Sports coaching: what is it and what are its benefits?

This resource provides the physical and psychological resources needed to reach goals.

Coaching is a discipline that has become very fashionable in recent years. And although it receives some criticism, if the professional who applies it is well trained, it can bring excellent results for personal, professional, educational and sports development of people.

Today we will talk about sports coachinga proposal that allows to maximize the potential of a sportsman or athlete.

Different types of coaching

Coaches guide people through the process of change and help them achieve their full potential in a variety of areas and improve their well-being. They can work with individuals who want to achieve their life goals (Life Coaching: the secret to achieve your goals), with managers to better manage their dealings with staff (Coaching for companies: what is it and what are its benefits?) and even with teachers and professors (Educational Coaching: a tool to learn and teach better).

But the coach not only works with the coachees (the coach's client) individually, but also with groups of people and work or sports teams. In this area, it allows the adoption of strategies to maximize the learning and management potential of the coach. the potential for learning and management of psychological resources useful to achieve a goal. resources useful to achieve a goal.

Coaching is a methodology that helps to overcome those limiting beliefs that often prevent us from being halfway between what we really want and what we can achieve.

The origin of sports coaching

The relationship between coaching and sports is a reality since the origins of this discipline. In fact, coaching as we know it today was born in the United States in the 1970s, specifically in the field of sport. Its main precursor was Timothy Gallwey, a tennis player who later became a coach. player who later became a coach. He realized the importance of psychological aspects in the achievement of objectives and in sports performance in general. In his book The Inner game of tennispublished in 1974, he presented his ideas on coaching, which would later be used in other fields, especially in the workplace.

However, the origins of coaching go further back in time, since, for example, the contributions of Socrates and his methodical dialogue known as maieutics, the concept of self-realization of humanistic psychology, whose greatest exponent is Abraham Maslow, or the well-known practice of Emotional Intelligence initially proposed by Daniel Goleman, have shaped this discipline.

Benefits of sports coaching

Sports coaching brings many benefits for athletes. But what are these benefits?

1. It helps to know oneself better

Sports coaching allows athletes to know themselves better, because they develop Emotional Intelligence and learn to use tools to discover their own limits and impulses that hold back their full potential. With sports coaching, self-knowledge improves, which is key for personal and sports development. is key to personal and sporting development.

2. It helps to plan realistically

Self-knowledge also allows us to know which path we want to take, and helps us to plan realistically. This is key because it helps keep our feet on the ground and avoids frustration.

3. It allows us to reach our full potential

With the help of coaches, athletes develop resources, competencies and skills that allow them to maximize their performance and potential. maximize their performance and potential.. Coaching helps athletes go further by helping them remove mental barriers.

4. Helps overcome limiting beliefs

Limiting beliefs act as a barrier to reach the potential that an athlete possesses, because the mind can be our worst enemy if we are not aware of how these negative thoughts affect us.

The sports coach offers the coachee techniques and resources that are oriented to enhance talent at its maximum expression. In other words, sports coaching allows to identify weaknesses, but also to take responsibility for changebut also to take responsibility for change and take action to overcome any obstacles.

5. It favors the management of emotions

Emotions can help or hinder sports performance. Thanks to coaching, sportsmen and women are able to know and regulate their own feelings, emotions, beliefs, judgments and coping strategies.judgments and coping strategies. This undoubtedly leads to better results.

6. Increases motivation

Sports coaching is key to make plans and set realistic goals, but also to stay in the present moment and get feedback on how we are behaving. Coaching is motivating because the person discovers his or her own motivations and achieves a greater capacity for challenge and ambition.

7. Increases concentration and performance

Staying in the present moment and acquiring a high level of awareness also promotes concentration and increases performance.

In addition, since coaching coaching allows athletes to connect with themselves in the here and now, so that they reach the state in which the level of difficulty of the task and the motivation required to perform it are kept in near perfect balance. What is known as "flow state" is favored.

8. Reduces frustration

Realistic goals and well-planned objectives help maintain high self-esteem, since people do not live in irrational expectations and become less frustrated. Coaching establishes medium and long-term action plansIt is beneficial to go step by step and live in the here and now.

9. Empowers leadership

Coaching empowers athletes, who feel responsible for their own actions thanks to this methodology. Athletes have a greater capacity for learning, decision-making power and acquire a positive mentality towards acquire a positive mentality in the face of change..

10. Improves group cohesion

Coaching can be done on an individual basis; however, and especially in the world of sport, group coaching or team coaching sessions can be carried out. When a group feels united and pursues a common goal, it is easy to perform at a high level. Coaching increases the feeling of belongingdiscipline and improves relationships within the team.