This post is based on an interesting article and the comments it attracted in International Journal of Sports Science and Coaching published 2009*.

Basically, a couple of investigators from Finland (Yuri Hanin and Muza Hanina) wrote an article called Optimization of Performance in Top-Level Athletes: An Action-Focused Coping Approach. Then, a number of other University-types from around the world each wrote short articles commenting on and critiquing the authors’ ideas (in fact, they mostly criticized it).

The Finish guys proposed that it’s best for elite athletes to learn the intricacies of performing the skills of their sport. That is, to increase their self-awareness of how each part of their body moves when they play their sport. Such knowledge could be gained from, for example, in depth video analysis.

On the surface, this sounds reasonable.

However, the other guys disagreed for a couple of reasons. Mainly, because athletes can know too much about their movements.

It is important that coaches are mindful that increasing an athlete’s awareness in practice and in competition is a double-edged sword; the athlete who becomes more inclined under pressure to intervene with conscious control becomes more likely to suffer from deautomatized movements. That is, they try to control every little action.

Top-level athletes ordinarily perform with very little awareness of their movements, but can become increasingly aware of their movements when anxious to perform well.

The most effective approach may therefore be to discourage or limit the build up of movement knowledge during practice so that athletes are less able to consciously control every little movement.

This will help to prevent the breakdown of skill under pressure (ie, ‘choking’) due to self-focused attention.

Athletes should direct attention to the movement outcome rather than internal movement components, allowing the body to more naturally self-organize, and place fewer demands on attention, which leaves the athlete free to attend to important task-relevant information.

In short, fine tuning a movement pattern to address a mismatch between what feels right and what is right is a common challenge for elite athletes and their coaches. However, it makes little sense for athletes to consciously control the exact position of each body segment during practice. Instead, focus on the goal of the movement.

Every sport, skill and athlete are different - so what do you think? Does the above apply to you?

For more on Skill Acquisition, see posts under Sports Psychology

*International Journal of Sports Science and Coaching (Vol. 4, No.1, 2009)

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