Delving inside the minds of some of sport’s big hitters

WHETHER YOUR golfing dalliances take you all the way around Wexford Golf Club, or a more laid-back amble through the trees of Rathaspeck Manor, you would have come across that nerve-jangling, perspiration-forming, six to eight footer for par.

Things have been going well, you’ve hit nobody - today anyway - and have lost just the one sleeve of Titleist Pro V1s, but this is that tricky length putt; a miss can bore deep into your psyche, and ruin the good, solid round you have going.

You look at it from all angles. Look at your putter, your mind is saying ‘just make a smooth stroke, back and through, like a pendulum’. You shove it out to the right and, what’s worse, it’s run three foot by.

Well, Dr. Bob Rotella would say you’ve allowed your conscious mind to get in the way of something your subconscious mind should control. He says as much in his latest publication, ‘How Champions Think’.

The offering was ghost written by journalist Bob Cullen (who is, interestingly, from Chevy Chase, Maryland - not named after the actor of the same name, disappointingly). It does what the name suggests, attempts to display the inner workings of the ‘champion’.

It’s hard to define a ‘champion’, a vague enough term. As the book progresses, Rotella settles for the term ‘exceptional’ to describe such - constantly referring to ‘the exceptional person’, whether they operate in sport, medicine, business, or whatever.

This is certainly an interesting read. A lot of what Rotella says might seem like common sense, but if it was that easy hundreds of sports psychologists wouldn’t be making the tidy living that they do, and sports teams and franchises wouldn’t be employing them in droves.

One thing to note; the book is written in ‘American English’, so if that’s a pet peeve then you should stay clear. However it is, like the vast majority of mainstream American sports work, in book and journalistic form, extremely well written and uncomplicated, quite the feat considering the topic.

For the Irish there’s a bit of interest here. Rotella talks several times in glowing terms about Pádraig Harrington, particularly in regard to his mental approach to the game and his relaxed attitude in pressure situations. The author also has strong views on why Tiger Woods has gone off the boil.

There’s an interesting story about Paul Runyan to keep an eye out for. Rotella summons his inner ‘Chubbs’ from Happy Gilmore with trips to a ‘Happy Place’ and talks about how it can calm a sportsperson, particularly a golfer, during downtime in competition.

He also has some controversial views on burn-out, believing it more the result of a negative attitude and loss of passion than anything physically amiss.

Everyone will find some segments of the book they can relate to, regardless of the perceived ‘success’ of their life and work. There are elements of what Rotella teaches that can resonate with all readers.

For the golfer familiar with the good doctor’s work, this is an easy read that has plenty of focus on the sport but realistically, if you want to improve the mental side of your golf game, then one of his previous eight titles solely dedicated to the sport would be a better fit.

Maybe the lad or lass that’s an aspiring ‘exceptional’ talent could really pluck something out of this book. For the person that sees game after game going past them like a whirlwind, maybe there’s something in Rotella’s words that might make your journey clearer. DEAN GOODISON Visit The Book Centre on Wexford’s Main Street for the very best selection of sports books.