Lifestyle Management

Goal Setting

Goal Setting is the key to Lifestyle Management. High performing athletes will set goals for each session that they do, without realising that they have even done so.  Goals are not so easy to set in an unfamiliar environment, like when we are injured, or when we're planning for life after sport.  

Coping with Injury

Setting goals can be a great way to overcome injury.  You don't have to think about what you want to achieve after the injury - this often results in over-compliance to rehab programmes, and rushing back to training before you're ready - but think about the process goals that will help you get the most out of your time off.  

Not all goals need to be performance goals, and outcome and process goals are especially important during times of injury, illness, transition, or poor form.

Managing your time

Over the years of working with high performance athletes, we have noticed that those who manage to fit the most into their lives, are the ones who know what they want to achieve in both sport and outside of sport.  We’ve come across medical students who have managed to compete at an international level, and triathletes who can fit training for three sports around being a full-time student.  There are enough hours in the week - we just need to be motivated enough to use them wisely.

Making decisions

Knowing what are goals are can greatly help when making decisions.  If your sport is the most important thing in your world, then make sure that you choose a university where you have the facilities, coaching and environment to maintain your training.  If your goals can't be achieved by the decisions that you have made, you are unlikely to lead an unsatisfied life.   Making decisions based on your goals also prevents you making them for the wrong reasons, or making them to keep others happy.

Goals don't just help us to preform better - they help us decide what is important to us, to decide what we want to achieve in life, how to transition from one phase of life to the next, to deal with injury, to manage our time, and to make decisions.

Process Goals

Process goals are all about the things over which we have complete control.  They deal with the technique or strategy which is necessary to perform well.  They are usually used to establish that route to achieving outcome goals.  They help to focus attention, and because they have nothing to do with uncontrollable factors, they can help to control anxiety.  

Managing Career and Sporting Transitions

Irrespective of what our career is, what sport we do, or what our personal life looks like, we all go through a number of points in our lives where major changes occur.  Our ability to prepare for and deal with these times of change - or transitions can be a major determinant of success both on and off the field. Dealing with small transitions successful can help us manage bigger, more significant transitions later in life.

Some of the major transitions that an athlete faces include:

• The transition from junior to senior competition
• The transition from school to university
• The transition from university to the world of work or full-time sport
• Retirement from sport

There may be a number of other significant transitions which have the potential to impact on your sport. These may include becoming a parent, changing coach, changing event, becoming an Olympian, or becoming famous.

Managing Multiple Transitions

At many points during an athlete’s career, they will come across various transitions, education, performance and lifestyle. Identifying when these are likely to happen early makes the transitions to manage. One at a time can be easy to recognise, but the problems occur when the transitions overlap.

All this can both be physically and mentally draining for the athlete and may cause higher stress levels and therefore the athlete can become prone to illness and fatigue and maybe a slump in performance which can be frustrating and again cause stress levels to rise.

Immunity and the Athlete

An immune system which operates within homeostatic limits protects against common illnesses that can impair an athlete’s ability to train and perform.  Ensuring adequate carbohydrate and protein intake, a well as adequate intake of a wide range of micro-nutrients will help maximise the immune system's ability to protect against illness.  Improving immune health should be based on the following:

• Training - Load and Recovery
• Environment
• Psychology
• Lifestyle (Sleep, Diet, stress)
• Clinical conditions

Supplements

Athletes can be quite quick to turn to vitamin and mineral supplements to prevent illnesses and time out of training. However. these should not be the first thing that the athlete looks to, and careful thought should be taken before this step is taken.

• What is the likely benefit of the supplement, or the likely harm?
• Are there any interactions between the nutrients, supplements and medications?
• What is the evidence supporting these supplements?
• What is the cost, availability, and risk of contamination for the both the sport and the individual?

Our Roles in Lifestyle Management

We help the athlets in:

• Goal Setting
• Processing the Goals
• Adapting proper Trainings
• Managing Multiple Transitions
• Immunity
• Supplements

Choose Dobson Sports – Make your life easy.