Doing Sport Psychology Mark Andersen Many sport psychology texts focus on what to do - relaxation, imagery, etc. This is the first text to focus directly on the how of doing sport psychology. Applying sport psychology involves much more than the standard techniques such as goal setting and positive self-talk. Counselors' personalities, the history of their relationships with athletes, the interaction of individual psychologists and athletes with entire teams - these factors are at least as important as the application of standard procedures. This book reveals in intimate detail the process of sport psychology at work. The text includes the following five sections: "Getting Started," details first encounters, intake sessions, and establishment of working relationships. Removing psychological barriers to optimal performance and managing athletes' inevitable stressors are covered here. In every instance, actual session transcripts reveal how counselors related to people in specific situations. "From the Applied Sport Psychology Canon," covers traditional topics such as goal setting, relaxation, imagery, and self-talk. But these interventions are not as easy to deliver as some texts imply. The focus here is on how such techniques are applied in real-life situations. "Beyond Performance Enhancement: Working With and Working Through," reveals what clinical/counseling sessions with athletes really sound like. Performance-enhancing sessions often expose deeper clinical issues such as personal loss, depression, or eating disorders. "The Study of Service: From Supervision to Complex Delivery," deals with advanced topics. Some of the world's most experienced sport psychologists provide their insight regarding supervising others who deliver psychological services, dealing with interns, and developing long-term relationships with elite athletes. "Branching Out: Other Practitioners, Other Settings," provides details of sessions with injured athletes, cross country runners, athletes who are retiring from professional sports, and even a musician (illustrating how sport psychology is broadly applicable to any endeavor where performance is important). Order Doing Sport Psychology Today! Developing Sport Psychology Within Your Clinical Practice: A Practical Guide for Mental Health Professionals Jack A. Lesyk Provides guidance to experienced psychologists and social workers who wish to expand their practice into the growing field of sports psychology. Addresses how to change personal and professional priorities and increase knowledge and credentials to expand clinical practice, clinical techniques such as prescribed exercise, and how to use sports psychology techniques in other areas of clinical practice. Also treated are the special problems of amateur and professional athletes, including women, youth, and injured and aging athletes. Order Developing Sport Psychology Within Your Clinical Practice Today! Frameworks for Sport Psychologists: Enhancing Sport Performance Karen Hill Many traditional psychology texts devote significant coverage to psychological theory. In Frameworks for Sport Psychologists, author Karen L. Hill highlights five popular theoretical models and demonstrates how they can be applied in helping athletes to improve their performance. To demonstrate how theoretical models work, the author introduces the hypothetical case of a struggling professional golfer, Lisa "The Cheetah" Irons. Through this case study, readers learn how each theory assists the sport psychologist in interpreting Lisa's thoughts, emotions, and actions and how to create a plan of action for performance enhancement. The text follows a progression of learning about each of the five theories, learning how each theory is applied to a single case, applying the same theory to other cases, and writing an original case. In addition to the ongoing case study of Lisa "The Cheetah" Irons, each chapter includes an additional case, providing the reader further opportunity to apply the theories to real process plan. Frameworks for Sport Psychologists offers the reader a practical look at sport psychology through its unique blend of theory and practice. Order Frameworks for Sport Psychologists: Enhancing Sport Performance Today! Sport Psychiatry Daniel Begel and Robert Burton (Eds.) This book is for mental health clinicians, sports medicine specialists, and others involved in sports. Several doctors and psychologists have contributed essays which together provide a framework for understanding the psychological challenges of being an athlete, from little league to the Olympics, such as family issues, drug abuse, mental disorders, and performance issues. The book begins by evaluating the biopsychosocial development of an athlete, such as the mind-body relationship in training. Articles follow that discuss the common clinical issues faced by athletes, as well as the therapies that seem to work best for them. This book is for mental health clinicians, sports medicine specialists, and others involved in sports. The editors - Begel, in Milwaukee, and Burton, in Chicago - have both been consulting psychiatrists to professional sports teams. Order Sport Psychiatry Today! Sport Psychology