for them very like the reaction most of us have to a “crisis” of this kind. One response is a sense of grief, with typical stages we often associate with more severe health conditions. First there is denial: If I keep up my training, even at to it, I will get through this. Then there is anger: I am fit, I eat well, this should not happen to me. Then bargaining: if I do this or that, … but then, who do we bargain with? Depression may follow – a fairly common reaction, too, at least in a non-clinical sense: disappointment, failing to meet goals or expected performances, something missing in our lives. And then acceptance: this is how it is. The other common model is called Cognitive Appraisal: how athletes see their injury or illness, and what follows from these, points to how they will react. In either case, the negative consequences can be wide. We are all at various times good at denial, and this may turn into self-damaging behaviour such as refusing to follow advice, losing an ‘edge’ though loss of confidence, feeling just plain down, and so on. How athletes view themselves is therefore a significant place to start. What, then, might they do to speed up their recovery without further undermining their health well-being and their post-recovery performance? This discussion reflects on Dr Olivia Hurley’s observations on the A Lust For life website.* She offers five tips that bear thinking about, whatever your role – as the athlete, as a parent or friend, as a coach. They may seem obvious at first sight, but do we really approach such problems systematically? Dr Hurley’s comments make an excellent starting point. There is considerable study to take it further.** First, see if there is a role for the athlete in the team anyway. Now that they have time to watch, reflect and analyse, what can they contribute to others’ performance? This makes them feel valued and useful but it may also give them time and resources to develop new insights into their own performance when they are recovered. Second, support them. Get them to talk about the problem and how they feel – and listen carefully to what they say and how they say it. They may reveal deeper concerns than their surface manner first suggests. They need to know they retain a place and a value. But if you suspect a problem of another kind, get them to seek help. Professional “listening”, well done, can be very curative. Third, check that they can fill in their time usefully. If their bodies cannot do so much, the space in their heads might be put to better use – study, hobbies, catching up on important tasks, cathing up with people they may have missed because of time constraints. Fourth, use their natural approach to training as a mechanism: they are used to planning, setting goals, measuring outcomes, analysing success or failure. These are mental skills they already have that can now be applied to their current problems, with adjustments and advice on what is possible and achievable. They are, in a way, back in training already. Fifth, the athlete is not the first or last to suffer from some injury or illness. Here, too, making or renewing contact with others who have shared such experiences may be useful, not just with a sense of belonging but with practical tips – “What I did when…” The take-out is that negative reactions are inevitable and natural, but not the end of the discussion. Ways of managing can be adapted to skill level and age, but knowing that there are ways of managing shifts to focus to a more positive frame. An injured or ill athlete doesn’t have to like the current problem, but with help and reflection they may be able to turn it in a new direction – and be readier to return to sport when they recover. * https://www.alustforlife.com/my100hours/dealing-with-injury/tips-on-managing-injury-in-athletes **E.g., Dijkstra, HP, Pollock, N, Chakraverty, R, Alonso, JM. 2014. Managing the health of the elite athlete: A new integrated performance health management and coaching model. British Journal of Sports Medicine, 48: 523-531. https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/bjsports/48/7/523.full.pdf  ** Kraemer, W, Denegar, C, Flanagan, S. 2009. Recovery from injury in sport: Considerations in the transition from medical care to performance care. Sports Health, 1(5): 392-395. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3445177/  ** NCAA Sport Science Institute. Mind, body and sport: How being injured affects mental health.  http://www.ncaa.org/sport-science-institute/mind-body-and-sport-how-being-injured-affects-mental-health 

Supporters are an integral part of any sporting event,  ‘participating’ from the stands, watching in mute silence or vociferously supporting their player or team,  urging them on – driving them on – to victory. Or do they? And if they do, how? Sport is big business, attracting sponsors and providing large salaries to the best participants. Not surprisingly, then, there has often been discussion about what inspiration athletes can draw from their supporters. Supporters, in turn, derive great personal satisfaction from the teams they support – especially if the teams are winners! We can become very attached to our teams, whether through geography, our peers, our families and parents, or the attachments that build up over time. Think of football codes: how many people do you know who change their teams? So it is in both sides’ interest to know what galvanises sportspeople, beyond their own pleasure and rewards in winning. Much of what we think is intuitive: it is so because it must be so. ‘It stands to reason.’ But sometimes these intuitive reasons do not bear close scrutiny, or they turn out to be a little different from what we expect. Take home ground advantage. Fans know it works: their supportive noise encourages their team, their hostile reactions to the other team and often to officials distracts them (even the officials). Players and umpires, however, disagree. They argue that it is all about being on familiar turf – the surface, the light, the wind, just feeling comfortable ‘at home’, etc., and in any case umpires aim to be impartial. The other side is away game performance – the distraction of booing as well as unfamiliarity. But more complex is evidence that good teams, as they move closer to championship, seem to risk ‘choking’, and they seem more distracted by supporter disappointment or criticism. American baseball provides numerous cases of this. As with sledging, players need strategies to refocus attention and concentration from both sides of the distraction.