-Lance Armstrong

Lance Armstrong (American road racing cyclist)*

*Winner of the Tour De France for seven consecutive years breaking the records of the previous five wins. Also a Cancer patient

Life is small and dreams big. Many a times the external or internal factors confront people from living in peace and harmony. With the ever increasing cut core competition, devastating changing life style and most important the changing value systems of people, stress’ have become an inevitable part of our lives. Also, the level of stress has increased manifold in comparison to the last decades. In 1870, Ralph Waldo Emerson said “We boil at different degree” making a remarkable assessment of humans much before the twentieth century– naming it as age of Anxiety. Probably the 21^st century will be christened as the “era of stress” unless strategies are evolved to successfully cope up with it. Stress has become an inevitable companion of man in all walks of life weather it is a soldier standing guard on snow clad mountains or an overworked house wife or a player in competition.

But is STRESS that tough to handle??

If you say ‘Yes’…… there’s something you need to know…

Lance Armstrong, an American professional road racing cyclist ; on October 2, 1996, was diagnosed with nonseminomatous testicular cancer. Despite being diagnosed with such a severe cancer Lance won the “Tour De France” with a record-breaking seven consecutive years performance, from 1999  to 2005. He is the only individual to win seven times, having broken the previous record of five wins. Also, you’ll be surprised to know that when he was on a career high the cancer had already spread to his lungs, abdomen and brain.

On being asked on what message he’d like to convey to people suffering from TCRC? He said “one should come out and do the ride! Things are fragile and we only have so many opportunities to do good things. It’s important to be physically fit. I just tried to stay so positive, though  there were days, there were moments when I thought, this may not work out and I’m gonna die!”, but I tried to get rid of those thoughts just as fast as I could and just start thinking about winning, thinking about getting rid of cancer. Everything I did, I tried to play games with the cancer…mentally tried to get rid of everything–just stay strong.”I’m sure after reading about Lance you’ll have a different perspective about stress ….

At work or in life, everyone experiences stress. And that goes double for athlete. Not only player has to worry about lifestyle and emotional stress, they also have to worry about training and competition stress. But the question that arises is how do players know it they are under stress? Quite simple, a player with a manageable training schedule and stress load is full of energy and performs well. An athlete, who is stressed, on the other hand seems listless and without a competitive edge, may have trouble in sleeping and eating and more prone to injuries and illness. Chronic worry, inability to relax, excessive use of alcohol or smoking, sleeplessness, uncooperative attitude, lack of adjustability, emotional instability, digestive problems, high blood pressure, nervousness, tension, nail biting, headache and nauseas, lack of concentration and excessive fatigue are symptoms of stress seen in athletes. The sports psychologists use a Varity of tests to measure stress among sports persons, which  includes measuring the athletes Behavioral(Sleep difficulties, appetite loss, nervousness) Physiological (increase in heart rate, respiration) & Psychological (stress assessed through various paper-pencil measures or state anxiety inventory for children, competitive state anxiety inventory, and sports competition anxiety test) aspects. Also various techniques such as teaching the athlete how to cope with pressure, reinforcing practice, biofeedback & dealing with fear of success are exercised to maintain the performance of the athlete.

While a player can handle stress better than a non athlete as he is trained to handle pressure but over-training or too much competing can ruin his years of hard work. It is very important for players to carefully achieve a good balance, by maintaining a high level of fitness without going over there physical and mental limits. Since the body perceive all stress as the same, it is important for players to make sure that their lives outside of sports are stress free and manageable as well. The truth is that stress is impossible to avoid. Every athlete during competion and other wise experience stress. But stress can be managed. The second question that arises is how can a sports person manage stress? Many sports psychologist’s have reported that a big mistake that a player make’s is, training himself too hard or too fast. Instead, training should be gradually progressive. It should be made sure that the body can handle its current load before increasing the load and the body should be given adequate rest between sessions. Also sports psychologists have laid a lot of emphases on managing competition stress. If the player finds competition stressful he should not avoid it, rather the selection of competitions should be made carefully. The player will have more success if he plans his competitions so that the challenge increases each time out. The player’s confidence and self esteem grows every time he is successful. But there are times when the player is unsuccessful these experiences should be recognized as great learning experiences. It is equally very important for players to manage there everyday stress. Any player who is moving, breaking up with a partner, or going through other life-changing events will experience stress which will have an effect on performance. Since there is no way to really get rid of the stress, the best way to combat it with is to cut down on stress in other areas. If lifestyle stress is high, cut down on competition, and see training as therapy. A player should do only that much which makes him feels good. It is very important for an athlete to never completely avoid physical exercise when he is under extreme stress, he must exercise as long as there is no over training as this helps in reducing overall stress. Especially during tough time, player should exercise at least 30 minutes a day, five day a week. Also it is very important to monitor one’s eating and sleeping patterns, as they have a direct impact on stress. Regular patterns of healthy eating and correct amount of sleep is important as it helps in keeping the stress level in check.

Sports psychologists use a lot of intervening packages to help athletes deal with stress, this includes stress inoculation training. This inoculation training program uses a four phase approach which includes self-talk and relaxation to cope with imagined stress. This is followed by stress management training which includes a five phase approach including self-awareness and relaxation to cope with imposed stress. Then comes the anxiety management training session where in the athlete is taught to relax under conditions of arousal. Visual motor behavior rehearsals are conducted with athletes which is a combination of relation and mental imagery techniques to desensitize athletes to stress. Psychologists also use a seven step peak performance approach including relaxation training, stress management, positive thought control, self regulation, mental rehearsal, and concentration and energy control. A four phase psychological skills education program is conducted for improving athletes closed skills involving self awareness, motivation, and various interventions. As such there is no universal solution to cope with stress as effective coping depends on the nature of the stressor and the degree to which control is possible but it is very much possible to change a threat into challenge. It is very important for an athlete to have an ability to change his existing goal to more realistic ones; to be able to change his physiological reactions under stress and most important to be prepared for stress even before it is encountered.

Therefore it is very important to understand that stress is not that bad rather it helps an individual to focus better and maintain a high peaked performance. What is required for athletes is to learn effective ways to deal with stress. As is said by Hans Seley “I cannot and should not be cured of my stress, but merely taught to enjoy it”.

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