From Theory to Practice Mark H. Ansel This 3rd edition text provides a framework for the application of psychological principles to the field of athletics. A good resource for teachers, students, and clinicians alike as well as anyone who is interested in the field of sport psychology. Order Sport Psychology From Theory to Practice Today! Case Studies in Applied Sport Psychology Mark A. Thompson and Ralph A. Vernacchia (Editors) A book of case studies that provide an excellent flavor of the mental side of sports for all you "armchair" athletes and sport psychologists to savor. Order Case Studies in Applied Sport Psychology Today! Working It Out: Using Exercise in Psychotherapy Kate F. Hays Author is president-elect of APA's Division of Exercise and Sport Psychology. Reviews the benefits of exercise, provides empirical support for using it as a therapeutic tool, and describes ways to apply it to a wide variety of populations. Includes case examples, quotes, and support from research and clinical studies. For practitioners. Order Working It Out: Using Exercise in Psychotherapy Today! Advances in Motivation in Sport and Exercise Glyn Roberts This book brings together several top scholars in sport and exercise psychology to present the latest information on motivational behavior in exercise, physical education, and sport. Each contributor sheds new light on the process of motivation and the variables and constructs that help us to understand why we are motivated or are not motivated. This extensive resource thoroughly examines key motivational concepts such as: self-efficacy, perceived competence, achievement goals, self-determination, and perception of control. The research provides valuable insight on enhancing motivation in physical activities. Advances in Motivation in Sport and Exercise is an excellent reference for professionals in both clinical and applied psychology, particularly those who work with athletes, coaches, teachers, and parents. Order Advances in Motivation in Sport and Exercise Today! Motivating People to Be Physically Active Bess Marcus and LeighAnn Forsyth This book is a comprehensive reference describing proven methods for helping people change from inactive to active living. The behavior change methods are useful not only for healthy adults but also for individuals with chronic physical and psychological conditions. Bess Marcus and LeighAnn Forsyth describe intervention programs for individuals and groups in workplace and community settings. You will learn how to: improve motivation by understanding the key psychological principles of behavior change assess your clients’ physical activity patterns, readiness, motivations, and barriers use a 5-stage model to measure motivational readiness for physical activity apply stage-specific strategies for individual, group, workplace, and community interventions In addition to exercises and various reproducible log pages and worksheets, this book has eight sample reproducible questionnaires for evaluating the effectiveness of programs. This is an essential resource for health professionals who want to improve their effectiveness as they plan, develop, implement, and evaluate physical activity programs. Order Motivating People to Be Physically Active Today! Enhancing Recovery: Preventing Underperformance in Athletes Michael Kellmann, Editor Enhancing Recovery: Preventing Underperformance in Athletes is the first book to address the multifaceted aspects and significance of recovery in maintaining high-level athletic performance. The book combines a wealth of information from medicine, physiology, periodization training, and psychology as well as studies of people's motivation, health, and lifestyles to explore all aspects of underrecovery - not just in sports, but also in everyday life. The four-part text features theoretical models that draw distinct connections between overtraining and underrecovery, applied strategies for preventing underrecovery, case studies that provide practical examples and illustrate the importance of integrating recovery into daily training routines, and full descriptions of how underrecovery affects athletic performance as well as everyday work and overall health. The book is a critical resource for anyone researching or practicing in the exercise science field. Order Enhancing Recovery: Preventing Underperformance in Athletes Today! Exercise Psychology Janet Buckworth, Rod Dishman Awareness of the importance of exercise and physical activity to long-term health has never been greater. Despite this awareness, physical activity remains below recommended levels in developed countries around the world. Exercise Psychology provides an in-depth examination of the psychological antecedents and consequences of physical activity relationships, helping the reader to understand the mental health benefits of exercise as well as the thought processes behind the decision to exercise or not to exercise. The book is divided into three basic parts: introduction and basic concepts, exercise and mental health, psychology of physical activity behavior. Exercise Psychology fills the void left by sport psychology textbooks. It is the most up-to-date and complete