By Stu Hadden
(and Mick’s 2¢)
This article’s purpose is to discuss the mental aspect of winning. Covid has left me very much alone with my thoughts so I’ll be using a couple of squash anecdotes to illustrate my points and I really feel that these concepts can be extrapolated and utilized in any area of life where you are trying to hold your nerve and win. This piece will explore what a choke is, the reasons why it occurs and finally, the art of avoiding them.
In order to talk about how one goes about avoiding “bottling it” we first must identify what we believe that to actually mean. I would define choking as losing a match that you should have won because of a mental lapse. It is important that at this point, I make this very crucial distinction; a choke is when you actively manage to lose as opposed to your opponent going on a hot streak, dousing you in petrol and setting you on fire. Sometimes you can be up 2-0 and your opponent then outplays you: that is not choking. If you are up and lose on fitness, that is not choking either. A choke then, is when you are up, see the checkered flag… and simply fall apart.
Over the years I’ve borne witness to some scandalous chokes and as a result I have thought quite a lot about why it happens. There are a few reasons but the first one I remember noticing was a fear of failure.
Scared to lose
I was fortunate enough to play on the world’s best uni team in Bristol. The chap who played number 5 was a joy to watch, as strong as an ox, lightning quick, and had a flawless technique. He was so fast he earned the nickname the “chicken legged ninja” from our Norwegian team mate. He was the under 19 national champion when he arrived and was a meticulous professional in all aspects of his training and recovery. He had very little social life and it was obvious he had every intention of going on to become a world class player. I fully believe he had and still has every probability of achieving that. There was however, one problem. He had a tendency to go 2-0 up and be destroying his opponents, and then somehow lose. He managed to beat me for the first time in my final year but he was a far better player for at least two years by then! After having watched him choke so many times against others as well as me, I believe the reason that he lost these matches was that he had worked so hard and wanted it so much that he was scared to lose. Terrified it would internally invalidate all of his training and nullify all of the sacrifices he had made, he had a chance at being one of the best, but petrified of what people would say if he lost.
When the top players talk about pressure this is often what they are referring to: the pressure is always on the top seed in a tournament because it is written in black and white that they are expected to win and if they don’t, then they have failed. The way my teammate viewed himself and the sport, he had left himself completely open to the fear of failure. The way I see it, a lack of balance increases pressure. He sacrificed everything outside squash so it was all he had and thus he had to win. I guess the moral that I take from this story is to always have a plan ‘B’ in life to ease that pressure. In turn, that may help to achieve plan ‘A’ because it may diminish the stresses of self-inflicted must win situations.
Adding on to that, I believe also that some players subconsciously “take their foot off the gas” once they are in a dominating position such as being 2-0 up. This may be because the victory is within smelling distance and a little like the ‘Hare and the Tortoise” race, when one is so far ahead, there is nothing wrong with relaxing and cruising to the finish line. That mentality has undoubtedly proved fatal for probably all of us at one time or another and is a form of choking in itself. Not really being scared to lose, but more an overzealous expectation that one is going to win too easily.
One of two things generally happen when you are leading convincingly. Either your opponent rolls over and then your win is virtually guaranteed, or they do actually pick up their game and fight even harder. Suddenly they play more freely since they have nothing to lose anyway, and quickly the pressure falls heavily and squarely on your shoulders. When the latter happens, in my experience I have found the other rather odd choking factor: Doubt. It creeps in. Suddenly, it’s no so easy, you have to work harder for your prize. With doubt comes the “what-ifs”. What if I lose? Can’t possibly lose from here… can I? As Stu mentioned above, a loss from this position would invalidate all the previous efforts to get to this point in the first place. So excuses start materializing from nowhere. Is my knee a little achy? Stomachache coming on? I feel dizzy now? Losing all of a sudden doesn’t feel so bad because I no longer can put in the 100% effort… and what happens? - Choke!
Scared to win
This sounds absurd but it’s one I can personally relate to. There have been two separate occasions I can remember when I bottled it horribly. Fortunately though, on this particular one, I actually managed to escape with a win.
