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Greg Norman had a few good swings in him at the British Open on Sunday as fans lauded the 53-year-old Australian golfer's ability to keep up with the kids.
The Great White Shark would have won that coveted claret jug, they say, if only he didn't pull the same stunt he had in eight previous major championships. He choked.
Sports psychologists say some athletes repeatedly let their minds wander to how badly they want to win or how disappointed they were in their previous play.
Think U.S. figure skater Michelle Kwan's falter during two Olympic attempts, not winning a gold medal though she was both times the favoured athlete. Once playoff time rolls around, New York Yankees superstar Alex Rodriguez has a reputation for swinging and missing.
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What made Mr. Norman, who played well for most of the tournament, buckle when it counted most?
Pressure, anxiety and the lack of a plan, experts say.
"I believe he could have won had he had a plan and stuck with it," said Ontario-based golf psychologist Doug Smith. "When Greg Norman falls down where he does, he gets emotional and under stress."
While Dr. Smith says he's impressed with Mr. Norman's play, part of the problem is he has never developed a consistent mental game plan.
"Under pressure we always revert back to our original style. His style is a go-getter and not [to] use a plan or a strategy," he said.
It's not for lack of talent that athletes drop the ball, says Saul Miller, a Vancouver-based sports psychologist and author of Performing Under Pressure.
"We certainly know it's not about skill," he said. "Our feelings affect our thinking and our thinking affects our feeling. [Fear] causes contraction, tightening. At the same time it affects our thinking. The thought becomes 'don't miss, don't screw up' - the thought plays back into the emotion."
That tightening can have direct physical effects on an athlete's play, Dr. Miller says. The athlete's breath shortens, his heart rate quickens and he gets tunnel vision because of all the pressure.
And it's all because they want it so bad they can taste it, says Krista Chandler, a sports psychologist at the University of Windsor in Ontario.
"Choking usually only occurs in situations of some type of emotional importance to the athlete," she says. Because of their strong desire, athletes tend to think too much instead of focusing on the task at hand. "It's an excessive concern with the mechanics of skills execution," she said. "That exact same putt, they're now overthinking how to sink it."
Instead of imagining the pop of Champagne corks and the gleam of a gold medal, athletes need to step back and realign themselves, says Andy Higgins, director of the National Coaching Institute for the Ontario region.
"It's called being both the observer and the participant. The observer part says, 'Oh, you've lost it here; step back and take a breath,' " he says.
"Recognizing what's happening and being able to do something about it are two different things," he says. "Some can work their way through it and some can't."
When athletes are recovering from disappointment, Mr. Higgins says, he often asks them to get some perspective and stay confident in their abilities.
"When all is said and done, you look at somebody like Greg Norman, you know the man has life in perspective. ... Do you think he's disappointed? You better believe he is. But he doesn't get into the stuff that makes it worse."
It doesn't help that Mr. Norman lost a venerable title - he would have been the oldest man to win the British Open - to victor Padraig Harrington, 36, who enlisted the help of famed sports psychologist Bob Rotella, said sports psychologist Mario Faveri, who is based in London, Ont.
"To be in a position to be the oldest golfer to win the British Open, that would make it difficult to focus on the task at hand," he said.
Dr. Miller says if athletes imagine themselves with all the abilities and none of the pressure, they'll pack a heavier punch at game time.
"I often ask athletes to pick an athlete with the qualities they would like to have," Dr. Miller said. "If Norman had been a little more the Shark, he might've just won the thing."