textbook available on exercise psychology, and it is perfect for any sport and exercise psychology course. Order Exercise Psychology Today! Resistance to Exercise: A Social Analysis of Inactivity Mary McElroy Resistance to Exercise: A Social Analysis of Inactivity is an in-depth exploration of the social forces that perpetuate a sedentary lifestyle. Author Mary McElroy provides an insightful analysis of the social problems associated with physical inactivity and recommends solutions for re-engineering environmental and social institutions to increase physical activity. The book broadens and expands current notions about individual responsibility for lifestyle changes. This book will help health and fitness program administrators to better understand the social forces that influence people's resistance to participation in activity programs. In addition, it will motivate physical activity professionals to continue their promotion of physical activity as a major health benefit. Order Resistance to Exercise: A Social Analysis of Inactivity Today! Foundations of Exercise Psychology Bonnie Berger, David Pargman, Robert Weinberg Foundations of Exercise Psychology presents a summary of the information to date on the psychology of exercise and offers lucid suggestions for practice and future research. The contents of the book go well beyond past texts in the field and include some innovative and thought provoking chapters on little discussed topics in exercise psychology such as the meaning of exercise and the psychological and physical dangers when exercise goes awry. The range of populations examined includes women, children, dependent and habitual exercisers, and participants throughout the life span. Foundations of Exercise Psychology will help shape the direction of the field of exercise psychology for many years to come, and it will do much to encourage young professionals to enter the field and to pursue further study. The text spends considerable time exploring the relationship between exercise and personality, self-esteem, self-concept, mood alteration and motivation - concepts and features of being human that are all intimately related. Students moving toward the exercise professions will gain a solid background in key issues surrounding exercise and health and make great strides forward in becoming competent and compassionate practitioners. Order Foundations of Exercise Psychology Today! Directory of Graduate Programs in Applied Sport Psychology Michael L. Sachs, Shawn Gomer, and Kevin L. Burke (Editors) A guide to graduate schools that offer training in this specialized field. Order Directory of Graduate Programs in Applied Sport Psychology Today! Athlete's Guide to Career Planning Al Petitpas, Delight Champagne, Judy Chartrand, Steven Danish, and Shane Murphy The Athlete's Guide to Career Planning is a straight forward guide that shows how to develop a "game plan" for life. High school, college, and elite athletes will find helpful tips for balancing school, work, and the demands of sport participation. Coaches and counselors will find valuable career and life skills information to share with their athletes. The highly experienced authors, who have worked with thousands of athletes at all levels, provide specific tools to help readers make important transitions and life decisions during each stage in their athletic career. With 46 easy-to-use worksheets, readers will learn how to: identify physical and psychological transitions; establish and use support systems to guide them through transitions and plan for the future; relate scholastic and vocational choices to their personal identity; balance the demands of sport and academics; apply sport skills to career planning; identify and match their skills, interests, and values with career goals; and succeed at the job search process, including writing resumes and cover letters and preparing for interviews. The Athlete's Guide to Career Planning also features case studies of athletes that help readers understand important issues about athletic life and transitions. Order Athlete's Guide to Career Planning Today! Successful Coaching Rainer Martens This book is a comprehensive introduction to the art and science of coaching. Readers will find valuable information on developing a positive coaching philosophy, applying the principles of sport psychology and sport physiology to coaching, teaching sports skills properly, and using sports management skills effectively. Audio Edition also available Order Successful Coaching Today! Coaches Guide to Sport Psychology Rainer Martens Just as its title suggests, this book is a useful introductory text for all coaches who have an interest in sport psychology. An introduction on Psychological Perspectives serves to introduce coaches to the world of psychology. This section is then followed by sections on psychological skills for coaches and athletes as well. Order Coaches Guide to Sport Psychology Today! Psychology for Physical Educators Yves Vanden Auweele, Stuart Biddle Psychology for Physical Educators strikes a splendid balance among theory, research findings and action ideas. It's also a pleasure to read. The book includes relevant examples, frequent