Vancouver Canucks Race to the Stanley Cup – Is it all in their Minds?

The Vancouver Canucks National Hockey League team just made it into the Stanley Cup Finals for the first time in almost 20 years. The Canucks, under the direction of sports psychologist Len Zaichkowski, have been using a new state of the art technology called the Mind Room. The Mind Room (using instruments from Thought Technology) uses biofeedback and neurofeedback instruments to assess and train athletes to control their stress and attention in competitive situations.   The Canucks have several older players who are performing at their highest levels  more consistently. Professional and Olympic athletes have been using biofeedback and neurofeedback for years to achieve successful performance outcomes. Athletes from the National Football League, World Cup Soccer, Major League Baseball and numerous Olympic Teams (Indian Shooting, Canadian Skiing) have utilized biofeedback and neurofeedback to gain championships in their sports.

Biofeedback uses physiological measures of muscle tension (EMG), skin perspiration (GSR), temperature , respiration and heart rate variability. Neurofeedback, or EEG biofeedback assesses unhealthy brainwave (EEG) patterns to determine if an athlete is anxious, in the peak attention zone or over-focused and trains their brain to be able to maintain the optimal pattern required for peak performance. The Mind Room combines biofeedback and neurofeedback measures with game video that can be used to train several athletes at one. In addition, using the Mind Room concepts, players are less like to suffer severe injuries and recover from these injuries, including concussions, more quickly and with better long-term results.  These training benefits result in greater player performance and durability, often resulting in Olympic Gold Metals and Team Championships.

The use of biofeedback and neurofeedback are becoming more frequent in sport psychology, especially in the area of concussion assessment (using QEEG assessment) and treatment. Athletes in contact sports, especially hockey and football are increasingly experiencing concussions which not only can significantly interfere with their teams success (i.e. Sidney Crosby in the NHL), but also negatively affect their future sport success and life health.

Additional information is available in a book to be released in June 2011 called “Applications of Biofeedback & Neurofeedback in Sport Psychology” edited by Ben Strack, Ph.D. and Michael Linden, Ph.D., published by the Association of Applied Physiology and Biofeedback (www.aapb.org).

Dr. Linden is a Clinical Psychologist and Nationally Certified in Neurofeedback and Biofeedback.  He is the director of The Attention Learning Center, which has offices located in San Juan Capistrano, Irvine and Carlsbad, California.