The Sport Psychology Of Momentum
Momentum is a highly sought after, poorly understood state that athletes, both individually and collectively with their team, experience when feeling a peak in confidence.
It’s often generated as a result of strong play. Sometimes, it’s from direct results, like scoring a goal. Other times, succeeding in pieces of the process that lead to results, like scoring chances also facilitate momentum.
Listen to the (more expanded) podcast version of this article:
https://open.spotify.com/episode/1IqQ6YeB3Hh778pNgHFrAo?si=4023054b8fe94909
Many athletes have difficulty accessing this state of mind without seeing confidence boosting results beforehand. This article will help you play like you have momentum on your side despite lacking the precursor so many athletes need.
First, what does it look like in athletes and teams when they experience positive momentum?
Although personality and type of sport plays a role, there are some common characteristics:
Attention is anchored to the present moment. Athletes are efficiently processing and reacting to relevant information in the moment. They aren’t playing with extra mental weight from the past, nor are they anticipating in a way that will hurt their performance by thinking in the future.
More confidence, less self-doubt. With this confidence, athletes aren’t experiencing self-talk that resembles self-doubt which slows decision making and keeps players from taking necessary risks that lead to successful outcomes.
Emotional control. It’s important for athletes to stay level-headed - not getting too high or too low because negative outcomes can result from either state.
With these characteristics in mind, it will be easier to access this state from any moment, not just after you make a great play. Let’s discuss two concepts at the core of the sport psychology of momentum.
Positive Inhibition - The Enemy of Momentum
Positive inhibition is the phenomenon of athletes and teams “letting their foot off the gas pedal” after positive results. It’s the odd, but common, sight of seeing athletes and teams gain a lead, only to stop playing the way they did to obtain the lead. Unconsciously, these athletes feel a bit safer with a lead and less of an urge maintain the optimal focus and effort they put in to get there. It’s important to recognize this state of mine as it unfolds, then constantly bring yourself back to a mindset where you’re still tied or even behind in score. It’s one thing to understand this, but it’s much more effective when you have concrete cues to anchor your focus to that helps you land in the right mindset - we’ll discuss them soon.
Negative Facilitation - Accessing Positive Momentum
Negative facilitation is the phenomenon of athletes and teams “stepping on the gas pedal” in the face of negative results. It’s called negative facilitation because the negative results (losing) facilitates positive performance. Essentially, these athletes think something along the lines of “we need to bring our best now, otherwise we’re finished.” Assuming the athletes are not overwhelmed by this threat of losing, they exhibit optimal focus and effort.
In hockey, for example, many people consider a 2 goal lead as the worst lead possible - enough to feel a sense of security that lulls the winning team into positive inhibition. Conversely, the losing team understands the chance to win might slip away soon, so they’re pushed to give it their all and go for it.
What ends up happening? The team losing gains positive momentum because of the negative facilitation state of mind combined with the opponent’s dip in performance from positive inhibition.
This is just an example from hockey - you can see similar events unfold in all sports.
The state you want to access as much as possible is negative facilitation. But, you don’t want to wait until your back is against the wall to be playing your best. You can get there when the game begins, and maintain it despite gaining a lead.
How to access the positive benefits of momentum
Everyone is different - you want to understand yourself as an athlete, specifically, in what ways do you show up when you’re at your best? Here are some common ones to jog your memory:
Feeling loose but strong
Quick decision-making, little self-doubt
Optimal focus - on mechanics, strategy, and elements of the process under your direct control
The trick to accessing the positive benefits of momentum is to anchor your mental game to those characteristics that consistently show up in your A-game. Relaxing your muscles, repeating a mantra to optimize focus, and reminding yourself to trust your instincts is not a strategy to save for the time in your game when your back is against the wall. This can be done at any point.
In order to replicate that state more effectively, you can also visualize and experience the feeling of being down, where you need to have the best performance of the game in your next opportunity. What emotions are associated with it? Fire up your bodily systems if it won’t overwhelm you.
It’s important to cultivate a strong sense of self-awareness in two ways
What is a pattern you can notice in your game when you play your best? How can you focus on this proactively in the future?
Quickly catch your mind thinking ineffectively when it goes off the rails. As a result, you’ll be quicker to access a more effective state of mind that will lead to the results you want to see.
As a reminder, you can listen to the full discussion on this topic from my podcast, The Sport Psychology Of, with Mike Howard through this link: https://open.spotify.com/episode/1IqQ6YeB3Hh778pNgHFrAo?si=4023054b8fe94909
