The SportMind podcast presents world class thinkers and leaders to discuss all aspects of the mind and how to craft mental strength and flexibility for all walks of life no matter the domain or setting. SportMind is the gym of the mind. The app of action that keeps you at the top of your game, thinking like a pro. At work, at home, or out and about. As a young professional, husband, wife, parent, or weekend warrior. SportMind is a mental strengthening conditioning app - honing, hammering, shaping, and sharpening. It’s your window into elite thinking and your toolbox for tackling the throes of life and being the best version of yourself. Your coach, mentor and motivator in your pocket. By your side, 24/7. Your voice of reason and calm when yours has abandoned you. To find out more visit www.SportMind.io (www.SportMind.io)
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Overcoming The Top-10 Mental Obstacles In Sport - https://go.sportmind.io/Mastery (https://go.sportmind.io/Mastery)
The SportMind Portal - https://go.sportmind.io/Portal (https://go.sportmind.io/Portal)
The Daily SportMind Book: https://www.sportminddaily.com/ (https://www.sportminddaily.com/)
The Squash Playbook - https://www.squashplaybook.com/ (https://www.squashplaybook.com/) ⚫️💨
Three Olympic Games, three finals in the same event. Sixth, then fifth, then fourth. She got closer every single time, and the medal never came. In Rio, she missed it by a fingertip. So here's the question that makes this whole episode: What do you do when the thing you gave 20 years of your life to never arrives?
My guest today is Hannah Miley MBE, a Scottish swimming icon, double Commonwealth champion, world and European champion, European record holder, and the most decorated Scottish woman her sport has ever seen.
Three Olympics, 15 plus years at the very top. But the medal that was meant to fix everything, it never landed. And when she finally stood on a Commonwealth podium two years later, silver around her neck, she told me it didn't fill the hole she thought it would. That's where this one gets honest. In this episode, we get into the good stuff.
Why she says the worst thing you can do when you race is to think. The strange pre-race ritual she swears by. Breathing out hot colors, breathing in cool ones, flat on her back on the floor. What it's like being coached by your own dad for your entire career. Why she's now on a mission to change how sport talks about women's health, and the two words she'd give her younger self that still get her: You're good enough.
If you've ever tied your whole worth to a result, a ranking, a medal, a number on a scoreboard, this one is gonna land. Grab a cuppa. Let's get into it.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/smiley8889/ (https://www.instagram.com/smiley8889/)
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15 Jul 2026
Dr. Aakash Shah
Overcoming The Top-10 Mental Obstacles In Sport - https://go.sportmind.io/Mastery (https://go.sportmind.io/Mastery)
The SportMind Portal - https://go.sportmind.io/Portal (https://go.sportmind.io/Portal)
The Daily SportMind Book: https://www.sportminddaily.com/ (https://www.sportminddaily.com/)
The Squash Playbook - https://www.squashplaybook.com/ (https://www.squashplaybook.com/) ⚫️💨
Here's something that properly messed with my head. You can train your mind, your breathing, your self-talk, all the stuff I bang on about every week, and you can still walk on court, feel the pressure, and freeze, and it might have nothing to do with your mindset. It might be your eyes. Yes, your eyes.
My guest today is Dr. Aakash Shah, a board-certified neurodevelopmental and sports vision optometrist. Yeah, that's quite a mouthful. UCLA, a doctorate in optometry, adjunct professor, the lot. He works with everyone from kids chasing their first scholarship to pro quarterbacks and baseball players.
But here's the bit that got me. Akash was born with a lazy eye, no depth perception, and every single doctor told him the same thing. That's just how you are. Live with it. He didn't. Six years of training later, he did ten times the vision in that eye and got his depth perception back. The man rebuilt his own eyes, and now he does it for athletes. In this one, we get nerdy. Why eighty to ninety percent of your game is actually your vision. Why elite players really do see the ball in slow motion, and why it's not magic.
The one-eye drill that can calm your nerves mid-match. And he walks me through a free eight-minute neural warmup you can do before you play. I'm doing it live on the call, head wobbling all over the place and getting it wrong. If you've ever trained like a world beater and then shrunk on the big day, this might be the missing piece. Grab a pen. Let's get into it.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drshah_neurovision/ (https://www.instagram.com/drshah_neurovision/)
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
26 Feb 2026
Holly Budge
Overcoming The Top-10 Mental Obstacles In Sport - https://go.sportmind.io/Mastery (https://go.sportmind.io/Mastery)
The SportMind Portal - https://go.sportmind.io/Portal (https://go.sportmind.io/Portal)
The Daily SportMind Book: https://www.sportminddaily.com/ (https://www.sportminddaily.com/)
The Squash Playbook - https://www.squashplaybook.com/ (https://www.squashplaybook.com/) ⚫️💨
She got expelled from school at age four. Too much energy, uncontrollable, a school that didn't know what to do with her, and a mom who gave her a hug and told her she was awesome. Anyway, 43 years later, Holly Budge has Skydived Everest, summited it on foot, raced a thousand kilometers across Mongolia on semi-wild horses,
and works with over 6,000 female wildlife rangers across Africa. She has done things that most people wouldn't even dare to dream about. But here's what I want you to borrow from her today. Holly doesn't call herself an athlete. She calls herself an adventurer,
And that distinction matters more than you think because when you stop chasing the outcome and fall in love with the experience, something shifts, the pressure changes, joy comes back, and ironically, you perform better. There's a reason the winner of that Mongolia horse race sat at the finish line for two days
wishing he was still out on that step. We get into the mirror step. Her technique for silencing the inner critic when the environment is trying to break you. The difference between fear and risk and why you can outplay one but must respect the other. How she normalized jumping out of planes until it felt like brushing her teeth.
And what that teaches us about pressure
also what Post Expedition Blues has to teach every single athlete about identity and what happens when the big goal is suddenly gone? She says it best herself. My body is screaming, no, but my mind is whispering. Yes. Athletes. This one's for you. This is Holly Budge.
Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/hollybudge/
https://www.instagram.com/howmanyelephants/
https://www.instagram.com/worldfemalerangerweek/
https://www.instagram.com/wildlifepositivetravel/
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy (https://acast.com/privacy) for more information.
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