What psychological interventions could be used on a cross country runner who has just competed in her first race back after a stress fracture of her foot, and is disappointed with the result?

-- chris holman (caholman@hotmail.com), June 01, 2000

Answers

Chris,

I think probably a combination of goal setting and a bit of expectation management. You need to find out if her expectations of performance are realistic given the recent injury, and then work on setting some realistic goals to work towards.

Athletes often have a lot of concerns about returning to competition after injury. Stress fractures in particular are a problem because there is always a degree of uncertainty about whether they have healed.

If disappointment is realistic, ie performance was poor even given it's the first race back, then goal setting should also help get the athlete "up" and task focused. Positive self talk probably would also be helpful. One bad performance does not mean the athletic career is over, only that there is work that needs to be done.

Hope this gives you some ideas. contact me by email if you want more info.

cheers adam

-- Adam Hall (a.hall2@pgrad.unimelb.edu.au), June 21, 2000.