Jeremy Snape, founder of Sporting Edge, explains how important mental strength is in all aspects of life, and how to achieve it
The mind is a muscle. It must be trained in just the same way that a hamstring needs constant attention and care so that it reaches its peak performance when needed, on command, on match day.
“We would spend so much time training in the nets, doing physical training and talking about tactics but we very rarely spent any time talking about our mental approach,” Jeremy Snape, tells The Cricketer, reflecting on his experience during his 19-year career.
Since hanging up his cap, Snape has founded Sporting Edge, a company dedicated to helping anyone reach their maximum potential, whatever their fi eld, through strengthening the mindset of those in sport and business.
“Sporting Edge was set up to translate the insights from world-class performers and make them accessible for people in bitesize and practical formats,” Snape explains.
The ex-Leicestershire captain does this via his vast library of exclusive video content where he gets into the minds of some of sport’s most high-profile names. Shane Warne, Stuart Broad, Pep Guardiola, Sir Viv Richards and Baroness Sue Campbell are just a handful of names from whom Snape has absorbed insight.
But while these lessons are adaptable across the business and sporting landscape, they were learnt on the field.
Snape after dismissing Sachin Tendulkar in 2002
“I had some great days as a cricketer. I was man of the match on my England debut (ODI v Zimbabwe, Harare, October 2001) and hit the winning runs in a T20 Cup final for Leicestershire in 2004, but there were also failures. In front of 120,000 people in an ODI against India (2001/02) I choked under pressure, I wasn’t thinking straight.
“That moment was where the idea for Sporting Edge was formed, if not the business but the concept. Even though I was playing at the top level I never felt like there were clear mental strategies that players could use to be able to deliver the plans they had set out.”
Snape’s journey to better himself, and ultimately others, mentally began with a Master’s degree in Sports Psychology at Loughborough University.
He was still playing, but had stepped down from the first-class captaincy in order to complete his studies.
“It was fascinating to be able to retrofit all those personal experiences. Playing against people like Curtly Ambrose and Sachin Tendulkar, and knowing how I felt and how to captain and lead a team. It gave me a framework to understand what I had been living for 19 years.”
The connection between mindset and superior sporting performance is undeniable, however Snape’s research led him to insights that went far beyond the boundary.
“The more sponsors and senior executives I met from the business world, the more I realised they were talking about exactly the same thing. I might be walking out to play cricket for England, but they were walking out to pitch to investors or present to their board. Yet we would both have the same self-doubt and psychological response, perhaps the sweaty palms and butterflies in the stomach.”
Sir Dave Brailsford – “Anyone can have a dream but the key is having a gold medal plan and staying disciplined to it.”
Dame Sarah Storey – “To achieve extraordinary results your training needs to be of extra-ordinary quality.”
Stuart Broad – “We have to look to continually improve with feedback backed up by data and evidence.”
Sir Viv Richards – “My mindset was the engine room of my performance – everything flows from there.”
Shane Warne – “It’s never easy or straightforward, you have to stay committed and find a way to win.”
Annabel Croft – “Everyone needs to create a dream team around them that supports and challenges you to be your best.”
Through Sporting Edge, Snape can teach the lessons he learnt from the professional sports arena and apply them to the business world, “so people can be more confident, more focussed and more successful in their work.” And these lessons can start from a young age.
“There is pressure on children at the moment to worry about outcome, ‘will I get my GSCE grades, am I going to score a century?’. That thinking creates this cascade of pressure and emotion that can hijack somebody from doing the work they need to deliver their skills.
“One of the fundamental shifts is not to worry about the outcome but to focus on the process and planning. If you’re able to concentrate for 100 balls in a row and not play any rash shots it is likely you will be near a century.”
The same applies for exams: should you revise sufficiently, you enter the hall with confidence that you should, and deserve to, do well.
Snape cites Cheteshwar Pujara in the first Test of the Australia v India series as an example of not worrying about the overall outcome.
“Pujara faced 147 balls before scoring a boundary, then hit two in a row. That is a great example of not getting worried about scoring quickly and trusting your process. If you try and force it you might lose your wicket. It’s about not letting the scoreboard, or what others are doing, contaminate you.
“I think about the winning mindset as there being two versions of each of us. One who gets up out of bed when the alarm goes, we exercise, attack the priorities in our days, have good relationships and eat healthily.
“The other version presses snooze, is more sluggish, doesn’t eat healthily, is on social media more than doing our jobs, gets distracted, frustrated and ultimately achieves less.
“We all have periods in our life when we are the first version, firing on all cylinders, feeling great and making a real impact. For me that is the winning mindset. How do we then create an environment both in our head but also in our office, school or team that helps us stay closest to our best game?”
The answer to that question is different for everyone but the map to get there can be read by all.
To find out more about Sporting Edge and the events and webinars they run, visit www.sportingedge.com
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