An aspiring elite rower is struggling in the third 500. Her legs burning, she winces as she stares at the monitor, unable to slow her climbing split. The voice in her head is critical, telling her to back off because she’s not strong enough to hold this pace. Too deep in the hurt to fight back, she ends up with a disappointing result. But the voice doesn’t stop. She continues to blame herself, listing in detail all the ways she’s let her team down.

Feels familiar? Self-talk is powerful. It can propel you past your expectations or hold you back from ever reaching your potential. Almost everyone has a voice inside their head, but little time is spent understanding or training it.
 
Importance of Self-Talk
 
Self-talk is a conversation with yourself. For most rowers and coxswains, the inner dialogue is a constant presence throughout the day, especially during practice and racing. It’s more than just words and phrases said in your head. Just like when you talk to a teammate, what you say has consequences. It affects and influences your future thoughts, how you feel, and what you choose to do next. 
 
At its core, self-talk is everything you say to yourself. It can range from automatic, spontaneous reactions to the world around you to thoughtful, pre-planned statements to help you overcome a challenge. Self-talk can also take many forms. It can be positive (“great job”) or negative (“pathetic”), instructional (“hands up at the catch”) or motivational (“let’s go now!”).
 
Researchers found that positive, instructional and motivational self-talk helps you push yourself for longer because it delays the feeling of exhaustion. Although the exact reason is unknown, researchers speculate this occurs because self-talk eases some of the brain’s workload or helps it interpret the physical stress of rowing as less threatening. Either way, self-talk is a trainable skill that coaches are uniquely positioned to develop in their athletes.
 
Coach’s Influence on Self-Talk
 
When it comes to self-talk, the way coaches interact with their rowers matters. When they respond to mistakes, poor performances, or failure in an overly critical or punitive way, their athletes’ negative self-talk increases. Over time, rowers internalize their coach’s voice. The criticism, frustration, and disappointment become their own inner dialogue. And the voice follows them to every race, erg test, and practice. 
 
This high level of influence isn’t a surprise. Research shows that the way you talk to yourself is a product of many factors, one of which is important people in your life. You internalize their speech and mannerisms, whether positive or negative. For an athlete, a coach is one of the most important people in their lives, often more than family or friends. And the more competitive the program, the more influence a coach has over the rower or coxswain.
 
It’s not just what coaches say but also what they do. A coach who paces anxiously on the dock or who visibly reacts to a bad split during an erg test can negatively affect their athletes as much as yelling. Similarly, coaches will not have a beneficial impact on their team if they say to use positive self-talk but don’t model it themselves or fail to build a supportive team environment. “Do as I say, not as I do,” doesn’t work and will backfire.
 
Interestingly, being negative doesn’t need to happen often to make an impact on self-talk. Even occasional criticism delivered the wrong way can take root in a rower’s mind long after the coach has forgotten saying it. This is compounded by the fact that athletes can unintentionally twist what was said, sometimes taking it out of context and making it worse.
 
It’s important to note that coxswains are likely to mirror their coach’s speech and attitude. Since coxswains are often extensions of the coaches in and out of the boat, this amplifies the coach’s influence across the entire boat.

Strategies for Coaches
 
Due to self-talk’s importance, coaches should understand and train it like any other component of rowing. They don’t need to be a sports psychologist either. Rather, it involves teaching and modelling basic self-talk principles and creating a supportive, caring environment. Below are several strategies to help with both aspects.
 
Direct Self-Talk Strategies
 
Teach Self-Talk
Coaches can help athletes understand the difference between positive and negative self-talk, as well as instructional versus motivational self-talk. To give direction and structure – especially those new to using self-talk – coaches can help rowers and coxswains identify a situation that self-talk can help them improve (e.g., pushing through the last 500 meters of a 2km race or getting their body over faster on the recovery).
 
After developing two to three statements or cue words, coaches should then give time for the rowers and coxswains to practice and reflect, making changes as necessary. With enough practice, the right statement will become automatic when it’s needed most. 
 
Model Good Self-Talk
Teaching self-talk is only half the job. Coaches must also model it. Incorporate self-talk into your coaching. Give examples of helpful cue words when introducing drills or motivational phrases that can help during erg pieces. For example, saying “quick hands” while demonstrating a quick release out of the water. Over time, integrating self-talk into all parts of practice will help rowers learn proper cues and internalise positive self-talk. 
 
Coaches can also describe their own experiences with self-talk, especially as former rowers and coxswains themselves. Showing how they struggled with negative self-talk can be just as helpful as positive examples. When describing negative self-talk, however, pair it with a concrete explanation of how to reframe or replace it with something positive.
 
