Fear of Failure Syndrome

Fear of failure syndrome is a psychological phenomena that inhibits a person from being involved in any challenge where a result can be achieved. 

Fear of failure syndrome can affect people from any age and who are involved in any task, from competition sports to college exams and everything in between. 

The cause of FOFS can be found rooted in child hood development. From a sporting perspective children can be made feel that they won't be socially accepted unless they win medals, especially if they have friends on the team that have won medals. 

In some cases parents who create stress and cause pressurised environments around children in sport can also be responsible for creating FOFS in their own child. How many times have you seen a parent barking orders at a child involved in a sports competition? And if that child doesn't win or place, how many parents criticise and tell them what they did wrong? There are plenty. A child in this situation now relates being scolded and criticised to being involved in competition. Inevitably turning what should be a fun endeavour into a task that could result in them feeling like they've let the parent down, which results in a spiralling psychological breakdown where the child equates performance to family acceptance. They inevitably quit sport. Fact. 

The problem with FOFS, if it's not already obvious, is that it can and will plague a child through their teens and haunt them well into adulthood. So much so that tasks such as interviews, exams and other sporting events are avoided or results are diminished due to the hard wiring of their thought processes carried out when they were children back when this fear was established.

When I was in school in 1993, junior cert year, there was a girl who had her arm purposely broken so she could not sit her exams. Her excuse was her parents would "kill her" if she under performed. Of course the school got wind of the arm break incident and councillors and child psychologists became involved. She had to sit the exams anyway. This is a very cruel example of the lengths a human being will go to avoid being challenged or tested, simply based on a result that will either have them accepted or not. 

I've come across many many manifestations of FOFS. I had a mental blockage myself over the years of 2005 and 2006/7 when I became an instructor. Now I felt my performance on the mat would determine whether I was a good instructor or not. I fought in Bulgaria in 2007 and had to ask people who travelled with me to wait outside the arena, in case I lost. I made it into the final which was broadcast on Bulgarian television. FOFS had me by the neck. It wasn't until I became involved with coaching at a higher level and had 8 one on one sessions with a sports psychologist that I began to learn about this phenomena and the damage it can do. Only by understanding it could I move to deal with it. Becoming involved in White Water kayaking and going on the be an instructor in this sport was when I really began to understand the phenomena a whole pile more. 

Coaching juniors in the combat sports can really open your eyes to how FOFS can get in their way of what should be enjoyment. I've seen it first hand, it mostly manifests itself in the form of feigning injury or sickness. At the European Championships in 2008 I had to deal with a fighter who didn't want to fight because of a sore toe. In 2011 a fighter broke down and cried their eyes out. In both cases neither person was concerned about their well being, they weren't concerned about being hurt in the ring, they were concerned about their result. FOFS loomed over them like a black cloud. In both cases in my opinion, it was more about peer acceptance and the need to be seen to perform so they could fit in with the team and the team's results. Sounds silly doesn't it? But it's completely paralysing. 

Social media has also weighed into this problem with its two feet. Now I'm seeing junior athletes, only new to the fight scene with a handful of international outings creating athlete "like" pages on facebook. Youth culture in the 21st century equates the amount of likes they get on a picture or a post to actual acceptance and friendship. To many, including adults, there is no differentiation between real friendship in human terms and the sight of a little blue thumb on a facebook post. 

These like pages can be problematic. The junior athlete will put up their statuses about their fight preparation. About how their training is going, early morning sessions, gym visits and healthy eating habits etc. This attracts well wishes and slaps on the back from all their "friends" both real and virtual. Before long they have created an online reputation of being a skilled and dedicated athlete. Problem is, it's just an online reputation. The athlete wins at some small local tournaments, 14 gold medals strung around their neck, facebook goes wild. The reputation grows. But now they face the real challenge of international competition. All the likes and friends remind them they're going for gold, all out victory is at hand, the crowd await the arrival of the emperor who has told the crowd about how cool they're going to look.

On the mat they face an athlete who has no page, probably no facebook. They've trained in silence. Our online hero receives a defeat. How hard that must be to have to report that back to the virtual fan base. Some don't report back, many will claim they were "absolutely robbed", others might claim to be injured or sick. The excuses will be many. But all of the excuses are not needed. 

