Performance People

Jess Thom is Team GB’s lead psychologist, a sports and performance specialist who helps elite athletes to fulfil their potential, on and off the field.Jess shares some of the key mental strategies she uses to help her athletes excel, many of which can be applied to anyone looking to improve their everyday performance. You’ll hear Jess explain how to handle your inner critic, when and how visualisation can be most useful, how to handle nerves and fear and why ‘what-if’ planning builds resilience and reduces anxiety. These are insights from someone making a difference at the very top of elite sport.

As Liverpool’s Director of Research for over a decade, Ian Graham was at the heart of the data revolution in football, and his approach helped Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool, the team he also supports, to win the Premier League and Champions League in his time there.Ian shares the stories and insights that helped them to win - why Brendan Rodgers left partly because he couldn’t get on board with the new approach, how the experience of Liverpool’s owners in American sport allowed data to thrive, the players, including Mohammad Salah and Joel Matip, that were identified by this approach and why even Jurgen Klopp’s appointment as manager was only green lit after some last-minute data analysis.Ian also gives his thoughts on the state of the Premier League, why data’s most effective when combined with the human touch and how he can still watch football as a fan, not just as an analyst.

Tom Beahon is the co-founder of sportswear label Castore, which in less than a decade has grown in to a major global challenger brand, and can be seen on athletes and teams including Andy Murray, Red Bull Racing, Newcastle United and the England cricket team.Growing up, all Tom ever wanted to be was a pro footballer, but that particular dream ended when he was let go by Tranmere Rovers as a 19-year-old. It was this crushing disappointment that fuelled the fire for what came next. He made the decision that this failure wouldn’t define him and, with his brother Phil, took his passion for sport on a new path.Tom shares the stories of starting out on his journey with no clue how to start a clothing label, the qualities he believes opened the doors which allowed the business to grow and shares the most important lessons for anyone looking to start out on their own.

Ed Jackson says he has lived two lives. For ten years he was a professional rugby player, who was defined by his physicality and performance. But in 2017, at a family friend’s barbecue, an accident ended this old life forever. He dived into a swimming pool, not realising it was three feet deep. On the way to the hospital he had to be resuscitated three times. Not long after, he was told he’d never walk again.Incredibly, just three years from this moment, Ed was standing on the world’s highest trekking peak, Aconagua. He shares this rollercoaster story, from the initial devastation of his prognosis to the slow flicker of hope, from long rehabilitation to a level of recovery he didn’t think was possible.It was a fundraising expedition to Snowdon that then sent his life in an entirely new direction, when he saw the opportunity to use his experience to help others in a similar boat. Now, as co-founder of the Millimetres 2 Mountains foundation, such is the purpose he has found, he says he no longer regrets the accident that led him here.

Jacqui Oatley is a hugely respected sports journalist, commentator and presenter who in 2007 became the first woman ever to commentate on Match Of The Day. In fact, her career is full of media firsts for women, although all she ever wanted to do was the job she loved.A football obsessive from a young age, a serious knee injury in her twenties led to her reappraising her career. She retrained as a sports journalist, she worked her way up from non-league football, to the Premier League on Radio Five Live. An opportunity to commentate on Britain’s flagship football highlights programme blew up into a huge national media story with her at the centre. As the first woman to ever call a match on the show, she faced a torrent of publicity, criticism and, frequently, abuse. Jacqui tells her story vividly and honestly from the inside, describing what it was like to be at the centre of a cultural moment, how she had to develop a thick skin to get through the aftermath, how things have progressed and why there’s still work to do across the board.

Now the dust has settled on the 37th America's Cup, it's the perfect time to look back on how things played out both on and off the water with the skipper and CEO of INEOS Britannia, Ben Ainslie.As well as some stories from the inside, Ben considers the highs and lows of his team’s journey to face off against the Kiwis, the details that he thinks made the difference and the biggest lessons, both collectively and personally, he’ll take in to next time.He tells us how the boat’s near sinking made him realise how much potential was in the team, explains the challenges of having leadership roles both on the boat and on the business side and looks ahead at what it’ll take to take the extra step and win the cup for Britain for the first time in history.As always, the parallels between success in sport and life are on show here, with insights on everything from team-building to handling pressure.

A true rugby union hall-of-famer who ranks as one of the best scrum-halves who ever played the game, George Gregan is known for having the whole package - skill, creativity, tenacity, intelligence, sportsmanship and leadership. He is the seventh most capped player of all-time with 139 appearances for Australia, 59 of them as skipper.George puts these remarkable performance standards down to the moment at 19 when he gained a scholarship at the Australian Institute of Sport. It’s what he learned there, from elite coaches, specialists and athletes in every sport and discipline, that paved the way for the personal and team success that followed.He shares some of the lessons that can be applied to anyone looking for performance gains in their own life - how preparation can see you through even unexpected challenges, how regular reflection can iron out problems and the factors which make the difference between good and great.

Professor Russell Foster is one of the world’s leading experts on sleep and circadian health. He explains how modern lifestyles have disrupted our natural body clocks and why many of us aren’t getting the quality sleep we need to perform at our best. More importantly he goes through ways  to get back into the rhythm. As Professor of Circadian Neuroscience at Oxford University, Russell says it’s vital we understand the importance of sleep in how our minds and bodies function to unlock its benefits. Expect to learn why light plays such a crucial role, what to do if you wake up in the night, why it’s not all about getting eight hours, why bad sleepers have a negative world view, and why dreaming helps us solve complex problems.You can take the anxiety out of sleep by taking back control. Get it right and it can become the most effective performance enhancer we have.