A Routine Before You Compete: What the Research Supports and What Athletes Do

Researchers at the University of Vienna pooled the results of studies covering 15 sports and about 800 athletes, and asked one question: does doing the same set of things before you perform make you perform better? Their answer, published in November 2021, was yes, and for beginners as well as elite athletes.

The finding is useful to a young athlete because a routine costs nothing, needs no coach and can start this week.

What counts as a routine

The researchers define a pre-performance routine as a set of task-relevant thoughts and actions an athlete carries out systematically before performing.

Their example is Michael Jordan at the free-throw line: feet shoulder-width apart, spin the ball, bounce it three times, spin it again, look at the hoop, shoot. Every time.

Two words in the definition carry the weight. Systematically means the same way each time, in practice as well as in competition. Task-relevant means it points attention at the job. The study’s last author, sport psychologist Peter Gröpel, says routines of this kind can raise concentration and help an athlete reach the mental state in which they perform best.

The study compared kinds of routine and found a benefit across them. So there is no single correct one to copy.

What Indian athletes describe

Manu Bhaker, who won two bronze medals in shooting at the Paris Olympics, told The Week in 2024 that her mother, a Sanskrit and Hindi lecturer, used to recite the meaning of phrases from the Bhagavad Gita when she was a child. She began reading it as part of her daily routine only about a year before the Games. She credits her mother, her yoga and meditation teacher and her coach.

What stands out in her account is that it is daily and that it is about meaning. Her meditation teacher gives her two shlokas at a time and asks her to take the sense of them into her life.

That is one athlete’s practice. Others use breathing, music, a fixed warm-up order or a few minutes of silence. The research does not rank them.

Where a prayer or a mantra fits

Many Indian families already have a daily practice: a prayer, a chalisa, a mantra, a few minutes of quiet. An athlete who grew up with one does not need to invent a routine. They have one.

We want to be exact about what is and is not claimed here. The Vienna study looked at pre-performance routines in general. It did not test prayer or chanting, and we have found no study we could read that did. What the research supports is having a steady routine. Which one is a matter for the athlete and the family, of any faith or none.

If a mantra or chalisa is part of yours, Mantra Spirit, from our own team, carries the text with transliteration and translation in 15 languages, on its website and in an Android app. The app adds word-by-word meaning and a daily reminder. Understanding the words is the part Manu Bhaker’s teacher insisted on.

Building one

Keep it short. A routine that takes 20 minutes will be dropped on the first rushed match day.

Give it a fixed order. Two or three steps, always in the same sequence, is enough: for example slow breaths, one cue word for technique, one look at the target.

Use it in training first. A routine that only appears on competition day is new on the day it is needed most.

Keep it in your own hands. A routine that depends on a particular seat, a particular person or a lucky item breaks when that thing is missing. Breath, words and attention travel anywhere.

The moments a routine is built for are the ones described in Performing under observation and Composure under scrutiny. For the wider load of training and study together, read The mental side of the dual journey.

A routine is a tool for ordinary nerves. A child who is persistently anxious, low or not sleeping needs a conversation with a doctor or counsellor.