Victor in mente, victor in corpore

The intellectual preparation of the athlete is designed to develop the ability to accumulate a relevant reservoir of knowledge necessary for successful participation in sport. Decision-making ability and cognitive creativity in part determine how efficiently the athlete will compete. The athlete must be independent, not vulnerable to manipulation by the coach or any other administrator within the sport and be able to control the self in the chosen competitive arena. Such development of thought capacity requires years, and a patient coach who strategically plans the individual’s preparation through integrated inputs. Sport science support is necessary to give an objective foundation to the development of athlete cognition. Such universal preparation is now a basic requirement for the athlete competing against organised coaching systems operating in other countries, which emphasise overall development. The terminology should not put coaches off making use of specialist input; a cognitive strategy is simply needed for a thinking competitor. Given that competition implies adaptation to changing variables, the athlete should not be limited through lack of intellectual preparation.