Table tennis psychology workshop in Bishop Auckland

Brain-SPEC has again joined up with Bishop Auckland Table Tennis Club to offer another workshop. 


Do you ever feel you are playing really well in training but not in matches? A difficult thing in table tennis is to know how to make training feel more like matches and matches feel more like training and how to get the most out of the limited training you have access to. The two topics we will look at in this workshop are-

• Training Optimisation 
• how to make the most of every minute when training and optimise the speed in which you improve and transfer that into matches. 
• Routine Setting 
• How to best prepare for matches to make sure you play closer to your best on a more consistent basis. 

These topics will build upon the previous 2 workshops given last year at Bishop Auckland TTC but are also designed for people new to the whole topic.

Players of any level who are interested in improving their performance in table tennis can benefit from this workshop, by learning skills that can be practiced and integrated day in day out for the rest of their lives!

The workshop will take place on Tuesday 26th May 6pm-8pm at Bishop Barrington School, home of Bishop Auckland TTC and will cost £8 per person. Parents of children under 16 are welcome to sit in on the workshop free of charge.

Players who are attending the training camp the following day will particularly benefit as these skills can be worked on during the camp. A discount is also available to these players by contacting Matt Porter.

Those who wish to book their place on this camp can do so by contacting Matt Porter at Matt@bishopaucklandttc.co.uk or on 07411018856 or by emailing brainspecsports@gmail.com

Team goal setting workshop in Bishop Auckland

Reaching your goal, as a TEAM!

Having clear goals for your team is crucial to motivating your team to train harder and work more effectively together on and off the pitch.

This interactive workshop will give teams the opportunity to learn how to set effective goals both individually and as a team, while also allowing them to work with a specialist together to set goals for the coming season. It will also equip them to regulate, and reset goals in the future.

This workshop will be of great benefit to the team. It helps to improve team spirit, understanding of roles within the team and enjoyment of the collective unit they are part of. It is most effective when as many of the team as possible (most effectively, the full team) including the coach attends. 

It will take place at Bishop Barrington school in Bishop Auckland, home of Bishop Auckland Table Tennis Club on the evening of Monday 25th May 6pm

Please email Brainspecsports@gmail.com for further information or to sign your team up! It is well worth attending and could make the difference in your team`s season!

High numbers are anticipated and spaces are limited so get your team booked in early to avoid disappointment

Make Exclusive Sessions to make your club MORE Inclusive

Stopping people from coming to your sessions will increase the number of people coming to your sessions! While this may seem like a paradox, a contradictory idea, bear with me!
What I am talking about is having specific sessions aimed at certain types of people. In doing this, you are removing some of the reasons potential members of your club are staying away.

What reasons might they be?

One of the biggest factors in whether some people exercise or not is based on what they think other people will say/think about them! Two heavily under-represented sections of society in sport are women and people with handicaps (both mental and physical). I'm sure you can easily imagine some of the comments that might be made by some lesser minded people, or at the very least may go through the minds of someone considering whether to attend one of your club`s sessions and naturally imagines one of these scenarios occurring. This sort of thing is enough to push someone who is on the fence about attending over to the side of not attending.

How can you minimise this barrier to people?

Making specific sessions can help remove some of this thinking. If they know they can attend a session where they will not stick out, be laughed at, stared at, etc. and know that everybody else there is in the same boat (perhaps literally) then they a less likely to be put off.

What sort of sessions could your club offer?

As already mentioned, women-only sessions are already becoming more popular, but some other sessions may be disability sessions, age-specific sessions (e.g. over 50s, under 18s), beginner-only sessions (so they don't feel they will be laughed at if they are terrible, which even the best players were at some point!)

Won't this exclusion lessen my session numbers?

No. Let us take women-only as an example, think about how many women generally attend your mixed sessions currently. It is most likely not very many...
Now think that half the people in the world are women. Half the potential attendees of your sessions are at risk of excluding themselves from coming because of these fears. This is already limiting your sessions!

Should all your sessions do this?

No. I talked at the start about this being more inclusive as a club, but surely if all the sessions are specific then the club is segregating members and therefore not actually being very inclusive and diverse!
Well, this is where also having general, open sessions is also important, and having regular social events where all are invited encourages interaction between members of different sessions. Then they realise perhaps those others aren't so bad, and perhaps they won't be laughed at if they attend the open sessions. Then, once these fears have been put to bed, you have thriving, busy open sessions and a clearer pathway for non-playing potential people to get involved safely, then progress into active, engaged members of your club!