Junior athletes no matter what the sport need to have a healthy approach to competition. One that allows them the opportunity to enjoy participating above having to perform for medals or results. A competition day needs to be a day out with friends, having a healthy competitive edge where they want to feel like they've performed their best, even if they didn't. The psychological advantages to this approach will manifest 100 fold as they develop as young adult athletes and into adult hood in society. 

As coaches and parents there many ways to help FOFS stay at bay. 

Here are some tips:

1. Unconditional positive regard no matter what the result. A person's sporting performances does not define them as a person.

2. Parents - Remember it's them in the ring performing, not you. You're not competing for your own reasons. 

3. Allow coaches to do their jobs. Win or lose a good coach will always find the positives and create an atmosphere of achievement. Just because you watch UFC and trained for 6 months as a child doesn't qualify you to know more than the pros. 

4. Always, always, always encourage participation in competition and never focus on the result - "You should go and enjoy yourself! You'll feel great afterwards whether you win or lose!" - needs to be the language used. 

5. Avoid unnecessary parent coaching. Chances are the child knows more about the sport than you do.

6. Make big the effort the child has made in competing, make sure that the effort made is not overshadowed by the lack of a medal and vice versa, never make a bigger deal when a medal is won you don't want to set that bar for every competition. 

For anyone that has competed with me in the corner, they'll know what my last words are to them before they step on the mats "enjoy yourself".

In 2012, Brendan faced a tough Russian in the semi final of the WAKO junior world championships. There was thousands in the arena. We were centre ring, the lights were beating down on us. He did his usual routine when he stands into the ring, he looked nervous but focused. I stopped him in his tracks and said "hey look around, breath in that atmosphere, soak up that energy. You're in the semi final of the WAKO worlds baby you've nothing to prove to anyone, it doesn't get bigger than this. This IS Olympic level kickboxing, you have to enjoy it, just like I am". 

He smiled, he slapped my hand with his glove and he went to work like he always does and made the final. 

We enjoyed ourselves.

The Irish Open 2015 - A review, an analyses and our journey towards gold.

 

The Irish Open

A review, an analyses and our journey towards gold.

Lauren, Alan, Pawel, Darragh and Brendan chatting with friends before the kick off

The Irish Open International is a modern Kickboxing phenomena.

2015 saw it reach it's 22^nd year. It also saw it reach participant numbers of well over 4,000. Phenomenal.

They say success is a result of many synergising factors or a number of things that coincide within a time frame to create the environment for success to develop. With that in mind, I would like to pay sincere credit to the people behind the Irish Open. The folks who have worked tirelessly over the last 22 years to create the type of opportunities that allow such an event to take place, on such a huge scale, on our door steps here in Ireland.

Roy Baker certainly has the Midas touch when it comes to Kickboxing. He'll tell you different, but that's just him. What he says in relation to the success of the Irish Open is simply modesty at play. He is right however, there is a huge team behind it, but without his vision 22 years ago, without his commitment to the event, without his desire to influence the Irish Kickboxing scene, without his approach that puts the fighter first - none of this could be realised today in 2015. I remember Roy, when I was a kid at the Irish School of Taekwon-Do coming down to train with us and telling us of his new tournament that he was working on.

Congratulations to Roy and his team.

In relation to our own results, they too have been phenomenal. 2014 was the first time we notched up championship status at the Irish Open. Lauren Bradshaw took home the gold in the +70kg's points and Brendan Kenny, who had joined us six months previous, also notched up a victory winning the -84's. Both Brendan and Lauren are unbelievably committed young athletes. Their entire life revolves around their training.

Brendan came to Red Star as a good fighter. He had notched up some nice victories in some small international tournaments. In order for him to develop into the fighter he is today, he had to adapt and modernise his movement. As his new coach, I was concerned at how long this would take him. He had some small habits ingrained in his movement that would inevitably be exploited by real world class fighters and at his first outing with us at a high level, he was left reeling after been beaten by Eric Melhorne of Elite Fighters at the senior national Kickboxing championships. He was swept, kicked and countered by Eric. This was the eye opener for Brendan. From here he took every part of our training programme and worked it to the bone. Two years on and he's now Irish Open Champion for 2015 taking on the very best in the world in the -79kg division.

