Rafael Nadal Quotes

You don't play against opponents, you play against the game of basketball.

The mind is absolutely instrumental in achieving results, even for athletes. Sports psychology is a very small part, but it's extremely important when you're winning and losing races by hundredths and even thousandths of a second.

My golf is woeful but I will never surrender.

I'm a sports junkie, and I am interested in athletic will - how you exceed the expectations of your own performance when it counts to deliver something beyond yourself so that you can win.

Half this game is 90 percent mental.

I know as a coach and a player we had three a day practices and that was physically taxing but at least we had food in our stomach and a good nights rest and plenty of cold water.

Track and field is tougher physically, but golf is tougher mentally.

Sports psychology or mental training has been viewed as a weakness, and I think that's a pretty silly way to look at it.

The mental aspect of kicking is the difficult part. Physically, we still have to be in shape and perform on the field, but the thing that separates the ones who make it versus the ones who don't is definitely the mental side.

I know my game pretty well, and that is the secret to success in most sports.

Running is a mental sport, more than anything else. You're only as good as your training, and your training is only as good as your thinking.

The power of the human will to compete and the drive to excel beyond the body's normal capabilities is most beautifully demonstrated in the arena of sport.

To have any doubt in your body is the biggest weakness an athlete can have.

I understand the psychology of the sport, especially inside the ring. From bell to bell, from when my entrance plays and I step through that curtain, people have to wonder what's going on inside that guy's head.

Dr. Parent has been a great influence on my mental game. ZEN GOLF is the best book at connecting golf and the mind together. It's for everyone, it really helps, and you're really going to enjoy it.

Obviously in the world of sports, you go through different ups and downs than in normal life. You might be on top of the world playing or you're sidelined with an injury.

Golf is the cruelest game, because eventually it will drag you out in front of the whole school, take your lunch money and slap you around.

I've had moments where I didn't hit the ball very good coming in, and you've got to turn it around. That's the whole idea of practicing and really working on being focused on what I'm doing and being committed to what I'm doing. I know what the fix is and I've proven it to myself, and it's just a matter of going out there and executing it consistently over 72 holes.

Golf is the only game I know of that actually becomes harder the longer you play it.

You learn to accept defeat graciously in golf. Unlike other sports, the game itself is a constant opponent. It never stops. A golfer is fortunate to win a few times. We spend our whole lives trying to conquer something, and we lose a lot more than we win.

The street to obscurity is paved with athletes who perform great feats before friendly crowds. Greatness in major league sports is the ability to win in a stadium filled with people who are pulling for you to lose.

I am the toughest golfer mentally.

It's a really weird mindset to kind of try to take my mentality on the basketball court and bring it here on to the golf course. I don't want to have too high of expectations on, like, each hole, just try to enjoy the process, but hopefully get out to a good start tomorrow and be in the conversation and see what happens.

Golf isn't a sport, it's a game. I'm not saying it's not a difficult game, with lots of mental stuff. But it's not a sport like mine. Where is the combat, the intensity of what we do?

Thinking instead of acting is the number one golf disease.