In 1993, running coach Joe Vigil set off on a quest. Vigil had been the track coach at Adams State University from 1965-1993, where he won 19 national championships in track and field, and cross-country. But American long-distance runners were in the midst of a long...
Articles
Creating a Senior Night to Remember
21-5. That is Anson Dorrance’s record in the NCAA Division 1 Women’s National Championship Soccer Game. An incredible record to post in the biggest soccer game of the year. How did he do it? According to Dorrance, it had very little to do with tactics. While most...
How Mistakes Really Hurt Your Team: 3 Factors that Most Coaches Ignore
“The team that makes the most mistakes usually wins because doers make mistakes.” —Coach John Wooden (10-time National Championship Basketball Coach) Coaches in every sport are usually trying to decrease (not increase) the number of mistakes that their team makes....
Why “Buy-In” Isn’t Always a Good Thing
The Fallacy of Buy-In Back in the 1960s, a researcher named Charles Hofling conducted an obedience study with a group of 22 nurses. A mystery doctor phoned in and asked them to see if they had the drug Astroten. When each nurse confirmed they had the drug, she could...
Why You Are Failing to Motivate Your Players
“Motivation is overvalued. Environment often matters more.” - James Clear Why We Fail to Motivate I just had a well known college coach ask me to come in and give a motivational pep talk to his team. I declined. Not because I was too busy. Not because I was unwilling...
Why You Shouldn’t Use Conditioning as a Consequence
The Problem with Extrinsically Motivated Competition Put me on a line and tell me to run 100 yards as fast as I can. I’ll run hard. Put me on a line next to another man, similar in age and athleticism, and then tell me to run 100 yards. I’ll run harder, and you won’t...
How One Coach Built the Most Competitive College Program Ever
It’s Not a Championship; It’s an Anniversary Anson Dorrance’s North Carolina Women’s Soccer Team had just won seven championships in a row and would go on to win 2 more, when a full page ad of the team was published hoisting the trophy would feature the caption, “It’s...
How Coaches Kill Player Motivation
Fighting Fire with Fire 4 Minute Read or Listen on iTunes “How do I motivate people to learn? To work? To do their chores? Or to take their medicine?—are the wrong questions. They are wrong because they imply that motivation is something that gets done to people...
How to Develop a True Competitive Spirit in Athletes
You probably have had the realization that you want to win more than your players do; most young people today seem to lack the competitive fire that makes for a special athlete. And in the cases when they do have a strong competitive fire, it seems to burn out of...
The Most Motivational Half-Time Speech You Can Give
And You Will Never See it in a Sports Film It’s halftime! But my team is losing. Maybe it’s because we didn’t execute the game plan properly. Maybe we lacked the hustle and effort. Or maybe the players didn’t believe they were good enough to win this game. Either way,...
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