Positive thoughts give elite athletes the vital edge

By John Mehaffey

LONDON (Reuters) - Elite professional sport with its unrelenting demands tests the mind and spirit as much as the body.

When the difference between winning and losing can be a fraction of a second or the unexpected bounce of a ball, encouraging positive thoughts and banishing the fear of failure is a consistent theme in the lives of successful athletes.

England cricket captain Andrew Strauss is a recent convert to the power of positive thinking, praising the controversial self-help book "The Secret" after his spell in the international wilderness.

"The theory is what you think about happens," said Strauss in his own book "Testing Times." "If you think positive thoughts, then those thoughts will come about."

"The Secret" by Australian writer Rhonda Byrne, which started life as a film, has been praised as a life-changing text and criticized as pretentious psychobabble.

Whatever the verdict, the lessons Strauss drew in 2008 -- positive thoughts, a winning frame of mind, visualizing success -- are certainly not new.

Twenty-five years earlier, the same principles resurrected the life and career of New Zealand's greatest cricketer Richard Hadlee.

At the end of an exhausting year on and off the field, Hadlee was close to a physical and mental breakdown.