Building a Supportive Environment
 
Treat Athletes Professionally
It’s easy for coaches to become fixated on outcomes like times, splits, or wins. These are important parts of rowing, but they can easily be overemphasised, distracting from the most important parts – the athletes themselves. Overemphasis on outcomes makes it easy for coaches to see their athletes as just numbers in a boat, an extension of the equipment that needs to be trained and moulded to squeeze out every millisecond of speed. This can create a toxic environment where coaches feel free to belittle their athletes or scream profanities, behaviours that are unacceptable in professional settings like schools and workplaces.
 
Instead, treat your athletes professionally, regardless of their age or skill level. Use their names and make eye contact when talking with them. Have difficult conversations, but avoid yelling and profanity when correcting mistakes. Focus on changing the behaviour that needs to be fixed like sitting up at the catch or missing a call from the coxswain, not criticising the person.
 
Create Supportive Culture
By treating rowers and coxswains professionally, coaches are already building a culture centered on growth instead of fear. For athletes to internalise positive self-talk, they need to believe that coaches will always support them, even if they make a mistake. For example, if a rower is afraid that a coach will be mad if she doesn’t perform well on her erg test, she is likely to worry and approach it with fear instead of excitement. In addition, she’ll be less likely to take a chance to push herself to test her limits. One fearful comment can undermine months of culture building.
 
To prevent this from happening, coaches should make their philosophy clear and repeat it as often as necessary. But more importantly, they need to show their team through their actions. Praise personal bests and calculated risk-taking. Emphasise improvement over outcomes. An athlete’s inner voice will then adopt this same language.
 
Coach for Understanding
When rowers or coxswains don’t understand what’s being asked of them, confusion fills the gap and negative self-talk can rush in, especially if they make a mistake. An athlete who isn’t sure if he’s executing correctly will default to doubt. To avoid this, coaches should use simple, direct language. This becomes critical in high-pressure moments like racing or erg testing when mental demands are already high.
 
An agreed-upon sign, like a thumbs up or raised hand, can eliminate any confusion and provide needed feedback more efficiently than a complicated technical correction mid-stroke. After a race or practice, coaches should give feedback that is brief, specific, and focused on what to do next rather than complain about what went wrong. For example, after a bad race, explain how to increase the stroke rate more effectively as a boat. That’s more useful than complaining why missing the planned rate cost them the race.
 
Use Positive Statements
Coaches should tell rowers and coxswains what to do, instead of what not to do. To save energy during activity, our brains tend to act on information before we consciously process it. This means a rower can make a change midstroke based on a coach’s correction before she has time to actually think about it. While the speed is beneficial, it can backfire if the correction is something like, “don’t rush the slide”. Research suggests the brain can latch onto the action word, triggering the very movement the coach is trying to prevent.
 
More importantly, if a coach uses primarily negative statements (e.g., don’t, stop, shouldn’t), then their athletes are more likely to adopt a similar style for their self-talk, making their own corrections less effective.
 
Build Genuine Relationships
Coaches who hide behind a false persona or coaching role can feel distant and unapproachable, which negatively affects the trust rowers and coxswains need to take risks and develop positive self-talk. Being genuine means admitting when you don’t know something, sharing your own struggles, showing appropriate emotion, and having fun with your team.
 
Coaches should also show a genuine interest in their athletes’ lives beyond rowing. It’s not about being their best friend, rather, it’s taking time to learn who they are outside of rowing and what else they’re dealing with. Over time, these kinds of small actions show that you’re human, and helps to build a relationship where athletes feel safe to be themselves.

Final Thoughts
 
Self-talk is a powerful tool, the potential difference between a rower who holds her split through the third 500 and one who doesn’t. While it is easy to put the full responsibility on the athlete, coaches play a pivotal role. Self-talk is coachable, just like any other part of the stroke. The coach’s behavior and team environment also shape an athlete’s inner dialogue. The strategies themselves are straightforward and can be used immediately. Building a culture, however, takes time and consistency, so be patient with the process. The payoff is worth the price.

Read more psychology pieces by Dr David Schary

References

Hardy, J., Oliver, E., & Tod, D. (2008). A framework for the study and application of self-talk within sport. Routledge.

Conroy, D. E., & Coatsworth, J. D. (2007). Coaching behaviors associated with changes in fear of failure: Changes in self‐talk and need satisfaction as potential mechanisms. Journal of Personality. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-6494.2006.00443.x

Zourbanos, N., Hatzigeorgiadis, A., Goudas, M., Papaioannou, A., Chroni, S., & Theodorakis, Y. (2011). The social side of self-talk: Relationships between perceptions of support received from the coach and athletes’ self-talk. Psychology of Sport and Exercise. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.psychsport.2011.03.001