summaries, activity exercises and study questions. Key points are listed at the end of each chapter. And the text is amply illustrated with photos and cartoons to help make reading easy and enjoyable. Forty sport psychology and physical education experts from eleven countries present an overview of the current state of knowledge in the field of psychology as applied to physical education. In addition to the traditional focus on motor and physical development, the book addresses more recent curriculum goals of health and fitness and the development of positive self-perceptions and social skills. Order Psychology for Physical Educators Today! Winning the Mental Way: A Practical Guide to Team Building and Mental Training Karlene A. Sugarman Whether you are a recreational athlete, little league coach, high school player, professional coach or top executive, Winning the Mental Way provides the tools necessary to help you achieve peak performance on a more consistent basis. No matter what your endeavors are, the goal is the same - peak performance. This practical guide will help you first develop a sound working team; and second, give you the skills to keep your team on its road to success. Order Winning the Mental Way: A Practical Guide to Team Building and Mental Training Today! Exploring Sport and Exercise Psychology Judy L. Van Raalte and Britton W. Brewer (Editors) A guide to the therapeutic and professional specialization of sport psychology, both working with athletes and promoting exercise in the general population. The 37 contributors offer advice and experience in performance enhancement with imagery training and hypnosis, the clinical applications of exercise therapy for mental health, assessment strategies, the various techniques of working with youth and college students as well as professional athletes, and the professional issues involved in specialized education, certification, and establishment of a clinical practice. Order Exploring Sport and Exercise Psychology Today! Foundations of Sport & Exercise Psychology 3rd Edition Robert Weinberg and Daniel Gould In the newly revised and updated edition, students and professionals will find a comprehensive array of information that bridges the gap between research and practice and captures the excitement of the world of sport and exercise. The authors combine contemporary practical examples, case studies, and anecdotes to help readers better understand different theories, concepts, and research. In-depth questions at the end of each chapter guide readers from research to practice and enable readers to think critically. The following are new features of this third edition: Extensive material on motivation, social loafing, and group development Expanded coverage of leaders in sport, including information on expectations, values, beliefs, and behavioral guidelines for coaches Research on anxiety and team-energizing strategies Comprehensive data on hypnosis phases, techniques, and their effects Details on the use of imagery in sport An entire section on goal mapping Updated information on eating disorders in sport A comprehensive section on exercise addiction Material on sport aggression, moral development, cooperation, and gender differences in competition Order Foundations of Sport & Exercise Psychology Today! Sport Psychology Richard H. Cox This 4th edition text covers a variety of topics that will be of interest to educators and students of sport and exercise psychology. Excellent organization helps clarify the material for newcomers to the field. Order Sport Psychology Today! Sport Psychology: An Introduction Arnold Leunes and Jack R. Nation The second edition of this unique sports psychology text has been revised and expanded to cover even more topics, including steroid abuse in sport and fitness, women athletes as portrayed by the media, psychological testing, fitness, exercise adherence, homophobia in sports, and eating disorders among athletes. This objective and scientific text discusses the theory, research, and application of psychology as it relates to sport and fitness. In order to familiarize the reader with the more applied aspects of the field, other topics such as licensure, credentialing, and the image sport psychology has among athletes and coaches, are also included. Order Sport Psychology: An Introduction Today! Advances in Sport Psychology-2nd Edition Thelma Horn, Editor The second edition of the popular Advances in Sport Psychology provides the most comprehensive and up-to-date review of the major trends in sport psychology. The new edition emphasizes future research directions, giving readers, students, and researchers alike an early look at the questions to be tackled in coming years. The updated text reviews personality, motivation, anxiety and performance, and goal setting in sports. It is divided into four parts: "Introduction to Sport Psychology" provides a comprehensive overview of the field, including definitions, history, research paradigms, and research methodologies. "Individual Differences and Sport Behavior" examines the characteristics of individuals that affect their behavior in sport and physical activity contexts. "Socioenvironmental