It seems Lauren has been training and fighting since she was born! Lauren joined Red Star when she was 7 years old. Since she was 11 she has competed internationally with us. Throughout those years she competed at similarly small international tournaments but as our training adapted and modernised, she too led the way as our ambassador on the international stage. In 2012 as coach, I made a decision to move away from the smaller international tournaments and seek out the larger, tougher international events. Our first big one came in Bulgaria in 2012 when she won the ITF European Championships. This was the ITF under Prof Chang Ung. This ITF, the largest in the world at that time, put forward a huge championships with the largest division Lauren had ever fought in. In true form, she nailed it, and from there on we started our journey, next up for us was the obvious step into the world of the WAKO international tournaments. Lauren became WAKO European champion in 2013.

Not to drag this post into the realms of our history, but it is important to note one thing. That one thing is in line with the phenomenal success the Irish Open is, the commonality is this; success takes time. It takes time, commitment, hard bloody work, real tears, and passion, but most of all it takes courage. As a relatively small club in Dublin, we could have easily stayed the pace attending small level international tournaments. But we didn't want to. The sport we were involved in was evolving at a fast pace and we wanted to be apart of it all. We took a gamble but we were eager to learn and eager to be up there with the best. Our gamble paid off, for now. We never take anything for granted, and while we have two Irish Open champs training at Red Star, that was yesterday. That was last weekend. We still have work to do and we're still eager to learn and move forward with our sport.

The Irish Open itself ran seamlessly, or so it seemed from the outside. No doubt behind the scenes the organisers were operating on a higher level of consciousness! In fairness to them, they made it feel seamless.

This year Red Star had a slightly larger team registered, we also had Alan O'Connell who was going to take on the elite of the -69kg division. Alan is a Red Star veteran and is never afraid to step up to the mark. Alan is a different fighter than he was last year and without a doubt he will make his mark. Alan had a tough opener and lost on a split decision (2-1).

We also had Darragh Murphy from Galway. Darragh has only recently joined Red Star and is on his own journey now as he adapts and brings his own flavour to his sparring. Darragh won his first bout in the -74's against Wales. Next up he fought Colm Carroll who is the current junior WAKO world champion. Darragh certainly learned plenty. Movement at this level needs to be experienced, and from there on it needs to be understood and the training methods adapted. Darragh has plenty of potential and I look forward to watching his improvements over the next few years.

In the novice division we had Pawel Dabrik. Pawel is a new comer to Red Star and the Irish Open was his third tournament in Kickboxing. All credit to him for making the big step in to such a huge event. Unfortunately it wasn't to be for Pawel this time, losing out to a British fighter. Everyone has starts somewhere!

Lauren's division was comprised of a current WAKO European Champion from Team Blue blood in Britain and a current WAKO World Champion from Italy. Lauren had already been beaten by the Italian last year so it was a huge challenge for the 17 year old who had cut weight to also compete in the -70kg division.

After dispatching her first fighter from Wales with a unanimous decision she faced the European Champion in the next round. If she was to win this, the Italian world champ had just won her fight and waited for Lauren in the final. I would have been just happy with some improvements that we had been working on to have shown themselves in the fight, winning was a bonus. Well the improvements were there, along with a comprehensive victory over the European champion. Job done, for now!

Next up we had the current world champ in the final. It was easily Lauren's hardest bout to date. The Italian rocked her with a sharp right hand in the first round which put Lauren on to her back. She was shook, I've never seen her so shook. Knowing her as I do, I knew that inside her is an aggressive spirit but to access it you have to be very autocratic with her, and so I was - “get it to together” I said sharpishly. “you can beat this girl, now don't be giving me any nonsense, no tears you're meant to be a fighter” - I told her. She sucked it up and got back to business. The Italian hassled her and knocked her to the ground more than twice later. But, her well timed techniques had the Italian chasing points. In fact Lauren's timing was impeccable. Although she might not have thought it, she was picking off points as the Italian drove forward knowing she was behind. In fairness to the excellent judging they spotted every simple technique that scored.

With 10 seconds left the Italian came for the kill bashing Lauren to the floor again and as she sat there, blood in her mouth, tears in her eyes not knowing that time was up, I turned to her and said “Jesus you won the bloody thing!”. It was a bitter sweet victory!

The Italians were annoyed that Lauren was knocked over so often. I don't think they realised that it was their fighter that knocked her over! In my experience rushing in to bash your opponent never works in continuous kickboxing. This is where impeccable timing and movement overcomes. And it did, Lauren had won the Irish Open.

