 There are demands in life which either causes

stress or satisfaction.
 According to Oxford Dictionary-“a state of
affair involving demand in physical or mental
energy.”
 It is body’s physical, mental and chemical
reaction to circumstances that frighten, excite
confuse, challenge, surprise, anger, and
endanger or irritate.
 Stress can disturb normal physiological &
psychological functioning of an individual.
 Stress medical parlance-“defined as a
perturbation (deviation) of the body’s
homeostasis.
 Demand on body-mind occurs when it tries to
cope with incessant changes in life both- daily
& over period of time.
 “Stress” condition is important to human
health.
 Good- Eustress Bad-Distress
 Stress is unavoidable, occurs so commonly
such as unrealistic job deadlines, money
worries, interpersonal relationships etc.
 In a challenging situation the brain prepares
the body for defensive fight or flight response.
By releasing cortisol & adrenaline (stress
hormones) which raise the BP as a result the
body prepares to react to the situation.
 With concrete defensive action (fight
response) the stress hormones in the blood
get used up, entailing reduced stress effect.
 When we fail to counter a stress situation
(flight response) the hormone & chemicals
remain unreleased in the blood stream for a
long period of time, resulted in stress related
physical symptoms such as tense.
 Regular stress can lead to risk of acute and
chronic psychosomatic illness and weaken
the immune system.
 External Factors
 Job
 Workplace
 Traffic snarls or disturbance
 Meeting or work deadlines
 Challenges
 Expected Performance in sports
  Internal Factors:
 Ability to respond
 Sleep
 Health status (Suffering from a disease)
 Nutritional Status
 Stress can cause the following:
 Headaches
 Irritable bowel syndrome
 Eating disorder (too much or too less eating)
 Allergies
 Insomnia (Sleep issues)
 Backaches
 Frequent cold
 Frequent Fatigue
 Cause of certain diseases: hypertension,
diabetes, heart disorders etc.

STRESS & SPORTS PERFORMANCE

 Every athlete need certain stress level that it
is needed to optimize his/her game.
 It depends on past experiences, coping
strategies and genetics.
 Stress in sports can be acute, episodic and
chronic.
 Episodic: Like during a match
 Acute: Preparing for a competition one month
prior to it.
 Chronic: Preparing for a Olympic, world
championships for years.
 In sport, stress can be best be thought of a
process.
 Stimulus Situation may or may not be
harmful. Eg: Some athletes are not frightened
by falling or getting injured, enjoy performing
in front of crowds.
 Athletes are likely to feel stress when they
are into some kind of threat or pressure when
their ability to respond is not sufficient to
meet the demands of situation.
 Younger athletes, though courageous are
more impacted by stress than experienced
ones.
 Managing stress in sports:
Modification of situation/stimulus to reduce
stress. Eg: Crowd.
Increase chances of success to minimize
failure and reduce stress. Eg: practicing for
competition.
Strategies like Muscle Relaxation to minimize
stress.
 Positive Effects of Stress
  Produces a competitive environment.
 Isolation from stress ( especially like crowd,
opponents, weather conditions) might be
detrimental because athletes become
vulnerable to stress.
 It makes him physically and mentally
conditioned/stronger to find stress.
 Opportunities to learn arise due to stress in
life and sports.
 Some individuals are comfortable with certain
amount of stress known as thrill seekers. Eg
Mountain climbers, bikers, race drivers etc.

STRESS MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES

 MEDITATION
 Can be learned on own.
 Related to focus and concentration.
 Associated with specific religious some
extent.
 AUTOGENIC TECHNIQUE
 It is based upon passive concentration and
awareness of body sensations.
 One focuses on sensations like warmth or
heaviness in different regions of body.
 IMAGERY
 “Guided Imagery”
 Use of pleasant or relaxing images to calm
body and mind.
 By controlling breathing and visualising
soothing image, a state of deep relaxation can
occur.
 Easy method to try out.
 EXERCISE
 It helps to be happy, more emotionally
controlled, less stress.
 BIOFEEDBACK
 It is meant to achieve relaxation, control
stress responses or modify the body’s
reactions though the use of monitoring
equipment that provides information normally
to available.
 This feedback can be heart rate, blood
pressure, brain activity etc.
 By receiving this feedback one can learn to
identify the process that achieve the desired
result, such as reduction in heart rate.
 BENSON’S RELAXATION TECHNIQUE
 It involves repetition of a word or phrase
while quietly seated, 10-20 minutes a day.
 Designed to evoke the opposite body reaction
to the stress response.
 JACOBSON’S PROGRESSIVE MUSCLE
RELAXATION
 Mental relaxation will be natural outcome of
physical relaxation. It is specific stretching.
 10-20 minutes a day.
 YOGA
 It involves Yogic asana and pranayama.
 Deep breathing & focused breathing produces
natural relaxation.
 Breathing helps calms your body and mind,
release muscle tension.
 LAUGHTER
 Humour reduces stress.
 Being too serious or alert causes stress
often.
 A sense of humour also allows us to perceive
and appreciate the incongruities (discrepancy)
of life and provides moments of delight.
 Emotions we experience directly affect our
immune system.