Issues, Sociocultural Issues, and Sport Behavior" discusses various factors in the social environment that impinge on participants' behaviors. "Psychological Skills, Intervention Techniques, and Sport Behavior" examines the research and theory behind selected intervention techniques that have been used to enhance athletic performance or modify participants' behavior. Returning and new readers will find the most significant current topics in sport psychology research compiled in one place, allowing them to see what the field has and has not accomplished. The new edition is a must-have reference for professionals in the field, and it makes an ideal text for graduate-level sport psychology courses. Order Advances in Sport Psychology - 2nd Edition Today! Telling Tales in Sport and Physical Activity: A Qualitative Journey Andrew Sparkes This is the first book to challenge and displace the tried-and-true and often atrociously dull writing styles employed by qualitative researchers of sport and physical activity. Using traditional and contemporary writing styles as examples, the author provides readers with innovative examples of how, when, and why to use new writing practices to make research more readable and understandable. The text features: artful illustrations of how writing styles ranging from confessional to fictional can persuade readers to more readily accept and believe what is written; a thorough discussion of the emergence of new forms of representation and the shifting landscape of qualitative research within the social sciences; a comprehensive evaluation of the methods that can be employed to judge and legitimize the different tales researchers are using to represent their work; an overview of what the future of sport and physical activity looks like if researchers make informed, principled, and strategic choices in their storytelling; and illustrations of how new approaches can be better and more beneficial in certain contexts and for certain purposes than the older, more traditional style of reporting qualitative research. Scholars in the field will be encouraged to experiment with how they represent their findings as part of an emerging research community that is spoken, written, performed, and experienced from many sites. Telling Tales in Sport and Physical Activity: A Qualitative Journey is an essential resource for social scientists performing qualitative research and a perfect supplemental text for graduate-level students who are beginning their research journey. Order Telling Tales in Sport and Physical Activity: A Qualitative Journey Today! Medical and Psychological Aspects of Sport and Exercise David L. Mostofsky, Leonard D. Zaichkowsky In Medical and Psychological Aspects of Sport and Exercise, Boston University professors David L. Mostofsky and Leonard D. Zaichkowsky have assembled the best theorists and clinicians in the field to explore various ways that sport and exercise have been recognized as valuable therapeutic elements in treatment and rehabilitative settings. Chronic disorders, in particular, have shown themselves responsive to well designed programs of sport and exercise; a development of critical concern to our increasing aging population. Medical and Psychological Aspects of Sport and Exercise draws attention to the clinically significant interactions between psychological and physiological systems, and the role of sport and exercise in dealing with cardiac, respiratory, and sundry nervous system, immune system, and endocrine disorders. The book responds to an urgent need expressed by many primary care physicians, health psychologists, sport psychologists, and other educators and clinicians in medicine and allied health specialties. This book is the first to address the multifacted, multidisciplinary issues from the fields of science, scholarship, and clinical practice and place them in a single volume with the participation of truly eminent authors in the respective areas. Order Medical and Psychological Aspects of Sport and Exercise Today! The Mental Athlete Kay Porter Improved mental ability means improved sports performance. Athletes who excel do so not just because of their physical abilities but because of their mental awareness, preparation, and skills as well. The Mental Athlete will help improve your overall performance by providing the tools, guidance, and practical insight you need to sharpen your mental skills. This conditioning manual for the mind will help you further enhance mental strengths and address weaknesses through effective self-assessments, increase confidence in personal abilities and avoid the fear of failure, heighten awareness of inner-thought processes and learn ways to improve them, and be free of inhibitions to initiate action and to respond intuitively and positively to challenges. No matter what sport you play and at what level you play, you will find this practical, reader-friendly book useful because it not only lets you know what you need to do to improve your mental abilities, but it also shows you how to improve them. It contains exercises, tests, and worksheets that help you move through the steps of mental achievement. Order The Mental Athlete Today! The