Mental Focus at Meets

There are a lot of reasons why swimmers regularly freeze up at meets. Probably the main reason for swimming slow under pressure is having the wrong focus of concentration both before and during your races. If you go into your meets and races with an “outcome focus,” that is, you’re worried about breaking a certain time or beating a particular opponent, then chances are very good that you’ll freeze up and swim way below your potential.

– Dr. Alan Goldberg

This quote comes from a very short article on USA Swimming. Here’s the full article.