The Olympic Games currently taking place in Rio are a great source of inspiration for those of us who are keen to build our own confidence. Every competitor, at some point or other will have faced rejection, failure and defeat and yet they still bounce back to compete and win medals at the Olympics.
Firstly, let's take the GB men's track cycling team who won gold last night in a pulsating evening in the velodrome in the sprint event. That was the third Olympics in a row in which the UK had taken the title. Despite these successes at Olympic level they had not won in the World Championship at any point in recent years. Therefore, the team may have felt that they were up against stronger opponents from New Zealand, Denmark and Germany who had all performed better than them recently
So how do they do it?
Sir Chris Hoy's analysis on the BBC was fascinating. He said that part of the success was due to technical innovation like ensuring that the team uniforms were as aerodynamic as possible by moving the seams and zips to the back. This in addition to a thousand other technical improvements would help by fractions of a second which are crucial in an event like this. Secondly, there was the training. The Uk team had clearly undergone a highly intensive and detailed training regime with the athletes peaking their performance in time for the Games.
However, these are relatively easy to copy, how do the UK team manage to keep winning gold in the Velodrome? Sir Chris offered some insight when he said the final would, in part, be down to mental strength.
One of the most significant books I have read is the Chimp Paradox by Dr Steve Peters. This helps us identify the helpful and less helpful thought patterns we can become trapped in offering a solution as we can rethink our lives based on the human brain being divided into both Human and Chimp sections. This was a life changing book for me and it was no surprise that it's author also worked for the GB cycling team.
Cheers
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