Athlete Practice Quotes & Sayings

In team sports the athletes were bonded by each other, there was an immense peer pressure to keep going. One dared not miss a practice for fear of letting his teammates down. Every time an athlete thought of getting back into bed in the morning he knew he would have to face the anger of his closest friends. But the sculler had to find motivation entirely within himself. No one else cared. — David Halberstam

I am a dancer. I believe that we learn by practice. Whether it means to learn to dance by practicing dancing or to learn to live by practicing living ... In each it is the performance of a dedicated precise set of acts, physical or intellectual, from which comes shape of achievement, a sense of one's being, a satisfaction of spirit. One becomes in some area an athlete of God. — Martha Graham

The biggest concern with female athletes is they don't naturally compete. And so I think a part of what we do here exceptionally well that separates us from other programs is we train them to compete. So a huge challenge in women's athletics is to get them to compete against their teammates and friends in practice with the same intensity they compete with their bitter rivals. So that's a huge challenge for me, to get the women in practice to go after each other the way you would a rival — Anson Dorrance

I was an athlete growing up. I was a wrestler, I played football, so I can take a fall. I actually wanted to be a stuntman when I was kid, so I would practice falling down the stairs. It's just something I like to do. — Chris Pratt

Growing up in Harlem, I had the chance to practice with a Negro League team. At fifteen, I was over six feet tall and a fair athlete, but my skills didn't come close to some of the players I saw. — Walter Dean Myers

I think that we ill-prepare athletes from the very beginning. From the moment they pick up a ball or kick or whatever it is they're doing. We ill-prepare them. Especially with the major sports. What you see is this cycle of entitlement that gets thrown their way, so the kid who is in junior high and hasn't finished his test, but still gets to play because he is an athlete, fails the test and still gets to play because they're an athlete, gets to get away with not doing chores at home because they've got practice. — John Amaechi

I really didn't realise until I got back the work that goes into a performance. You're like an athlete - if you haven't been practising things tighten up. I had to do a lot of practice work, but I got through it. Even when I was 21 I would have a 40-minute nap on the day of a show, and I will still do that. — Michael Crawford

I want to see all the countries in the world and learn all the languages. I want to have thousands of friends and I want all my friends to be different. I want to play six instruments. I want to be the best in the world at two things. I want to be a great athlete and I want to be a great surgeon. I need to practice very hard every day. I need to sleep as little as possible. I need to read at least one major book every week. And I need to remember that my seventy years are going to go by too quickly. — Diana Nyad

Meditation practice is like piano scales, basketball drills, ballroom dance class. Practice requires discipline; it can be tedious; it is necessary. After you have practiced enough, you become more skilled at the art form itself. You do not practice to become a great scale player or drill champion. You practice to become a musician or athlete. Likewise, one does not practice meditation to become a great meditator. We meditate to wake up and live, to become skilled at the art of living. — Elizabeth Lesser

Zone, focusing on your movements without having any unnecessary thoughts, an extremely focused state that goes beyond a normal concentration. Although it can bring out everything that the player possess, it's a phenomenon that eve an top athlete can only come across accidentally. Only ones that have accumulated practice after practice is allowed to stand in front of that door. But even still, it will only open on a whim. It's the ultimate territory where only the chosen may enter. However, Aomine's natural talent laughs at such thing and forces the door open. — Tadatoshi Fujimaki

One of the privileges of being an athlete is that on days when I have practice and games, I'm present whether I'm present or not. It's not fair, but that's the system. What can I do about it? — Erin O'Riordan

Luck? Sure. But only after long practice and only with the ability to think under pressure. — Babe Didrikson Zaharias

Do not practice finely skilled movements after you are tired, for you will begin to substitute gross motions for finer ones and generalized efforts for specific ones. Remember, wrong movements tend to supervene and the athlete's progress is set back. Thus, the athlete practices fine skills only while he is fresh. When he becomes fatigued, he shifts to tasks employing gross movements designed principally to develop endurance. — Bruce Lee

Extraordinary performances come out of a process of continuous, regular physical and mental practice. The mindset of an extraordinary athlete is relaxed but focused and open to even higher achievements. — Chungliang Al Huang

But at school, I wasn't athletic, and if you're not athlete in high school, it's kind of hard to find your place, so play practice seemed perfect, especially if you were as uncoordinated as I was. — Piper Perabo

Behind all the years of practice and all the hours of glory waits that inexorable terror of living without the game. — Bill Bradley

Coaches who scrimmage all the time don't know what to practice. — Paul Brown

Becoming a great leader, a great athlete, or great chef takes more than desire or even knowledge. It takes effort. It takes practice. — Dave Anderson

Kay Cannon was a woman I'd known from the Chicago improv world. A beautiful, strong midwestern gal who had played lots of sports and run track in college, Kay had submitted a good writing sample, but I was more impressed by her athlete's approach to the world. She has a can-do attitude, a willingness to learn through practice, and she was comfortable being coached. Her success at the show is a testament to why all parents should make their daughters pursue team sports instead of pageants. Not that Kay couldn't win a beauty pageant - she could, as long as for the talent competition she could sing a karaoke version of 'Redneck Woman' while shooting a Nerf rifle. — Tina Fey

Isn't reading a kind of preparation for life?'
But life is composed of things other than books. It is as if an athlete, on entering the stadium, were to complain that he's not outside exercising.This was the goal of your exercise, of your weights, your practice ring and your training partners. — Epictetus

Ask any great athlete or the concert pianist or the successful actor if they have arrived at the place where they need no further practice. They will tell you that the higher you climb in proficiency and public acceptance, the greater the need for practice. — Eric Butterworth

Never underestimate your players; they can do it with enough game-like practice. Coaches must put more emphasis in practice and in life on making student-athletes aware of what they could or can do, rather than what they couldn't or presently can't do. The focus must be on solutions, not problems; what is wanted, not what is feared. — John Kessel

No athlete, no scientist, no musician ever got better without focused practice, and there is no program you can download for that. It has to come from within. — Thomas L. Friedman

I believe that we learn by practice. Whether it means to learn to dance by practicing dancing or to learn to live by practicing living, the principles are the same. In each, it is the performance of a dedicated precise set of acts, physical or intellectual, from which comes shape of achievement, a sense of one's being, a satisfaction of spirit. One becomes, in some area, an athlete of God. Practice means to perform, over and over again in the face of all obstacles, some act of vision, of faith, of desire. Practice is a means of inviting the perfection desired. — Martha Graham

Somewhere behind the athlete you've become and the hours of practice and the coaches who have pushed you is a little girl who fell in love with the game and never looked back ... play for her. — Mia Hamm

Looking at the championship-winning quarterbacks, Edwards remembered their particular talents: Steve Young: Here's a guy that is really a talent. He's the best athlete we ever had. He could run, he developed into a good thrower. He's smart. He's intense. He could make it in the movies. Really, he's got it all. He was coachable, but he had his own ideas. He never let up, not even in practice. I'd take Steve Young every year. — LaVell Edwards

A knowledge of our ability to consciously radiate health, strength, and harmony will bring us into a realization that there is nothing to fear because we are in touch with Infinite Strength. This knowledge can be gained only by making a practical application of this information. We learn by doing-through practice the athlete becomes powerful. — Charles F. Haanel

This process is like starting a fitness regimen for the brain. At the beginning, your muscles burn a little. But over time and with repetition, you become stronger, and the improvements you see in yourself can be remarkable. Becoming a better thinker, just like becoming a better athlete, requires practice. We challenge you to feel the burn. — Sarah Miller Beebe