Breakout Principle Herbert Benson & William Proctor In The Breakout Principle: How to Activate the Natural Trigger That Maximizes Creativity, Athletic Performance, Productivity and Personal Well-Being, the bestselling author of The Relaxation Response delivers the ultimate self-help principle -- simple instructions to activate a powerful biological trigger that converts conflict and confusion into clarity and extraordinary performance, a state athletes refer to as "the zone." Dr. Benson and coauthor William Proctor explain the cutting-edge science behind the phenomenon in accessible language, clearly describe the four distinct phases of the Breakout, and provide simple, step-by-step instructions on how to activate the Breakout "trigger." Compelling case histories and information on how to incorporate Breakouts into daily life are woven throughout the book. Order The Breakout Principle Today! In Pursuit of Excellence - 3rd Edition Terry Orlick In Pursuit of Excellence shows you how to develop the positive outlook that turns "ordinary" competitors into winners... on the playing field and off. You'll learn how to focus your commitment, overcome obstacles to excellence, and achieve greater personal and professional satisfaction. Author Terry Orlick, an internationally acclaimed sport psychologist, has helped hundreds of Olympic athletes maximize their performances and achieve their goals. In this third edition of In Pursuit of Excellence, Orlick presents his special insights and experiences to help you make the most of your potential. He also identifies the Seven Essential Elements of Human Excellence and provides a step-by-step plan for proceeding along your personal path to excellence. Whether you are an athlete, coach, or high achiever in another walk of life, In Pursuit of Excellence provides the expert advice and proven techniques to fulfill your aspirations. Order In Pursuit of Excellence - 3rd Edition Today! Embracing Your Potential Terry Orlick The drive to be #1 in a professional field or on a playing field is a powerful source of motivation for many people. Others place a higher priority on becoming a better person. Embracing Your Potential explains how to achieve excellence and balance in both the performance and personal domains of life. Author Terry Orlick labels these two domains as the "Gold" and "Green" zones. The Gold Zone includes the visible, tangible achievement markers, such as career advancement, win-loss records, and financial status. The Green Zone involves relationships and intellectual, spiritual, and cultural pursuits. Orlick argues that "going for the Gold" need not-and should not-require sacrificing the growth and development of the Green, and that the two zones can be nurtured simultaneously. Both inspirational and practical, Embracing Your Potential shares insights and quotes from elite athletes, performers, and people in highly demanding jobs. It also features 30 exercises that can help readers make meaningful, lasting changes to boost their performance and enrich their lives. Embracing Your Potential applies to people from all walks of life that want to excel and yet enjoy every day in the process. Order Embracing Your Potential Today! Mastering Your Inner Game David Kauss Even the most physically gifted athletes struggle in competition when they lose control over their thoughts and emotions. Mastering Your Inner Game arms you with the tools to understand, manage, and maximize your mental and emotional forces - factors that often determine whether you're an all-star and or an "also-ran." Author David Kauss looks at how athletic performance fits into your own life experience. His "total athlete" system takes into account your internal strengths and weaknesses instead of applying a predefined set of mental training exercises. Mastering Your Inner Game begins by presenting five vivid case studies that illustrate real challenges faced by real athletes. You'll experience the thoughts and emotions the competitors were dealing with as they worked to overcome their obstacles using Kauss' personalized mental training methods. Then you'll begin to understand how the method can work for you - whether it's breaking out of a slump, building confidence, or sharpening your focus. Kauss then leads you through the process of self-assessment. Self-guided exercises help you recognize the people and events in your life that have either contributed to your success or undermined your sport performance. Plus, you'll learn more about how your life has shaped your athletic identity through additional exercises that: reveal your motives for participating in sports expose your hidden fears tap into the power of your daydreams identify your personal core values Once you have pinpointed the underlying causes of your performance blocks, Kauss teaches you how to develop individualized mental training packages that will help you perform your best no matter how difficult the challenge. Only by analyzing and then rechanneling these forces in positive ways will you truly be able to reach your full potential. Order Mastering Your Inner Game Today! Body Mind Mastery Dan Millman Physically demanding sports such as tennis and basketball have a