Sport-Blog.com

At first I was a little surprised when I read in an otherwise excellent business book what leading sports personalities in America unanimously considered to be their greatest motivator for performance.

You'd expect it to be the dollars most of them earned. Or something else. Anything else but fear.

Yep. Fear of failure, fear of letting down their fans. At first I found this a little odd. After all we are all too familiar with that numbing fear that makes you freeze and unable to even think. How can that fear work for somebody in sports?

And even stranger was the fact that the book in question was actually a business book written by some famous American who made millions promoting… you guessed it, sports personalities.

Having had the privilege of being an international sportsman more than two decades ago, on the other side of the world, I cast my mind back and really thought about it.

It wasn't long before it dawned on me how true this statement was. I went to high school in a part of the world where instead of Football they play Rugby; I had actually experienced fear many times as a motivator.

I would practice for hours on end, trying to make a long field kick and I would never quite get it right. But come the big day of the game. With screaming home fans I would hold the ball and real fear would engulf me. Fear that I would mis-kick and disappoint all those adoring screaming fellow high school kids, (not to mention the girls).

As I kicked the ball I would get this strange sensation of extra energy flowing through my body, is that what they call adrenalin? And I would watch with pleasure as the ball soared high in the air. I would turn and run back knowing it was a good kick and my whole being would be bathed in the screaming adoring cheering of hundreds of voices with my name on their lips.

Then I played the same sport at international level and the worst fear I have ever felt in my life happened. The action took place in a farming province in a place called Matebeleland, Zimbabwe in an international game for my country.

Moments earlier a team mate had taken a heavy tackle from two Zimbabwean farmers built more heavily than most NFL players I know. It had been some sort of "sandwich" tackle that had caused him to pass out cold. He was carried off on a stretcher still unconscious and the game continued as if nothing had happened.

The next thing I knew was that I was getting under a long field kick with the same two farmers bearing down on me. As I concentrated on making a clean catch, I could feel that sickening fear gripping the pit of my stomach more tightly than I have ever felt it do, to this day. But I surprised even myself at how calmly I caught the ball and stepped in one direction only to calmly and suddenly make a sharp turn in the opposite one. I could smell the farmer’s hot breath as they rushed past me in the wrong direction and the crowd went wild with delight.

In the video footage it all looked pure magic. No sign or hint of any fear. Just pure magic.

I have fear to thank for that move, the move of my life in my short but eventful sports career.