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Calming your nerves before fight/competition

Meditate.

Read or listen to music.

Keep myself around others. Isolation gives you too many opportunities to think.

Positive visualization.

Watch videos of fighters you admire at their best.

Play a musical instrument (unless you are actually AT the competition)

Do a crossword puzzle or Jumble, or any other kind of thinking puzzle.

Write about your thoughts.

Watch a movie on DVD.

Coach a fellow teammate in their match. This will take your thoughts away from yourself and keep you from dwelling on your match.

Keep everything in perspective.
 
Don't make it something you do at fight time. Train for it. Mentally prepare for each workout the same way you would for a fight. Managing emotions is part of being a fighter. You would not just show up for a fight. It is an important component that people unfortunately only think about right before their fight. All that training is wasted if you have performance anxiety.

There are a few perspectives from sports psyche. Being internally or externally driven. Finally there is a flow state. Practice it.
 
Thank you for the suggestions, I will keep it all in mind.

The first time I stepped on the mat I was too nervous and wasn't able to think clearly. I caught caught in a darce pretty quick. Second match went completely different, i felt well now I have nothing to lose and was extremely lose the entire time and ended up winning.

I hope I don't experience this again in tomorrows tournament.
 
At tourneys I keep myself as busy as possible. (coaching other matches, reading, BSing with friends, walking around) the main thing that I find really calms me is knowing that it is for fun and that there is really nothing left to loose.

I find that those who freak out or put so much pressure on their performance tend to beat themselves before the match starts.

Pat yourself on the back for getting out there and stepping in the ring. That is more than most can say.
 
get to the fight as late as posible, talk about everything but fighting, warm up with a good friend, (I don't warm up with my trainers I warm up with a friend holding the pads) If nerves are geting me right before me walk out I do pushups in sets of 10 and bounce around alot, I wear a hoodie, working up a good sweat seems to calm my nerves quite a bit. nothing is going to calm yer nerves all the way but I think they are good for you in small quanities.
 
Build a competition routine. The routine should be something you do every time. A movie, a playlist of songs etc.. Whatever that routine entails, only do it before competition. If it's a movie for instance, NEVER watch that movie except before competing. Eventually the routine will subconsciously start to prepare you. Like Pavlov's dogs, except for fighters.

I'm not pulling this out of my ass either, my wife is a PhD in psychology and this what she counsels all the guys at our gym to do.
 
Just relax and clear your mind. The worst that can happen is you lose. You have trained hard and it will pay off.
 
My last fight was kind of rough. I was scheduled to fight second on the card. Then due to issues with the ring I fought 17th of 18 fights. So since I was in the back and already taped up when they made the decision I couldnt leave the warm up room. So I was back there for like 4 or 5 hours.

I remembered seeing Fedor before his fight with Tim Sylvia playing cards. He looked calm like a hindu cow. For some reason that stuck with me and really helped me calm down. I talked to the other fighters on the team. We all seemed to avoid talking about fighting. I kinda just layed around propped up my head closed my eyes and tried to think about nothing. Totally blanked out my mind.
 
KAYNE said:
I remembered seeing Fedor before his fight with Tim Sylvia playing cards. He looked calm like a hindu cow. For some reason that stuck with me and really helped me calm down. I talked to the other fighters on the team. We all seemed to avoid talking about fighting. I kinda just layed around propped up my head closed my eyes and tried to think about nothing. Totally blanked out my mind.
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i believe you acquire the ability to completely clear your mind of fight anxiety after you've been in the arena several times. when you almost certainly know for a fact that you're going to be okay, you're going out of it alive, and that your opponent is human, just like you are.


or you could just hammer this into your head, and repeat it like a chant during the fight:

"it doesn't hurt."
"i've fought bigger, better guys than you." (pre-fight)
 
Numero uno for me (besides knowing I'm physically ready) is good music on the iPod.
 
ChachiKiller said:
Don't make it something you do at fight time. Train for it. Mentally prepare for each workout the same way you would for a fight. Managing emotions is part of being a fighter. You would not just show up for a fight. It is an important component that people unfortunately only think about right before their fight. All that training is wasted if you have performance anxiety.

There are a few perspectives from sports psyche. Being internally or externally driven. Finally there is a flow state. Practice it.
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Thats really a good idea, gearing yourself up mentally in the same fashion for training as for fighting...as, when I was training (year ago), I'd go through a period of terrible performance for 10 minutes with shit butterflies, THEN "wake up" and have a good session.

If I can recreate the emotion in the gym, it will be managed easier :D
 
My fears in competition don't involve winning or losing, or even losing badly.

I get more anxious about injuries, thus finding myself not able to train and do what I most love to do.
 
i dont know really. i just cant find a way to calm myself down before a fight, no matter how hard i try. but once i get hit, thats when i really calm down and the nerves die down. i become relaxed after that. lol.
 
loafyofbread said:
i dont know really. i just cant find a way to calm myself down before a fight, no matter how hard i try. but once i get hit, thats when i really calm down and the nerves die down. i become relaxed after that. lol.
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Have someone hit you before the fight?

I don't like to rely on tricks like music or distraction, because once you get out there and the bell rings, you don't have an ipod with you to play your favorite music and calm you down. You have to learn how to do it yourself and just remember that it's just another guy you're fighting. He's nervous too, and once you realize that, and realize that you have to have faith in your training, everything seems to chill out.
 
I find myself in the nervous boat right now too. My first fight in front of an audience at a major (local) event is coming up Friday.

I was fortunate enough to get my girlfriend to drive the hour and a half, so that I can focus... but all my nerves have me psyched out a bit at the moment.

I'm going to load up some ambient techno on the MP3 Player tonight and see if that helps
 
I read a book it seems to help take my mind off of going out to fight.
I also like to be isolated and in a spot without alot of noise to just kind of get my inner peace type of thing going
 
My problem is that my adrenaline rush starts weeks or even a month or so before the competition. By the time I get to the match I am exausted by the time I first touch my opponent.
 
tri4ben said:
My problem is that my adrenaline rush starts weeks or even a month or so before the competition. By the time I get to the match I am exausted by the time I first touch my opponent.
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Not really adrenaline. It is somatic anviety. It comes before an event. If it is really bad it can enter the fight with you.

Look into cognative restructuring. It is a mainstream psy technique adopted by sports psyches as well.
 
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