Athletes
Sports Psychology Coaching for Athletes
Athletes rarely struggle because they lack talent or work ethic. More often, performance drops when pressure hijacks attention — confidence dips, focus scatters, and one mistake turns into three.
Athletes rarely struggle because they lack talent or work ethic. More often, performance drops when pressure hijacks attention — confidence dips, focus scatters, and one mistake turns into three.
Strong & Connected offers sports psychology–informed coaching (mental performance coaching) to help athletes build repeatable mental skills for competition and training.
This is skills-based, practical coaching — built around what sport psychology organizations recognize as core mental performance domains: goal-setting, self-talk, attentional control, emotional regulation, and resilience.
Whether you compete individually, with a team, or on the ice — mental performance skills transfer across every sport.
Golf, tennis, combat sports, endurance sports, strength sports — if you're searching for answers to these questions, this work is designed for you:
Basketball, soccer, lacrosse, baseball — especially if you want:
Hockey is a perfect "mental game" sport: speed, contact, constant mistakes, and short shifts create nonstop opportunities to tilt. We train:
Hockey Canada has emphasized that cultivating mental performance (e.g., self-talk, focusing techniques, deliberate practice) should be integrated into everyday drills and recovery moments — not treated as a separate "extra."
A structured, evidence-informed approach to building the mental skills that make performance more consistent under pressure.
We identify your pattern: what triggers pressure, what your mind does next (overthinking, rushing, catastrophizing, shutdown), what your body does (tightness, shallow breathing, tunnel vision), and what your behavior does (avoidance, playing safe, forcing plays, losing discipline).
You'll build skills you can practice like any other: attention control (anchors, cue words, target focus), confidence training (process goals + behavioral evidence), pressure training (practice reps that simulate competition), and mindfulness/acceptance tools for staying effective while nervous.
Even elite athletes don't perform in a vacuum. Performance is shaped by coach/athlete communication, parent/partner stress and conflict, team trust and repair, and shame and self-criticism after mistakes. We help you build the inner stability (and relational stability) that protects performance.
If any of these sound like you, you're in the right place.
Book a consult and we'll build your personalized mental performance toolkit.
A structured warm-up for your mind that's as reliable as your physical warm-up.
A quick, repeatable process to let go and refocus — before the next play, shift, or point.
Deliberate practice that simulates competition pressure so you're ready when it matters.
A structured schedule that builds mental skills the same way you build physical ones.
Strong & Connected provides coaching, not diagnosis or mental health treatment. If you need clinical care (e.g., panic disorder, depression, trauma, eating disorder concerns), we'll encourage you to work with an appropriately licensed clinician.
If you're comparing providers, the Certified Mental Performance Consultant® (CMPC) credential (through AASP) is a widely recognized standard in mental performance consulting. AASP maintains information about certification and a searchable directory.
This is coaching focused on performance skills (focus, confidence, routines, pressure response). For diagnosis or treatment of mental health conditions, work with a licensed clinician. The CMPC credential is one recognized standard in mental performance consulting.
Meta-analytic research suggests mindfulness training can improve sport performance and related outcomes, with variability by sport and intervention.
Yes — hockey is high-speed and mistake-dense, so we train shift-to-shift resets, self-talk, focus cues, and composure under pressure. Hockey Canada has highlighted self-talk and focusing techniques as practical mental performance skills that can be reinforced continuously in training.
For many athletes, virtual delivery is ideal for consistency, scheduling, and ongoing practice review (video, routines, debriefs).
If you want a structured mental performance plan — confidence, focus, composure, and bounce-back after mistakes — book a consult.
Proven method. Results oriented. Safe and empowering.