Profiling the Mental Characteristics of Sub-Elite Marathon Runners

Abstract

There has been a considerable increase in the number of participants running marathons between 1990 and 2014 with the majority of runners aged between 23-54 years of age 1 . The purpose of our institutional review board approved study was to describe the psychological skills profile of sub-elite marathon competitors. Additionally, draw conclusions for future applied sport psychology intervention research. 125 (30M, 95F; aged 20-70) healthy adults participating in an 18-week marathon training program were recruited for the study. Participants received electronic surveys at 4 time points corresponding with the training program:pre-training, 6 weeks, 12 weeks, and post-training. Participants completed the nine mental skills survey (9MS) 2 . The 9MS uses 30 items, rated 1-10 with three subscales: Basic (attitude; motivation; goals and commitment; people skills), Preparatory (self-talk; mental imagery), and Performance (dealing with anxiety; dealing with emotions; concentration). After exclusion of incomplete surveys, 45 (10M, 35F) surveys analyzed. An analysis of the mean response for the 9MS subscales across each training time point was conducted. Attitude and goals commitment strengthened from week 6 to week 12. Perceived ability to cope with anxiety and handle emotions decreased from pre-training through post-training. Motivation, self-talk, and imagery were inconsistently rated over time. The following aspects were unknown about the population studied 1) prior endurance sport experience 2) pain coping experience and 3) experience using mental skills. The rate of attrition reduced the strength of the profile. Inconsistent survey completion led to the population’s profile being partially representative of the group. Possible future research directions include development of mental skills training protocol 1) aligned with the stages of change outlined in the Transtheoretical Model 3 2) aligned with a marathon training program to determine the impact on pain coping and running pace 4 and 3) determine efficacy of a psychological skills intervention on training and race outcomes of sub-elite marathon runners.