lot in common with skills such as playing the piano. In addition to physical training, mastering these activities requires developing mental and emotional talents as well. Drawing on his own experiences, Dan Millman, in this revised and updated edition of The Inner Athlete, offers a regimen to integrate physical training with psychological growth. He examines the motivations for athletic excellence and offers a transformative guide to success that is as applicable in everyday life as it is in sports. Order Body Mind Mastery Today! Sports Slump Busting: 10 Steps to Mental Toughness and Peak Performance Alan Goldberg Sports are full of ups and downs. But the best athletes and teams bounce back quickly after poor performances and avoid ruts. In Sports Slump Busting, Alan Goldberg presents the proven slump-busting model he's applied successfully in his work with hundreds of athletes, teams, and coaches across a wide variety of sports, ages and competition levels. The book is built around 10 steps to help athletes break the back of any slump and perform at a consistently high level. You'll discover how to take control of your mental approach to competition, set goals, boost self-confidence, become mentally tough, and block out future slumps. Each step includes real-life examples and self-evaluation exercises to apply in training or competition to ensure success. Sports Slump Busting helps athletes prevent and overcome mental blocks or negative thoughts that keep them from doing their best. Help your athletes perform at a higher level and stay slump-proof through every season. Order Sports Slump Busting Today! Sport Hypnosis Donald Liggett Harness the power of your own mind! Hypnosis is now a mainstream, modern training technique used by top professionals; it's not the submissive state that has been portrayed in movies and misunderstood by the public. First, Sport Hypnosis presents an overview of mental training and hypnosis. Next, the book provides specific information on how you can use hypnosis to enhance a variety of mental skills. These skills include relaxation, imagery, goal setting, concentration, easing pain, and increasing inner strength. Finally, because athletes rarely focus on one skill at a time, Sport Hypnosis describes in detail how coaches and athletes can apply and combine different hypnotic techniques. Five case studies explain how athletes improved several aspects of their performance through hypnosis. You'll read how hypnosis helped a soccer player eliminate a long-standing, debilitating hamstring pain and how a basketball player achieved a higher free-throw percentage. The author presents the hypnosis techniques that he has applied effectively with athletes in many different sports. You can adopt these techniques readily to your own training and competitions. If you're looking for a way to improve the mental side of your performance equation, Sport Hypnosis just may be the edge you need to become a champion. Order Sport Hypnosis Today! Competitive Fire Michael Clarkson Words have been used to describe it: intensity, burning desire, mental toughness, warrior attitude. "It" is the special inner drive that allows an athlete to thrive in competition. At times it manifests itself in anger, at other times as a great burst of energy or power, and sometimes even as an almost surreal experience commonly called "the zone." This highly readable and thought-provoking book examines this special inner drive and the great athletes who have harnessed, mastered, and unleashed it to maximize their potential. Competitive Fire not only uncovers the mental and emotional essence of sports champions, it also offers valuable insights for aspiring athletes who want to achieve that powerful, winning mindset. Clarkson asserts that there are two common psychological and emotional characteristics of world-class athletes: their need to defend their egos and their controlled anger. He documents many cases in which the channeling of "negative" emotions spurred athletes on to great performances in every arena of sports competition. He also presents several case studies featuring stars like Michael Jordan and Jack Nicklaus that serve to highlight and confirm key points. Order Competitive Fire Today! Flow In Sports Susan Jackson and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Some call it a natural "high." Others refer to it as being "in a zone." Whatever it's called, flow is an elusive and very sought-after psychological state that athletes, coaches, and sport psychologists have tried to understand, harness, and employ to their benefit since Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi first coined the term back in the early 1970s. Most of the book delves deeply into the key factors leading up to and accompanying the flow experience. The authors also recommend certain actions on the part of the athlete or coach to optimize the conditions in training and performance that allow flow to occur. The book is full of vivid examples, captivating quotes, and revealing research findings that enhance the authors' clear and insightful text. The sport setting is rife with opportunities to experience flow-be it in pick-up games or the Olympics. But