FACE THE PAIN

The 2nd Key to Beating Big Shots is Conditioning

Here’s where you find out if you are just a big talker or are serious. This is where coaches find out if their team has what it take to be champions. In the conditioning process you find out how deep their desire is…are they just talkers or do they really have what it takes because here is where you really start to earn it.

If you cut corners here, you won’t have a chance. You won’t be able to keep up. It will be obvious to you and everyone else.

If you are physically weaker, you won’t be as mentally sharp either. You’ll find yourself making mistakes you never made before.

Pay the price of pain to get the gain
To reach peak conditioning you have to push yourself. You have to drive past previous barriers and do it over and over again. A couple of trips to the gym is not going to make you look like an Olympic athlete.

Michael Phelps won 8 Gold Medals swimming at the China Olympics. How did that happen? Well, for starters the years of hitting the pool with his coach at 5 am in the morning, doing drills, practicing each and every aspect of swimming for hours and hours EVERY day, 7 days a week might have a little to do with it. Want to beat Michael Phelps, son? See you at the pool at 5 am.

No shortcuts to developing critical skills
Elite fitness is available for whoever will pay the price. It doesn’t matter if someone has more athletic talent than you, if they won’t pay the price to get fit, they are going to get beat. 

It’s not just conditioning. It’s developing all the specific skills and techniques required in each sport. You may have been born with incredible talent but it won’t do you any good until it’s developed and refined into championship level skill. 

No one falls out of the crib being able to shoot a basketball like Michael Jordan or swing a golf club like Tiger Woods.

Remember this…to become Great, NO ONE ESCAPES THE REPETITIONS.
By the time Tiger Woods won the Masters at age 21 he had been playing golf almost every day for 19 years. That was because at age 2 he had learned how to call his dad at work and ask if they could go to the driving range after he got off work.

So how can you ever catch and beat them?
It’s because things change in the world…nothing stays the same and opportunities always pop up to win if you are ready.

• People get older—Arnold Schwarzenegger, once "Conan the Barbarian," doesn’t look so good in a bathing suit anymore
• They have injuries and surguries—Notice how Tiger Woods doesn’t have the same swagger after multiple knee operations?
• Success softens them—Almost NO team repeats after winning a college or professional sports championship.
• Life happens to them, changing their priorities—They marry, have kids, get interested in other things

Conditioning can give you the edge you need to win
If you are in better shape you’ll have the best chance to get the most out of your ability. You don't want to be running out of energy at the end of the game because the more energy you have, the clearer you'll be thinking at the critical times...also you’ll be more confident.

If on the other hand you show up and immediately see your competition is in dramatically better shape than you, you are beat before you start.

Paying the conditioning price is where you can leave most of your competition behind.

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Part 4 of 5 KEYS TO BEAT THE BIG SHOTS

Part 1:
You Can Beat The Big Shots

Part 2:
John Wooden and Shoelaces 

Part 3:
Get READY, Get SET

YOU CAN BEAT THE BIG SHOTS

The Great don’t always play Great

Why is that? It’s because, in competition, the formula for a great performance involves EFFORT! The formula is

ABILITY x EFFORT = PERFORMANCE

That’s how underdogs can pull off upsets
Let’s say one team is scary good with a talent and skill level of 8 of 10. Now, suppose they play an inferior team with a talent and skill level that’s only average, 5 of 10. That’s an 8 playing a 5, they should win easily on paper. But as you hear constantly in sports, they don’t play on paper. 

So game day comes...
Turns out, the better team has a bad day, is sluggish, and performs at 50% of their capabilities. That’s 8 x 50% = a 4.0 performance. Now, the other team has one of those rare games where everyone is on fire and everything goes right. They play the whole game at 90% of their maximum and BEAT the Great team! How? Their ability level of 6 times a 90% performance gave them a 5.4 game rating—which beats a 4.0 game rating every time!

David beats Goliath!

The commentators will say the “superior” team came out flat, they got out-hustled and out-played. Then they will try to analyze how that could happen, including talking to the mystified coach and players. They all will scratch their heads but it’s too late, they lost! 

That’s why you’ll often hear “They just wanted it more.” Exactly! The way you tell who wants it more is who makes the most effort! That’s the chance you need. 

And you will get it because no one or no team plays their best all the time. 

All you need is an opening. 
All you need is an opportunity. 

The thing you can do is be ready when that chance comes and then seize the moment!

Hard work is the great equalizer because hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard!

