Confidence and Resilience · Dimension 8 of 20

Emotions

The ability to read, understand, use and manage feelings in ways that support composure, sound decisions and effective performance.

Emotional awarenessSelf-regulationComposurePerformance readiness

08of 20 dimensions

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Understanding emotions

Emotions influence the body, attention, decisions and behaviour.

Being able to read, understand, use and manage emotions is an important mental skill in sporting performance. Feelings can affect heart rate, muscle tension, attention, judgement and the way an athlete responds to other people and competitive events.

Effective performers do not try to eliminate emotion. They learn to recognise their responses and create an emotional state that suits the task. Before competing, this may mean increasing energy or settling nerves. During competition, it may mean recovering quickly from frustration, disappointment or excitement.

Athletes may use breathing, relaxation, redirection of attention, self-talk and imagery to regulate emotion. The aim is to develop personal strategies that can be applied reliably in different competitive situations.

Dimension video

Watch: Emotions in sport

Explore how athletes can recognise emotional responses and use practical strategies to stay composed and performance-ready.

Managing emotions in sport

Watch on YouTube ↗

Why it matters

Emotional regulation helps athletes respond rather than react.

Composure under pressure

Recognising rising anxiety, anger or excitement makes it easier to use a prepared strategy before emotion disrupts performance.

Attention and decisions

A workable emotional state supports clear thinking, appropriate risk-taking and attention to the cues that matter.

Relationships and recovery

Managing frustration constructively helps athletes communicate well, recover after setbacks and avoid passing tension to others.

How emotional skill may appear

Look for patterns, not labels.

When emotions are managed effectively

Recognises and names feelings before they become overwhelming
Understands how emotions affect the body and performance
Adjusts energy and arousal to suit the competitive task
Recovers constructively after mistakes and setbacks
Expresses frustration without damaging relationships

When it may need development

Notices feelings only after they have affected performance
Becomes distracted by anxiety, anger or disappointment
Bottles up concerns or expresses them impulsively
Has no reliable routine for changing emotional gears
Is strongly affected by the moods and reactions of others

Balance matters: strong emotion is not automatically harmful, and calmness is not always the ideal state. The goal is to recognise what the situation requires and regulate emotion without suppressing useful information or ignoring genuine concerns.

Developing emotional skill

Six practical ways to manage emotions more effectively.

Keep an emotion log

Note thoughts, feelings, body signals and actions during training and competition. Look for recurring triggers.

Read other people

Observe expressions and behaviour, and consider how your own words and actions affect coaches, teammates and family.

Notice emotional influence

Recognise when another person’s mood is influencing your own, then redirect attention to controllable performance cues.

Express concerns appropriately

Discuss frustration clearly instead of bottling it up or reacting impulsively. Appropriate humour can help ease tension.

Change emotional gears

Combine slow breathing, helpful self-talk, imagery and an attention cue to move toward the state the situation requires.

Prepare situation-specific plans

Decide in advance how you will respond to nerves, provocation, mistakes, delays and other predictable competitive challenges.

Create an emotional reset routine

Choose one recurring pressure situation. Identify your earliest body signal, name the emotion, take one controlled breath, use a short cue phrase and refocus on the next action. Rehearse the sequence in practice until it becomes familiar.

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Emotions in practice

Find the state that works for you.

There is no single ideal feeling for every athlete or every task. One performer may need to reduce excitement before a precision skill, while another may need to increase intensity before an explosive effort. Self-awareness helps identify the useful range.

The most useful strategies are personal, specific and practised. Athletes should know what to do when emotion rises, test their routines in training and refine them from experience.

“A ballplayer who loses his head and can’t keep his cool is worse than no player at all.”

Lou Gehrig · Baseball player

“Staying calm is the key point. You feel a little anxious, a little nervous, a little unsettled. That’s when you’ve got to trust your feelings, trust your abilities.”

Elvis Stojko · Figure skater

Discover your profile

Find out how effectively you manage Emotions.

The SPQ20 measures Emotions alongside 19 other personality and mental-skill dimensions to provide a connected picture of your mental game.

Assess my mental game ↗Learn about the SPQ20