Understanding the basics of mindset, motivation, and mental skills can go a long way in coaching your athletes to better performance. This course explores the fundamentals of sports psychology for endurance athletes.
Learn how mindset, motivation, and mental skills can unlock new levels of performance in your athletes. Our online course “Sports Psychology 101,” led by licensed clinical psychologist and endurance coach Dr. Justin Ross, shows you how to bring proven mental strategies into your coaching. Equipped with these basics for coaching mental skills, you can guide your athletes to better, healthier performance.
You’ll learn how to:
- Help athletes set SMART goals that are truly theirs, not imposed by external pressures like rivals, teams or teammates, or parents.
- Guide athletes to use outcome goals, process goals, and performance standards (“I commit, I will not quit”) to stay focused no matter what race day throws at them.
- Understand the psychobiological model of fatigue and why perception of effort often matters more than physiology alone.
- Build athlete’s self-efficacy using four proven channels: mastery experiences, vicarious experiences, social persuasion, and mood regulation.
- Teach athletes to develop mantras and mindset “languages” that keep them resilient, positive, and engaged when it matters most.
You’ll also come to understand how tools like emotional intelligence, cognitive appraisals, and self-determination theory can transform training and racing into opportunities for growth—not stress. This course gives you simple, evidence-based skills to help every athlete unlock the mental side of performance.
How to Enroll
All USA Cycling courses are offered exclusively through USA Cycling’s online learning management system at learn.usacycling.org.
Questions? Contact Suzy Sanchez, Director of DEI and Membership Programs, at ssanchez@usacycling.org.
