team sports

Being mentally prepared can go a long way when it comes to your youth athlete’s development and overall performance in competition. It is something that they can use both on and off the game.

This is part 1 of our series of interviews with Jen Croneberger, softball and mental game coach, CEO/Founder of Excellence Training Camps, Inc., and a 2-time Centennial Conference Coach of the Year nominee.

Doubt is a real issue for athletes. The thoughts that are going through their minds can easily take away or distract from their confidence.

Building confidence comes from two different places – evaluating past performances and mental preparation!

Discover how you can help your youth athletes boost their confidence by leading them through techniques to work through doubt and worry.

In the video below Coach Jen Croneberger, a softball and mental game coach to youth and professional players, shows you how Mental Preparation In Sports Leads To Confidence.

Read on and find out how your child can use mental preparation before a game. We’d love to know what you think, please do leave a comment below.

Confidence comes from two different places — past performance and preparation. We have discovered after doing research that the most effective thing you can do to help set a player up for success is to teach them to draw confidence from those two places.

One of the reasons is that they are in control of developing their confidence.

They are in control of their preparation. They are in control of visualizing past performance; when they played well and what it felt like. Every player is different, so they might visualize literally from a visual standpoint.

They might be able to see what it looked like.
Some might feel what it felt like. Some might even hear what it sounds like when they get a good hit.

We take players through the ability to focus on past performance. To focus on their preparation; understanding that they have done this a thousand times and they can do it now.

We walk through ways to curb doubt. Doubt is a real issue for players as they walk up to the plate.

The thoughts that are going through the mind at that point can easily take or distract from their confidence building.

We guide athletes in working through that doubt very quickly; for them to recognize it and be aware of it. That is the first step. Obviously, they can’t change anything they are not aware of. They recognize it then a quick way to take a deep breath and regroup once they have recognized it.

We tell them not to beat themselves up because of doubt; because they are expected to. They are human. We enable athletes to regroup and refocus by giving themselves a word or a phrase or something they can say to themselves — a mantra so to speak — that they can repeat over and over in that moment.

The mind can’t do two things at once — right? So we can’t be focused on negative self-talk if we’re telling ourselves something positive.

To go to the next part of this series, click here!

Jen Croneberger has been involved in sports since a very young age. She was the CEO/Founder of Excellence Training Camps, Inc. and is president of JLynne Consulting. She has held numerous coaching positions and was the Mental Game Coach for the (NPF) Women’s Professional Softball Team, a well as other the top travel softball teams in the eastern US.

She also works with many community groups helping girls with leadership and confidence. Jen was a professor at Ursinus College, and was nominated for the Centennial Conference Coach of the Year award in 2011 and 2012.

Most of her last 10 years have been spent working with athletes, instilling confidence and building strength, both mentally and physically. To know more about Jen you can visit her website by clicking here.