Confidence is a feeling of assurance especially of self-assurance.
The Top Times meet will be this weekend at the Shirk Center on the Illinois Wesleyan University campus. It will mark the end of the indoor season and will begin the excitement of the upcoming outdoor season. I have been to several meets this indoor season and the one thing I've noticed from a lot of athletes is a lack of confidence. I haven't just sat in the stands and observed from a distance. I have actually gone on the infield and looked in their faces prior to and during competition.
Personally, as an athlete I have never lacked confidence. I can recall on meet day in high school my classmates asking me at lunch time what I thought my time would be in the 100m that day. I'd take a bite out of my sandwich as they awaited an answer and with a straight face say "10.40." A few hours later, I'd run 10.40. In college I can remember the Kansas Relays where I had a strained hamstring. My coach told me he was going to put the alternate in the final. I couldn't walk or get out of bed. I told my coach I'd be fine and that me being injured and at 75% is better than the alternate at 100%. I honestly believed that. I got the baton 8-10m behind and snatched the Arkansas anchor leg for the win. So even with injuries, my confidence remained high. As a coach of the 4x1 state champs back in '92, I told the official at the check-in tent as I dropped off my squad, "The next time I see you, We Will Be State Champs!" I came back after the race, tapped him on the shoulder and said, "I told you!" In fact, I guaranteed we'd win the state title and screamed it out loud after my high school lost a regional title in basketball (that's when there were two E. St. Louis high schools and only two classes).
Confidence in track and field is crucial. It can be the difference between a win and a loss. There is simply no one to blame like there is in so-called team sports. You either get the job done or you didn't. Confidence can push an athlete to a personal record, school, city or state record. An athlete's own self-confidence can intimidate an opponent or uplift a whole team. A team may simply feed off their top athlete's confidence.
There are some coaches in our state who exude a confident side. Angelo Brown of Lincoln-Way East reminds me of myself as a coach- that everything is under control, and no matter what the situation is they will prevail. Last Saturday at the Gene Armer Invitational, I watched him stand at the end of the track with his arms behind his back looking straight ahead. He stood as a field general unmoved by any previous heat performances. In fact, last year with confidence, he stated that Lincoln-Way East would break the all-time state girls 4x100 relay record. They did!
There are times that a confident athlete or coach will receive unwarranted hate from other athletes, coaches, teams and even fans. Athletes such as Muhammed Ali, Floyd Mayweather Jr. and even Usain Bolt are and were hated because of their confidence. People can't wait to see them lose. The funny thing is it rarely if at all happens. Why? It is because confidence can increase on the amount of work that was put in prior to an event. An athlete knows that they have put the work in and trusts that the workouts they've done are better than their opponents; their coach preps them as far as film work. All of this brings confidence to the starting line, runway or ring.
The lack of confidence can be a reverse effect on everything I've written thus far. In fact, there will be plenty of athletes who actually qualified for the Top Times and are top athletes within the state who will not attend due to a lack of confidence. They may not want to take a chance on getting beat or losing a reputation as a winner all indoor season.
There will be athletes who haven't lost all season come into the meet and close the deal because of their confidence. While others with perhaps the same indoor season will lose, because all of a sudden they're behind for the first time and with that came a lack of confidence. And don't be surprised at knowing some of the top athletes you have watched all season aren't very confident. They win all the time, but when you talk to them they're just as worried, nervous and scared as everybody else in the race. Once again at the Gene Armer meet I encouraged one our state's top athletes to be more confident in her abilities. A couple of days later I was repeating the same speech to several up and coming athletes on my brother's club team in Kentucky. The two girls are at two different points and yet saying the same things.
I have an athlete on my club team who came to me with very little confidence on or off the track. She was even afraid to do certain jumping drills like jumping over a cardboard box for height into the pit. A year later she qualified for nationals in the long jump. The year after that as her confidence grew she qualified in the long and triple jump as well as the 400m as she won the long and triple jump. She finished the season as one of the top triple jumpers in the U.S. All of this was accomplished because of one word, CONFIDENCE!
So as you pack your spikes and uniforms for not only the Top Times meet this weekend, but for the rest of the season make sure you pack your confidence. It's crucial to your success.