As a result of doing these things you build a diverse, inclusive, thriving club with people engaged from all walks of life.
This next part may sound extreme, but it is these little small steps that amount to big change...
Obesity and physical inactivity are two of the biggest killers in the world at the moment, think of how many of those who die as a result might have not exercised because of these fears. Opening the doors for these under-represented sections of society will save lives! Also, having a diverse, engaged club will help build bridges between sections of society, removing some of the stigmas attached wrongly to certain people, such as mentally and physically handicapped people. The positive social effect may also create a better society where you live and in the world!

Furthermore one more reason to do it... there are a lot of funding opportunities currently being offered to fund such projects from organisations such as Sport England, so doing these things may even make great financial sense for your club anyway, even if the numbers at these sessions are lower as a result of the specialising!

England- Book your Brain-SPEC workshops in May!

Brain-SPEC will be looking at setting up workshops in England during May. 

If your club is interested in hosting one then get in touch now to ensure the dates that work best for you are not booked up!

Prices will vary depending upon numbers of participants (the more, the cheaper it will for everybody!) and the topic can be specifically aimed towards your club.

Send an email to Brainspecsports@gmail.com to allow your club to benefit from a workshop.

Ask Me Anything, on Youtube!

Brain-SPEC launching a brand new Youtube channel! Exciting, no?

What is more exciting is that to kick it off, you have the chance to ask me anything!

interested in knowing what it is like to work with a performance enhancement specialist? Want to know about the techniques that are sometimes used? Or just always wondered what my favourite team is? You can ask me ANYTHING. 

Send your questions via twitter @BrainSPECsports via email Brainspecsports@gmail.com on the BrainSPEC Facebook page or in the comments at the bottom of this page.
I will collect all the questions and put together a video where I answer as many of them as possible and post it on the youtube channel.

Struggles of a Training Athlete- Focusing on one thing at a time

As mentioned in the blog post from the Expert in a year challenge Sam enjoyed his training camp because (unlike normal training), he was able to completely forget about all the other work and worries he had and solely focus on improving his table tennis. The other side of this positive thing is the way it suggests the other training he was normally doing was not 100% focused because he was still thinking about work he needed to do or other places he needed to be.

This has undoubtedly affected the quality of his training and therefore his rate of development. In the Train Smart Play Smart series I talk a lot about the importance of maximising the effectiveness of the training you are doing, and if you are not completely focused during training that will not allow this to happen.

So how do we enable ourselves to focus when training? Do we (like Sam) need to take ourselves away to another country and forget about all other elements of life? Perhaps your boss, partner, kids, friends, parents, bank balance etc might not be so happy about that idea. For most people it is about juggling all the elements of life in a way you can get the most out of each part.


Here are a few tips (that don't just apply to sport) on how to maximise efficiency through focusing on one thing at a time!

Spend time getting in the right frame of mind

The same way you would take time to prepare yourself for your best performance in a match, take time to prepare yourself for your best performance in training. Warm-up routines are a good way of systematising your preparations and ensuring you are in the right frame of mind any time that you play.

use Trigger Music/Video

As part of this preparing integrate some sort of music or video. Associate this music with your sport and then on those days where you might have a harder time forgetting about that meeting at work, the music will help to get `in the mood` for training

Set Goals and Plans

Don't just go into a training session without a plan. If you have a plan, then you have less opportunity for your mind to wander because there is a focused, structured plan to follow.

Shorten the training sessions- humans struggle to focus intensively for long periods of time, that means if you are training for a long time youre more likely to lose focus and that makes the hours you have put in less effective. It is better to have shorter, more effective focused training than long, unfocused sessions.

Schedule Effectively

Will you have your best training session straight after long busy day at work? Probably not. Admittedly there will be parts of life that you cant move around just to suit you, for instance you may have to work 9-5 every weekday whether you like it or not. However, within that week there may be days that are more or less stressful. So, if you can schedule your more intensive training for the days where you are less tired/stressed then you will probably have a better training session.

using these tips should help you to be more focused during your training sessions, and as mentioned at the beginning these tips can also be used in other parts of your life for instance to be more productive at work!

If you enjoyed these tips and found them helpful, or if you have any tips of your own, leave a comment. Also, check out the other articles on the website and if you are interested in working with Brain-SPEC on a more personal basis, click `contact Brain-SPEC` at the top of the page. This is the most effective way in which brain-SPEC can help you with your performance... and if you haven't noticed, the idea behind these posts is maximising that effectiveness!!!