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This is the Introduction to the series 5 Secrets of Beating Big Shots. Related posts are coming soon.

HOW HARD IS WINNING?

Winning is hard. But it's not THAT hard. 

It’s probably harder than you will expect it to be, but it’s not impossible. If it was, no one would win.

Winning is hard, but not in the way you think.

Winning is hard but not impossible…it’s not impossible hard. We aren’t talking about things you can’t do. Winning is hard but it’s not like being “drug behind a truck or something.” as my friend Jim Gudger once said.

What “kind” of hard is Winning?

It's “doing things you'd rather not do” hard. 

One of the hardest things for a person to do is to get themselves to “do things they’d rather not do.”

As a result, when faced with the necessity of doing them to get where they want to go, they talk about how hard it is.

It’s not really hard. It’s just that they don’t want to do it.
The discipline of doing things whether you want to or not is something you have to learn. That is the key discipline that takes you from amateur to professional status.

Winner’s do the things others won’t, so they can have the things others don’t. That’s exactly what’s “hard” about winning.

Tom Coughlin, The People’s Coach

Most of us can relate to Tom.

In spite of obvious ability, hard work and past achievements, poor Tom always seems to be on the hot seat.

Things just seem to find a way to go against him. Player injuries, strange losing streaks, player dissension are common for every NFL team. But for Tom it always seems to be a little worse. Its like the guy just can’t get ahead. The least you can say is that he seems to have to work harder than everyone else. He knows he can’t leave anything to chance because no one is going to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Things don’t come easy for Coach Coughlin
He wasn’t a child coaching prodigy. He had to work his way up the coaching ranks from the bottom one tough step at the time. He was overlooked and taken for granted. Over a long time he developed a great reputation. Only through tons of hard and extra work did he move up and reach the point where he could even interview for head coaching job. At 49 he finally got his chance and was hired to be the first coach for the Jacksonville Jaguars. In 7 years he took this expansion team to 2 AFC Championship games. His reward for this incredible achievement? Fired. 

Most of us can relate to his struggles
We go through life and see the breaks go against us. We find ourselves often ignored, past over and taken for granted. So much of our life seems like it’s tied up in grinding out work that no one notices or appreciates. We keep ourselves on track doing the quiet, thankless jobs that we know are important but we don’t ever see it pay off in anything big for us. Also no matter how much effort we put into our work it often seems like it’s not good enough.

The few times we have pulled off some great achievement and gotten recognized - finally - the moment is quickly forgotten by those in authority. In no time at all it seems like it never happened. We are still treated like we are just faces in the crowd. 

Tom is always on the hot seat
He took over as head coach of the New York Giants in 2004, inheriting a 4-12 team. He quietly went to work to turn things around. Four years later the Giants won the Super Bowl in one of the biggest upsets ever! But amazingly he still has been on the hot seat constantly ever since. You have to assume he works hard and takes his job seriously but when his team gets hit with injuries, bad play by key players or any of the hundreds of things that happen to a football team to create slumps, immediately there are calls for his job. It’s like overnight it’s all his fault because he’s no longer good enough. He can’t reach today’s players, he can’t relate, he doesn’t have charisma, he doesn’t have good enough coaches, etc. Result? Tom is always on the hot seat.

But how does Tom respond? Like you do.
He knows no one feels sorry for him. He keeps his head down. He keeps working. He keeps encouraging his team. He keeps looking for ways to improve. He keeps believing things will work out if he keeps working. He keeps believing that the odds will even out over the long haul if he stays on track. He keeps believing his luck will turn for the better. And the amazing thing is that they do. His teams are tough. You can never count them out. Just when the criticism is the loudest and people have totally given up on his team they come back strong and surprise everyone. This year is no exception. They had such a mid season slump many felt Tom would be fired before the season ended. Tom kept working. He kept the team focused and improving. Result? THEY ARE IN THE SUPER BOWL! They didn’t quit, they kept fighting and the results eventually started to show.

Tom has a style we can relate to
He isn’t known as a genius. He’s not a celebrity. He doesn’t dominate television with commercials and appearances on talk shows. He just works hard and keeps on working hard  even when faced with withering criticism or disastrous results. He keeps the faith. He keeps moving forward. He knows hard work can overcome almost all obstacles. He doesn’t make excuses. He doesn’t blame others. He just works…..and because of that he eventually wins!

Tom Coughlin’s  example of winning primarily through toughness and hard work is an example for us all. We can relate to his struggles. He is the “People’s Coach!”