I was about 17 years old playing a league match against an ex pro who I knew pretty well. A real funny chap, probably was in his late 30’s at that point and he had reached a ranking of around 100 in the world a few years back. I went on court with him and played out of my skin. I basically couldn’t do anything wrong and within 25 mins I was up 2-0. I remember walking back onto court for the third, and thinking how shocked my Dad would be when I told him that I had won… wow I’m actually about to beat this guy… I used to watch this fella play in the finals of tournaments when I was a little kid and here I was chopping him up like he was a fruit salad. It was set to be my biggest win. I swear to God I blinked and he had come back to 2-2 and we were suddenly starting the fifth set. I scraped a win because he ran out of wheels, showered up and headed to the bar for a couple beers. It was my best win up to that point. I remember my face hurting from smiling so much.
Then I hear, “Oi Tinkerbell, what’s that stupid grin on your face?” I told him it was my best win, blah, blah, blah. This guy was an absolute character, total joker, and luckily, was about to educate me about the world. I remember this like it was yesterday: “That is where you are wrong, mate. There is no such thing as a good win. In fact, you should have lost tonight because you were scared to beat me, you are so lucky I got tired. If I was a tiny bit fitter you would have let me win just out of respect. You were up 2-0 and then you started thinking about beating me and s**t the bed mate. There’s no such thing as a big win, if you think of it like that you’ll lose matches because you are scared of someone’s reputation. Don’t be a wet wipe.”
What he was trying to say was, if ever you step on court to play, always know that you can win, and if you do, don’t be surprised. When you are playing don’t think of the implications of losing, don’t think of the implications of winning. You need to stay centered and in the moment, focused completely on the task at hand.
I think more pros can relate to this than what would admit. The mental side of any sport is a remarkable conundrum. We train our backsides off to be the best player we can possibly be, and when we get into a situation that legitimizes that effort - such as being on the cusp of beating a higher ranked player, a position that all athletes dream about until they are giddy - it’s so easy to suddenly look at yourself and think, “I really shouldn’t be winning this - this isn’t normal.” Its outside of the comfort zone, so in order to maintain normalcy, we lose.
The Jackal
I bottled a match in Argentina to a Colombian player, losing the first game from 10–0 up (impressive stuff! “Impressive” wouldn’t be the word I would use!). I came off court reeling and called my mate. I am lucky enough to be close friends with a couple of guys who are legitimately the best in the world at something, so it’s always interesting to hear their perspective on pretty much anything because they just see the world differently. To make this even more interesting, this guy was ranked 5 in the world at the time and is nicknamed “The Jackal” on the tour because he plays so smart at the end of a game. Every top pro pretty much knows that if they find themselves in a tiebreak with Marwan El Shorbagy they are almost certainly going to lose. I told him I had lost from 10-0 up and I asked him what I needed to do, what was the secret sauce that made him so good at the end of games? His first question was how many tins I made after it was 10-6, I don’t remember exactly but it was probably 3. He started laughing and gave me a little bit of gold dust that I’ll share with you. He reckoned, the thing that makes him so good at the end of games is that he does nothing. Everyone expects him to do something with the ball, do something amazing, something completely different but he just goes in and hits one straight drive (rail) after another. Nothing fancy, just stays positive on his shots and focuses on hitting aggressive drives. Eventually the opponent runs off expecting him to play a fancy cross court flick or something similar and he then smacks it past them down the wall. This doesn’t sound like much, but it truly is the best advice I’ve ever had. If you are a bit nervous and close to the finish line, stay relaxed, keep the strategy as simple as possible and remain focused on that strategy instead of the outcome. Executing your strategy well is all that matters.
Long Story Short
Focus on the process and your strategy and not the outcome. Don’t think about what happens if you lose and or about what happens if you win… AKA ‘don’t be a wet wipe’. Finally, keep it as simple as possible at the business end of a contest. The more basic something is, the less there is to go wrong.
What I found to be most helpful in either winning situations or close matches such as Marwan’s tie-break headstrong approach, was self-belief. Not over confidence (which can be a fine line), but a personal conviction that I am up to the task better than my opponent. Trust in my skills, trust in my fitness and willingness to push myself. Without it, there is doubt. And doubt, as I mentioned earlier can be deadly. Did I win all the time? No, of course not. But I would venture to guess that my percentage of matches I have won in 5, or even individual game tie-breaks, is a winning one.
