Excessive stress and tension are major threats to optimal athletic performance. The goal of this project was to help the athletes optimize the management of their stress response through self-awareness and self-regulation of the activation levels of their autonomic and central nervous systems. Fifteen elite athletes preparing for the Vancouver 2010 Olympics underwent an EEG and psychophysiological stress assessment, as well as a bio-neurofeedback (BNFK) training intervention. Both athletes and coaches reported that the bio-neurofeedback intervention helped the athletes in managing the stress of training and competition and was a factor in producing better performances.

The purpose of this study was to explore the perceived outcomes of a biofeedback and neurofeedback training intervention with high performance athletes. Five Olympic level athletes preparing for world championships and the 2012 Olympic Games took part in a 20 session intervention over the period of one year. At the completion of the intervention, a semistructured interview was conducted with each athlete. The athletes indicated that they became more self-aware, were better able to self-regulate both their physiological and psychological states, developed a greater sense of personal control, and a greater understanding of skills inherent in the field of sport psychology. Three of the athletes made the Canadian Olympic team for the 2012 Olympic Games and two of those athletes won bronze medals. The present study suggests that biofeedback and neurofeedback training may be useful in enabling athletes to perform optimally, in both training and competition, on a consistent basis.

This study was designed to explore the relationship between elite athletes' self-regulation ability and their ranking at the world level using psychophysiological stress assessment profiling. Fifteen elite level athletes' psychophysiological stress response patterns were recorded during a nine-stage stress assessment. Respiration rate, heart rate, heart rate variability, skin conductance, peripheral body temperature, and electromyograph (trapezius and frontalis) were monitored. There was a significant correlation between elite athletes' overall self-regulation ability and their ranking at the world level, meaning that the better the overall self-regulation ability of the athlete, the better the world ranking. In addition, a multiple regression analysis indicated that self-regulation accounted for 76% of the variance in world ranking. Our results suggest the existence of a relationship between elite athletes' overall self-regulation ability and their ranking at the world level. Therefore, the results of this study have important implications for training of optimal psychophysiological self-regulation in athletes.

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