until now, flow has been an infrequent, accidental, and even mysterious phenomenon to most athletes. With Flow in Sports, this optimal experience becomes both more familiar and more achievable. Get to know flow, and get into it. Find out what you've been missing. Order Flow In Sports Today! Smart Tennis John F. Murray and Rick Frey How to apply the elite psychological expertise used by the pros to improve your game no matter your age or level of skill. Brief Description: It's no secret that professional tennis players have come to rely on sports psychologists to improve their games, particularly in situations of high-stress, grand slam tournament pressure. But this book shows all the rest of us hackers -- men, women, kids, teens, elders, recreational and competitive alike -- the practical tips and latest scientific studies in the area of sports psychology as applied to playing your best possible game of tennis. Among the many topics included will be motivation, focus, goal setting, imagery training, "flow", stress control, confidence, performance enhancement and other skills; plus specific tennis issues like singles and doubles competitive pressure, positive versus negative instruction, self-talk and confronting fear, tennis injuries, quickness, anger, close calls, etc. "The game with yourself is often tougher than the battle against any opponent. Smart Tennis shows you how to win the inner match while having fun along the way." (Lindsay Davenport, World's #1 Player 1998, Wimbledon Champion, US Open Champion) Order Smart Tennis Today! Pressure Tennis Paul Wardlaw If you are looking for a training system that prepares tennis players for the pressures of competitive match play, look no further than Pressure Tennis. This instructional book shows you how to raise the level of intensity of your practices, increasing their effectiveness and mentally toughening up your players. Tennis coach Paul Wardlaw has created and refined his extraordinary training program through his 14 successful seasons at the college level. Through his system, you will learn how to design and implement effective practice sessions using pressure drills that simulate match-like conditions. Pressure Tennis will also demonstrate how you can help your players develop the following: high-percentage tactics, aggressive court position, varied & intelligent shot selection, and better court coverage and anticipation of the opponent's shot. Within the first week or two of use, the system improves concentration, motivation, confidence, and conditioning. More important, players develop a resilience to match-play pressure and welcome the challenge of even the toughest opponent. To help evaluate progress, Wardlaw has included a novel Performance Index that provides coaches with a more objective measure of each player's execution, effort, and ranking on the team. Whether you're a player or a coach, you'll want Pressure Tennis for the blueprint it provides for enhancing mental toughness. Order Pressure Tennis Today! Focused for Golf Wayne Glad and Chip Beck Playing good golf requires more than physical skills- it demands positive and strategic thinking. PGA golfer Chip Beck knows better than most the mental challenges of the game. As a former Ryder Cup player and one of the few players ever to shoot a 59 in a tour event (as he did in the 1991 Las Vegas Invitational) Beck has experienced what it's like to be completely in the groove and confident. On the flip-side, Beck also knows the psychological fallout of failing to make the cut several weeks in a row. In Focused for Golf, Beck teams with sport psychologist Wayne Glad to provide practical advice and mental training exercises proven to work for players on the PGA and Nike tours. Sprinkled throughout the book are Beck's and others' helpful insights and memorable experiences in dealing with the game's psychological ups and downs. Profiles of fellow pros Hale Irwin, Mike Reid, Mark Calcavecchia, Lee Janzen, Bill Glasson, Fred Funk, Ben Crenshaw, Bruce Lietzke, Kenny Perry, and others highlight just how much of golf is a head game. You'll learn how remarkably similar the pros' mental challenges are to your own, and how each one of them has used the Focused for Golf principles to overcome mentally challenging situations. Regardless of your handicap, Focused for Golf can help you remain confident, stay in control, thrive in competition, and keep your concentration on the course. How you think is often how you shoot. Play it smart-play better golf with the help of this comprehensive mental training manual. Order Focused for Golf Today! Training From the Neck Up: A Practical Guide to Sport Psychology for Riders April Clay This book assists horse riders of all disciplines with developing mental training skills to improve learning and performance. It is divided into two sections, the first offers instruction in basic psychological skills such as focus control, managing show ring jitters and visualization. The second section deals with special issues in training and competition. An essential and easy to read guide for mental training, complete with illustrations and a means to track your progress. Order Training From the Neck Up Today!