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.
The second question to Dr. Dave Alred: So the pressure is placed on ourselves rather than from outside?
“I was a schoolteacher before going into elite coaching, and worked out that one of the biggest blocks to a child committing themselves to anything – academic work, PE, whatever – was their self-image. Watch a five-year-old trying to hit a golf ball. They’ll swing and miss and finally hit one, and they’re riveted with excitement. They’ve done it, they’re a golfer! The adult side of us goes “one in four?” but the child isn’t interested in failure, he’s interested in achieving. As adults we spend all our time reinforcing what we can’t do, and I’m trying to readdress that.”