Confessions Of A Doper Analysis

It may seem like all you need to succeed in sports is physical power, but there is another aspect that holds just as much, if not more importance. Mental strength can be just as important as physical strength when it comes to an athletes winning (or losing) streak. Success in sports does not only require physical power, it also requires mental strength,and along with that goes determination and self-control.If someone cannot tap into their mind, they may find that sports are more difficult than they imagined.

A person’s mental strength can have an impact on their potential to succeed in a sport. Their actions will show how determined they are to reach that potential, and this idea is written about in “Confessions of a Doper” by Jonathan Vaughters. “At 5:30 every morning,” he would practice cycling, and this shows immense determination and love for his sport.(89) Another example of this determination is when he mentions the “loss of friends and social contact.”(89) Many people want to have a thriving social life, yet Vaughters would choose cycling over most anything. There

can be a negative consequence to being so determined, however. He did not want to kill his dream, so he “chose to dope.”(90) Although it shows real determination, it also shows poor self control.
Another work to explore this idea is “What Could be Better than a Touchdown?” by Kelefa Sanneh.

“There are a few situations in football where scoring a touchdown is the wrong thing to do,” explains Sanneh when discussing a play that New York Jets safety Dwight Lowery made to win a game against the Minnesota Vikings. After Lowery made the touchdown, “Nick Folk kicked the extra point, putting the Jets ahead by nine.”(58) However, there was a way for the opposing team to win after this. Sanneh writes, “...if Folk had missed the extra point, then the Jets would have been ahead by only eight points, and the Vikings would have been able to tie the game with a touchdown drive and a two-point conversion.”(58) This circumstance shows how sports require you to smart enough to think on your feet. Had Lowery thought of a way to extend the play, there would have been a smaller chance of the Vikings

scoring.
Many people, however, don’t believe this, they believe in the “dumb jock” stereotype. Some people do seem to fit this stereotype, they aren’t school smart or lack street smarts, but you need to know a lot about a sport to excel in it. A lot of people think that because you play sports, you aren’t as smart as they are. The people that believe this may not play sports, so they do not understand the mental aspect of sports. They may also see sports as just a game, and don’t see the determination many athletes have.
In conclusion, to be successful in sports, you need more than physical strength. An athlete also needs mental strength, determination and self-control. In “Confessions of a Doper” and “What Could be Better than a Touchdown?”, two different situations are explained that show sports aren’t all brawn. Sometimes, an athlete needs to think quickly, or be able to make the right decisions for their career.