Lauren taking centre stage

Brendan had dropped weight from last year and was competing in the -79's for the first time. It was a tough division with 48 fighters registered. The former world champion was there, last years Irish National Kickboxing champion was there, last years Irish Open champion was there, Robbie Haugh was there!

I wasn't too concerned about Brendan's opening bouts. He beat Austria easily enough, he then dispatched Switzerland as he was starting to warm up. Next up was a former WAKO world champion from Belgium. This was a cracker of a fight with Brendan taking a close split decision. However, the semi final and final now comprised of fighters from Robbie Haugh's Elite fighters gym. Last years winner Colly Gilshinan was next in the semi's. Robbie's fighters are always clever. They're tactical, they're super fit and they can box as well as kick. Brendan had already had a knock with Colly in the final of the senior nationals. Brendan had won that bout but Colly was destined to learn from that and come back with a new game plan. Colly was fast, aggressive too. He closed the distance incredibly fast and had Brendan under pressure in the first round. We changed the tactics slightly and opened up a lead with some deceptive head kicks, Brendan maintained a lead and took the win.

Phil O Gorman had stormed his way to the final on the other end of the draw sheet. Phil is a class fighter who has made significant improvements since last year. We had to be clever with Phil.

It was classic final. Light contact continuous kickboxing at its best. Phil went up, then Brendan went up, then Phil went up again. On the break we had a narrow lead. Sometimes a narrow lead on the break is not the greatest place to be in, especially when Robbie Haugh is sitting across from you. They changed tactics to take back some scores in round 2.

Phil blitzed Brendan, just as Colly had done a round previous. Brendan tried to counter with a back kick but his timing was off and he exited the ring. A second exit that resulted in a minus point. Brendan was behind with about 30 seconds on the clock.

We chased and chased, we brought it back to a draw. We chased some more, then Brendan stopped chasing. He held his ground, I thought maybe he thought he was ahead! I reminded him we needed scores, Brendan still held his ground – Phil also needed scores. It was then I realised what was to come. Brendan maintained range, Phil blitzed him and boom... off went the back kick, this time scoring to the ribs. Phil dropped to his knees and the scores flipped. In that 10 seconds, Brendan had taken the win. Very clever thinking by him, whilst being under pressure. That's the fighter Brendan is. A thoroughly well deserved win for him.

That winning feeling

So with all that said and done, it's time to put those wins in the drawer and now move on to the next challenge. The WAKO junior Europeans are this year in Spain. This is Lauren's last year as a junior. We'll have our goals set for this.

The WAKO senior World Championships are in Ireland this year, this will be Brendan's first year as a senior. Lots of challenges ahead, but we love challenges – it's what drives us on.

For now the internet is buzzing with all of the clubs that represented themselves at the Irish Open. We are but a small part of a huge movement of sport kickboxers. Everyone should be proud of themselves that attended and put themselves up against the best that's out there. Those that didn't attend, need to ask themselves – why not? Your egos are not as important as those people that come to you for training, coaching and opportunities.

On we go.

Jon Mackey

 

Light Contact Kickboxing

“A continuous evolution of Kickboxing”

Back in the early days of Kickboxing's development, only two disciplines existed; semi-contact and full contact. In the late 1970's and early 80's both of these disciplines were held on 8x8 meter open mats. At the time full contact kickboxing resembled full contact sport Karate, with Karate moves being executed with full power. It wasn't until full contact moved into the roped ring that it came to resemble more of a boxing style than Karate. Boxing became such an important aspect of full contact training that rules were imposed to ensure a certain amount of kicks were performed in each round. This departure in full contact widened the differences between itself and semi-contact kickboxing. Semi contact being the stop/start discipline where a point is awarded on the execution of the first clean technique to score. The fight is stopped, the point is awarded and then the fight continues.

During the early days, semi contact kickboxing was a stepping stone for fighters to transition to full contact, but with both styles now differing a great deal, it wasn't long before semi contact developed it's own identity, rule set and it's own brand of fighters.

This widening differences between these two original disciplines meant that it was hard for world authorities like WAKO to develop new fighters into the full contact discipline. In his excellent book “Kickboxing a Phenomenology of a Sport” WAKO President Ennio Falsoni describes the circumstances at the time as such - “The ring was revered and feared at the same time. We had to inject new blood into full contact, or otherwise we were heading nowhere.”

