Peak Performance
Difficulties encountered which could be enhanced
Athletes invest a lot of time in their physical preparation. To reach new heights, many use Neurofeedback to train their brains.
Every region of the brain plays a special role in attention, concentration, anxiety, sleep, visual information processing and more. When an athlete consults us to improve their performances, we will first take into account the sport practiced, because the brain networks to train will vary according to the discipline.
For example, a hockey player will need to have fast reaction times and an ability to effectively process visual information. On the other hand, a person who practices golf should be better able to remain calm and focused. We will therefore train different networks in these two athletes.
Increase the
concentration
No matter what sport is practiced, the ability to focus well and stay focused is paramount. Neurofeedback is then used to train the regions and circuits of the brain that are responsible for attention and concentration. Thus, the athlete will develop a greater ability to be focused.
Decreasing anxiety
and enhancing sleep
Some athletes will have a high level of anxiety that will hurt them, as it will take the athlete over his performance zone. A higher stress level will also cause muscle tension, which will reduce reaction times and movement accuracy. An anxious brain profile will also have the effect of reducing the quality of sleep and sometimes even cause insomnia. The effect of a bad sleep can be catastrophic. It decreases concentration, recovery and reaction times. Neurofeedback training is then used to calm hyperactive regions in the brain and reduce or eliminate anxiety and improve sleep.
Improve
reaction time
When you train the brain using Neurofeedback, it becomes more efficient. In athletes we use the application “Sleep-2-peak” developed by the neurologist Marc Therrien in order to measure the speed at which the brain perceives a visual information and commands a physiological reaction. In some athletes we trained in Neurofeeback, we noticed an improvement in reaction times of over 30%. In other words, the athlete had become 30% faster to react!
- Level of concentration accented
- Better ability to recover
- Accelerated reaction time
- Better stress management
- Improved performance
Even if many athletes use Neurofeedback to improve their performances, the majority of them will not publicly disclose it. They do not want to reveal this “secret weapon”. However, among those who unveiled it were Quebec’s Alexandre Bilodeau, a freestyle skiing medalist at the 2010 and 2014 Olympic Games.
At the Neuroperforma clinic, we trained dozens of national, international and professional athletes in different sports including hockey, football, soccer, figure skating, tennis, boxing, fencing, judo, motorcycle racing and motor racing. Each of them noticed an improvement in their performances, following the training done at home.