* The evidence has been shifting back and forth for years now. In soccer, away teams earned more yellow cards (cautions) then when playing at home – attributable to more aggressive play.**  But larger crowds also appeared to increase home ground advantage over and above familiarity.*** For the promoters of sport, as well as the players, there is a clear interest in promoting attendance and spectator participation. When the Olympics or Commonwealth Games come to an Australia city there does seem to be an inspiring effect – athletes drawing on those extra reserves because the ‘home crowd’ is so dependent on them. Neither side wants to dismiss the intuition that this is so, that spectators matter, and that spectators deserve to be entertained and also rewarded with victories. The challenge for athletes is to use this, when it is positive, but also not to be too distracted by it so that errors arise, and, on ‘hostile territory’ to draw on a different set of learning and training, when focus becomes internal, reliance is on skills, team support and solidarity – a version of the ‘home ground’ writ small but tight. In the meantime, many more spectators and players, as well as sports scientists and psychologists, will be looking for clear answers in a very unclear arena. * A.-M. Knowles, R. Lorimer, V. Shanmugam. 2015. Social Psychology in Sport and Exercise: Linking Theory to Practice. Macmillan Education, London. pp.73-78 (Ch 4 ‘Audiences and spectators’) ** S. Thomas, C. Reeves, A. Smith. 2006. English soccer teams’ aggressive behavior when playing away from home. Perceptual and Motor Skills 102(2), 317-320 *** G.A. Agnew, A. V. Carron. 1994. Crowd effects and the home advantage. International Journal of Sport Psychology 25(1), 53-62

Is it okay to use insults or verbal intimidation to gain a competitive advantage over another player? Every season, notably in cricket, the question comes up about sledging. Not the ride down hill over the snow, but the common, sometimes amusing, sometimes worrisome practice of distracting an opponent through personal comments. Former Captain, Steve Waugh, has referred to it as “mental disintegration” – a deliberate attempt to ‘play with an opponent’s mind’ (‘mess with his head’), and an implied legitimate tactic (Daily Telegraph, 30 November 2013). Concentration is a feature of all sporting activity in some way or other. Distraction, especially through inciting anger (even if well-concealed by the victim), does indirectly affect performance.* So is it ‘sporting’? What is its place in sport? Does it have a place in sport? Once it would have been easy to call it unsportsmanlike, and that would have been the end of it. In cricket, for example, sledging just out of the umpire’s hearing would have been borderline bad behaviour – verbal intimidation just short of unpermitted physical intimidation (unless you consider aggressive fast bowling! – which was traditionally limited to ‘recognised’ or specialist batsmen). But times change. Australians, in particular, have a well- or badly-earned reputation for the practice. In tennis, where umpires are now more prone to intervene, Nick Kyrgios was fined for an offensive ‘sledge’ (2015). The Australian Open in 2020 seemed remarkably well-behaved in most respects, however, including Nick’s own performance. Any ‘bad’ language (or behaviour) on the court is rapidly punished with fines or other penalties. Is there, then, a place for sledging in sport and how should an athlete respond to taunts, unfair criticism, and bullying, and the like? If there isn’t a place, but the stable door is wide open and that bolted horse is well over the hill, how should we teach athletes in any sport to respond? One obvious way is to have the self-discipline to return the favour. West Indian batsman, Viv Richards, was so famous for retaliating with strong shots that most teams quickly understood that he turned any anger to his own advantage, channelling it into his next stroke. That requires great focus, and of course a degree of experience and skill that not everyone will have. Some reported remedies or coping strategies include self-talk, using routines, accessing external support (perhaps even from the crowd), showing frustration, avoidance coping, and relaxation techniques – a sufficiently large range to suggest that whatever works for you, follow it.** Some ‘intimidation’, of course, may be no more than the ‘silent treatment’, refusing eye contact with an opponent on the running track, say, focussing on something unseen in the distance, looking at the sky, etc. This, too, may also be an individual’s genuine, non-intentional, non-aggressive way of harnessing concentration before an encounter. So if we think that sledging and the like are here to stay, perhaps the remedy for each competitor is to develop a ‘thicker skin’ and a better sense of concentration – with training in effective techniques, if need be and available – and to bear in mind that, if you can turn it against your opponent, it is likely to stop. Bullying? That may seem part of the same picture, but bullying really is about intimidating or coercing someone who seems to be vulnerable. In the workplace, buttressed by law, we no longer accept bullying behaviour. The line may be grey, but if sledging moves across it into the territory or bullying, then it surely is time to call it that. Coping with bullying is only ever a short-term answer. Longer-term – it must stop! Sledging comes down more to a judgement call. How unpleasant or distracting is it? Is it more than that? Better, perhaps, to give it away altogether…   * Ring, C, Kavussanu, M, Al-Yaaribi, A, Tenebaum, G, & Stanger, N. 2018. Effects of antisocial behaviour on opponent’s anger, attention, and performance. Journal of Sports Sciences 37(8), 871-877 ** Joseph, S, & Cramer, D. 2011. Sledging in cricket: elite English batsmen’s experiences of verbal gamesship. Journal of Clinical Sport Psychology 5(3), 237-251