I have read a good article from the Coach Magazine (UK) which is an interview of Dr. Dave Alred MBE, a rugby kicking coach turned pressure specialist who Johnny Wilkinson calls “The best in the world”, on keeping a cool head.
First question to Dr. Dave Alred: Where does pressure come from?
“Fear of not achieving the outcome you want, and that fear can distract you from the process of improving. The first stage of anyone’s improvement is improving on themselves. With competition we tend to neglect that and try and benchmark against others, but it’s always about getting better – if you kicked eight goals last time and 10 this time, it does not matter who kicked 15.
This echoes with my own experience that I described in my book (Section: Kiss the negative goodbye; p.24-26) that competition is good for personal development to an extent up to the point before turning into negative energy.