“Everything seemed all set for Paula Badosa‘s ultimate rise in the stardom of women’s tennis, but 2022, which was expected to be the year of consecration, has so far been rather disappointing (the last defeat yesterday in Tokyo against 19-year-old Qinwen Zheng of China). This is a paradox when one considers that Badosa at one point this season, precisely after the Stuttgart tournament, became world number two, a position held, however, for only two weeks. How did it get from world number two to Badosa’s now well-known tweet this morning? “I don’t even win at parchìs.” A strong statement for a tennis player who is currently ranked number eight in the world but is going through a complicated phase emotionally. The reference to parchìs is typically Spanish, a board game with dice in which four players compete to achieve a goal, very famous in Spain and with some similarities to the game of the goose. A metaphor that betrays Badosa’s frustration, who in the tweet afterwards thanked everyone for the support, adding that he will keep fighting.”
This news highlights how difficult it always is to achieve results that match the outcome standards an athlete has set for herself. At first glance these would seem to be situations more typical of a teenage age when one does not yet know one’s qualities well, but instead these are the experiences of absolute world-class athletes. In fact, The Abbess is not the only one to experience these crises just remember Osaka or the difficulties of many other top 10s.
A survey I conducted with Robert Nideffer and Jeff Bond (former director of the Australian Institute of Sport) of absolute world level athletes showed that the difference between Olympic medal winners and those who had won more, so-called, serial winners consisted essentially in the latter’s greater ability to stay focused on the task.
This result would indicate that serial winners do not get distracted by their own expectations and those of their environment, think less about the outcome, are less influenced by the external environment and instead show a total focus on performing at their best. Other investigations conducted mainly in athletics have in turn shown that for these athletes the last two hours leading up to the race are crucial in activating this attentional mode.
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