And here is the secret to improving it:
“The most important athletic quality isn’t skill, speed, or strength.
It’s confidence.
To access one’s true athletic potential, they need the confidence to repeatedly display it.
Best way to improve confidence?
Find them a mentor who truly loves & believes in them.
Watch.”
-Ray Zingler on X
When we think of athletic performance, we love to talk about physical attributes.
Blazing speed, bone crushing strength, lightning quick reaction times, & crazy skill.
As a performance coach whose literal job it is to enhance these abilities, I most certainly know how to do it at a high level.
But I will tell you, as a physical performance connoisseur, obsessed with athletic performance, with going on 2 decades of experience training athletes from nearly every sport you can think of, at every level, I can tell you with complete confidence (you’ll see why this is ironic in a moment) that neither strength, speed, power, or sport skill are the most important athletic qualities.
That crown goes to confidence.
An athlete can have all the skill in the world.
They can run a 4.2, 40.
They can have a 40” vertical.
An 11’ broad jump.
They can squat 600 pounds.
I’ve seen all of the above happen in-person more times than you’d think.
But none of the above has contributed to athletic performance like confidence has.
It is for this reason, as a performance coach, I place a MASSIVE premium on love and mentorship.
“Huh, I thought you coached squats, bro?”
Obviously, there is a physical element to the training, but for most athletes, the training isn’t the end goal.
It’s a means to an end.
This is important to note because it really doesn’t matter what you do and long as you can confirm it works and you perform whatever it is you’re doing consistently and at a high level.
And while performance coaching bros on twitter argue over ideology superiority to impress other people in the industry who don’t care, I am vehemently focused on our kids and building their confidence.
Because here’s the deal:
Once you tie the mental to the physical and you have a kid with improved physical outputs and the confidence in him or herself to consistently display it…
You have a real monster on your hands.
1000 times I’ve watched the “less skilled” but more confident player outdo the skilled player with shoddy confidence.
Many in the performance training realm are playing checkers.
But I can promise you, the Pro’s know the game with athletes is chess.
