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After several days of volatile weather that forced torrential rain into you from every angle, including up, the sun finally reappeared making a sunny summer Sunday at Muirfield, Scotland. It was nearing noon, and after a morning of following around our few remaining players in the final round of the 2002 Open Championship, head Swedish coach Peter Mattsson and I ducked into the players lounge for a quick bite of lunch. As is typical on the final day of a golf tournament, the lounge was about half full of players with their families and coaches. As we stood in line for the buffet, I noticed the tall, strapping figure of Ernie Els come through the door. Ernie was leading the tournament and consequently, would tee off last that day, so he was getting lunch before warming up for his final round.
As he made his way to the lunch line, I heard someone call to him “How you feeling Ernie?” His reply caught me by surprise. “I’m not feeling all that confident,” he said in the languid South African accent of his. Champions were suppose to be confident–supremely so. The day before I had watched (and listened to) Tiger Woods’ supreme confidence never waiver while he shot the highest round he would ever shoot in a major tournament. While Tiger’s score climbed, his confidence never seemed to fall.
And now, on the very next day of the same tournament, the leader Ernie Els wasn’t “feeling all that confident.” As a coach, that was one of those moments that I could neither explain or ever forget, because you see, Ernie went on to win that tournament after 5 extra play off holes. Responding to a question about his thoughts during his final round, Els confessed “I was asking myself, is this the way you want to lose another major? Is this the way you want to screw up an Open championship?” Not the thoughts one normally associates with winning major championships. Certainly not what I would hope any of my players would be thinking or feeling in the final round of a tournament. Ernie’s confidence-challenged championship has long remained a mystery to me.
Until earlier this week. I came across a research report in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports that shed some interesting light on the long held believe that confidence is a pre-requisite for success. In studying elite sport climbers, it was found that climbers with higher levels of pre-performance anxiety were actually more successful then those with lower levels of anxiety. It appears that the anxiety made the climbers more cautious, particularly over the most difficult sections of the race routes. Because of the caution, they made fewer mistakes and had better overall times. Could this have been Ernie’s secret weapon? Did his lack of confidence lead to a more conservative, less-risky route on the course and with fewer mistakes he prevailed over those who took risky chances? Perhaps someday I will have the chance to ask him. In the meantime, I’ve seen confidence in a very different light when it comes to competition. I’d rather have it than not have it, but it clearly isn’t a necessary ingredient for success.
About the Author – Paul G. Schempp
Dr. Schempp, president of Performance Matters, Inc., is a professional speaker, coach and consultant. Paul has more than 25 years of experience in the fields of research, teaching and professional development. Individuals and organizations in business, education and sport have elevated their expertise and achieved exceptional performance by working with Dr. Schempp.
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I totally agree with you about confidence. I had a thought today that confidence is only an illusion to being a necessary ingredient to playing well. I googled to see if anyone else had the same thought and your article was the first thing to pop up. When we play well we tend to have confidence as a result of playing well and when we play poorly we tend to lose confidence as a result of playing poorly. Therefore, it seems like maybe we associate confidence as an ingredient for success because it is usually present when we are playing well.