Ennio Falsoni WAKO President

It was originally Geert Lemmens who had come up with the idea to introduce a third discipline to try and resolve this problem for full contact. This new third discipline would act as the new transition discipline for full contact. It would entail fighters squaring off on the 8x8 meter open tatami, but unlike semi-contact the opponents would fight continuously, like full contact, over 2x2 minute rounds. This new discipline would be known as Light Contact Kickboxing. 

Geert Lemmens

In early Light Contact Kickboxing all techniques used in full contact were valid, however they were to be delivered with control. Ennio Falsoni described the new system as being similar to that type of sparring already in practice in gyms around the world; “This training exercise enabled them to fine-tune their attack and defence combinations, thus creating the automatic reactions essential for real fighting” (Kickboxing A Phenomenology of a Sport p.68).

Light Contact Kickboxing made it's debut on the world stage at the WAKO World Championships in Birmingham in 1983 five years after the first WAKO worlds in Full Contact and European championships in Semi-Contact (1978). As a demonstration discipline at the 1983 World Championships Light Contact went down a storm. Even though not many had entered into it's divisions it was the -57kg category that stole show with Gianpaolo Spanu exciting the crowds with his ability. Unfortunately and ironically he was disqualified for excessive contact having knocked out his opponent with a beautifully executed butterfly kick. None the less the new discipline attracted a huge amount of interest. In 1987 at the Munich based World Championships Light Contact was made an official sport of WAKO. 

Gianpaulo Spanu

 

Over the decades and since its inception, Light Contact has evolved and has since become a discipline with its own unique style. No longer is it a discipline used only to train up full contact fighters. Light Contact has become a very fast paced technical sport which includes all the speed and accuracy of Semi-Contact while maintaining the continuous flow of attack and counter attack of full contact.

Throughout the years the discipline has attracted many of the world's greatest kickboxers who have moulded and developed the style with their own unique methods. Slovenia's Tomaz Barada was one of the greatest Light Contact fighters WAKO has ever known. He amassed a staggering 84 Professional WAKO fights without loss, winning 6 World amateur titles along the way. His method of sparring showed the world how tactically useful a sharp lead leg was. He was able to beat world class kickboxers who relied on older training methods with the use of a lead leg. His use of counter kicking and having the ability to spin at short range meant he heavily influenced a generation of Light Contact fighters to develop their dynamic kicking ability at different ranges. 

Tomaz Barada

From the mid 1990's Light Contact became less full contact orientated with fighters now developing their ability to jab with their legs as well as their hands. Light Contact fighters became less flat footed like the full contact of old and became dynamic in movement akin to Semi-Contact but without the limiting side facing position that hampered the use of boxing techniques at close range. The rules also changed to accommodate this new fast and dynamic style of kickboxing. To ensure fast flowing techniques, techniques on the inside, like what you see on the ropes of a full contact fight, were not scored unless they were very obvious and very clean. Fighters today in the Light Contact disciplines will use a tactical exit away from the opponent in a bid to score a clean shot as they create distance, hence why you see good Light Contact kickboxers finishing hand combinations with a kick. Exiting the ring without being forced out three times will get you disqualified and the ring itself has become smaller, scaling down from the original 8x8 meters to 7x7 meters internationally and 6x6 at inter-club tournaments. This creates more action packed bouts with less hiding space for fighters like what you might see in the bigger rings.

Today all world class Light Contact fighters have a lead leg that they could eat their dinner with and a jab that has all the hall marks and speed of the semi-contact blitz or back-fist. They can all kick from close quarters and utilise switching movements to create an operating distance that allows them to score with their legs as they disengage from a clinch.

Present day Light Contact champions such as Ukraine's Katya Solovey, Britain's Elijah Everill and Ireland's Des Leonard are all part of the future evolution of Light Contact Kickboxing. They, and others like them continue to develop the sport as lightening fast continuous display of Kickboxing.

In the words of Ennio Falsoni himself; “In truth the words 'Light Contact' are something of a euphemism, as light contact has become a highly technical tough speciality. It has become a discipline of it's own characteristics and heroes”

Footnote: The next WAKO Senior World Championships will take place in City West, Dublin, Ireland this year (2015). Don't miss your opportunity to see the world's greatest on your door step.