Nick Blalock is a sophomore player for @cbalincroft and @cbalacrosse.

He was coming off an injury and knew he needed to improve his toughness if he was to achieve his goal of making the varsity and starting at least 1game.

What was holding Nick back from playing his best was not his physical talent or skills...it was his game.

So for 3months, we worked on his goal-setting, self-talk, and ability to perform under pressure.

We used visualization and imagery techniques to allow him to play loose, focused, and confident.

Well, in the last week, Nick...
made the varsity
started in the season opener
...and then, in the 2nd game, Nick scored goals, including the GAME WINNERin 2OT.

Time to establish some new goals, Nick!

If you are looking to give your athlete the mental performance tools to play at their best and maximize their potential...on the field and in life....reach out to me.

This article was originally published in Soccer Today on November 6, 2020.

Help! I’m a Coach and Want to Teach the Mental Game – Part III

                                         By Bryan Price, Ph.D.

If you’re a soccer coach, chances are you religiously keep up with the latest drills and methods to improve the technical and tactical aspects of your team.

You no doubt study the latest trends in strategy, formations, and styles of play to stay one step ahead of the competition on the pitch.

But if you’re like most coaches, you probably don’t know where to turn for help on the mental game.

Even though U.S. Soccer has designated the psychological component as the 4^th pillar of player development, it is the one that is the most difficult for coaches to develop and the pillar that has the fewest resources for coaches and players.

And yet, that...

After an awesome time working with Seton Hall’s women’s golf and baseball teams last year, I’m excited to announce Top Mental Game will be working with George Washington Univeristy and their women’s basketball team this Fall!

I’m super pumped to work with Coach Jen Rizzotti and her staff in order to take back the Atlantic 10 Conference Championship and give this team the tools it needs to perform at their best when it matters the most.

Coach Rizzotti was the point guard that started it all for UCONN’s women’s basketball dynasty in the 1990s. The former 1996 AP Player of the Year and 2-time WNBA champion was inducted into the Women’s Basketball Hall of Fame in 2013.

Looking forward to giving Coach Rizzotti and her team everything I got to improve their mental toughness, confidence, focus, resilience, and abilty to perform under pressure.

#RaiseHigh

www.topmentalgame.com

What an epic surprise!!!!

I’ve been working with Callie O’Connell, a 8th-grade volleyball player from Abilene, TX, and an all-around awesome kid.

For the last six months, we’ve worked together on the mental game and she’s been one of my most favorite athletes to work with. Smart, motivated, energetic, and a complete sponge when it comes to ways in which she can improve her performance on the court and in life.

Because she’s so awesome, I wanted to do something special for our last session. In our first session back in March, I asked her who her favorite player was, and without hesitation, she said Hannah Lockin (now Sedwick), the All-American setter for the Baylor University volleyball team. That’s the same Baylor team that went to the Final Four last year.

So I threw a Hail Mary and tried to get on all of Hannah Sedwick’s social media feeds. I sent her my odd request via Twitter messaging, about a week out from my last session with Callie....

On August 24, I had the privilege of interviewing Jason Lezak about his swimming career and his mental game.

This four-time Olympian is the proud owner of 8 Olympic medals, including four gold medals.

We cover a lot of ground in our discussion, especially about the mental game - goal-setting, self-talk, maintaining discipline, and the extreme toll training for four Olympic games takes on your mind and body.

And of course, we break down perhaps the most epic comeback in swimming history - his record-setting anchor in the 4x100 relay in the 2008 Olympics.

NOTE: THIS ARTICLE WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED IN SOCCER TODAY ON APRIL 13, 2020. 

Muhammad Ali once said, “Don’t count the days. Make the days count.”

 For those soccer players navigating the COVID-19 crisis, are you making the best use of your time?

Because when this crisis ends and we return to “normal,” it will be apparent who made the days count, and which players simply counted the days.

For the past couple of weeks, I have run 5-day “bootcamps” on how to improve your mental game during this interesting time. This Tuesday through Thursday, I will be running a soccer-specific webinar series from 7-8pm EDT, and U.S. soccer legend Julie Foudy will be making an appearance to talk about her mental game.

If social media is any indication, many players are putting in the work. It’s awesome to see so many clubs providing players and coaches with video tutorials on how to improve technical skills, footwork, and physical...

The Announcement

Last February, I was asked to be one of three former collegiate athletes to speak to all of Seton Hall University’s Division-I athletes about leadership and life. 

Overcoming a lot of self-doubt and limiting beliefs, I announced that I was willing to work with any team or athlete on their mental game. I didn’t know it then, but it was the start of Top Mental Game. 

After the talk, several players and coaches came up and wanted to get started. One of those coaches was Coach Natalie Desjardins, the women’s golf coach. We met the next week in my office, and we collaborated on a set of team sessions based around various aspects of the mental game - mental toughness, self-talk, goal-setting, and visualization and imagery exercises. 

A Year With Seton Hall Women’s Golf

I first spoke to the team on Feb 28, 2019. At the end of my first session, I said that I’d also be willing to work with any of the players one-on-one. 

I...

Happy Mindset Monday everyone!

In this week’s edition, I decided to post a video from a recent talk I gave to the Seton Hall University baseball team on the power of visualization and imagery. 

I work with my clients to create personalized visualization and imagery exercises to increase confidence, reduce anxiety, and perform at their best when it matters the most. 

Every athlete is different - some prefer unguided visualizations where they create the imagery and content. 

Others prefer guided visualizations which involve listening to someone provide direction to you on what to do and what to think. 

I expose my athletes to both kinds of visualizations, and I use emWave HeartMath software to show them how their bodies react to each kind. 

One of my most effective unguided visualization exercise is the “waves” exercise which I will describe in another blog post.

But given it is Veteran’s Day, I decided to share this video of my...

Let's face it. Most of us are designed to be average. 

Whether through self-imposed limitations, evolutionary biology, or cultural norms and pressures, we are likely to revert to the mean.

But we don't have to be average. We can be extraordinary - we just have to know how to overcome the evolutionary and cultural deck that's stacked against us. 

The two most influential components that nudge us to being average are our brains and the fact that we are tribal beings.

Our brains are designed to keep us alive, and to do that, our brains want to keep us safe from harm. The brain does this by diligently alerting us to threats and then dealing with those threats so we can survive (e.g. fight or flight). Walk to the edge of a cliff, and your brain sends signals to your body that danger is lurking. Same thing when you are asked to deliver a speech to a large group of strangers. The brain concludes that what kept you alive yesterday and the day before that is likely to...

Is there anything better than watching your clients succeed even beyond their wildest dreams?!?

This weekend, two of my players had EPIC performances!

Maddie Sager (Sr, Phoenixville, PA) and Sarah Fouratt (So, Santa Maria, CA) just won the Nittany Lion Invitational at Penn State, besting 72 golfers from 12 other D-1 schools.

This is Maddie’s first-ever tournament win in college and she set a career low for a 3-round tournament, firing a 214.

It is also the first collegiate win for Sarah. But to do it, she had to shoot a 4-under 68, which turns out to be a Seton Hall record for a par-72 course and a career best for her, in the final round.

The best part? Both Sarah and Maddie (in the second pic) have been working with me since February to improve their mental game and to become the best version of themselves.

The pic of Maddie below is her SIX MONTHS AGO, listening to a personalized visualization recording of her “perfect round” that we collaborated on together. The...