“The expectation is to do as best as you can do.”
Steve Black is a curious soul. One of the most well known sports psychologists in the world, Steve is perhaps best known for his relationship with rugby player Jonny Wilkinson. Widely credited with saving Jonny’s career, Steve is often thought to be the “athlete whisperer”, capable of getting that extra 10% out of players.
Wilkinson once wrote about him, “It is difficult to narrow down what Blackie’s strengths are because there are no weaknesses. His class is his ridiculous knowledge, his thirst for gaining more and his ability to apply it all to an athlete. Blackie treats everybody as an individual and has always found the best way to help me to get better, just by being myself.”
Steve Black with Jonny Wilkinson after a Heineken Cup game in 2004. Jonny has since gone on to refer to Steve as like “a second father”. (Photo by Christopher Furlong/Getty Images)
‘He knows sport and understands pressure having been there and done it himself. Everything he teaches is about staying specific to your goal and visualising yourself being great so that no negative energy is wasted elsewhere. He leads by example and has only ever asked one thing from me: that I am honest in saying that I really want it and that I turn up and give him all that I have got.’
But when I meet him at a training event with Canterbury, rather than meet a drill sergeant coach or super science alchemist, instead I find an affable Geordie who talks in the sort of warm sentiment you might find in a comic book as a superhero mentor.
He’s a bit like Gandalf the Grey – a charming, kind soul, who could probably rule the land – but he’s so nice he’d much rather hang out with all us hobbits.
For Steve, sports phycology and coaching is more of a vocation than a job, and paramount to everything in life, be it coaching, or work, is just having a nice conversation.
“To try and form a relationship with someone… not necessarily talking about sport, not necessarily talking about any ambitions… to get to know somebody and open up with someone and talk about family and social and friends. How they get through this life of ours. What the type of things they enjoy doing, makes them feel good… the type of things that challenges them.”
 (Photo by Dave Rogers/Getty Images)
For a man who’s helped coach numerous sides to silverware, Steve instead prefers to view winning as more people making an attempt, rather that winning accolades and plaudits.
“Take the Great North Run this year… I was last. But you won because you competed. Next year, I’ll be second last.
Because really if we have this obsession with just winning… there’s nothing wrong with winning. But just conventionally winning… not many people are going to be happy. 20,000 people running the London Marathon, if everyone had the expectation to be number one… well there’s going to be a lot of sad people on the day.
The expectation is to do as best as you can do.
There was a great basketball coach, called John Wooden, UCLA. Wonderful, wonderful man. He said “Don’t try to be better than anyone else, just try and be as good as you can be.”
Another man, who you and I would expect to be on the other side of the spectrum – General Patton. He said famously “If a man gives everything, what else is there?” Now he said that because he didn’t want people to try and fail and just [slouches] get depressed. They didn’t have time for that during the war.
You did your best, I appreciate that, let’s move on. Not a bad way of looking at things, isn’t it?”
A Geordie through and through, this season Steve worked as for Newcastle United FC in a fitness consultancy role, helping the club reduce soft tissue injuries (Photo by Stu Forster/Getty Images)
Steve also has strong thoughts about the rise in gym culture. People bettering their lives is a key part of what Steve does, although he does not want people to get too downbeat and obsessed with results.
‘If you said to me ‘what’s the biggest difference you’ve seen in the last 40 years?’ it’s this instant gratification.
Say you came along to see me and said ‘I want to do this, I want to do that, I want to take up bodybuilding.’ Dead easy honestly. All you have to is, we got the knowledge how to do it, we just have to make it a fun experience for you. So you enjoy yourself.
How long will it take? It will take as long as it takes. If you try to fast forward, you’ll break down.  It won’t be a good experience if you try to fast forward as you’ll expect to get this buzz all the time… and it’s not there.’
What makes Steve such an interesting man is how often his advice crosses over from the world of sport into something bigger. So many times he drops advice as to how we can all help each other get along better, of how to remember to tell those around us how much we love and appreciate them, and of course his relationship of Jonny Wilkinson (“I love him to bits”).
As a final note, I’ll leave it to him:
Collectively together, if we’re all enjoying what we’re doing it’s infectious and some everyone and help each other. We might at times appear to be moving fast than others and progressing at a different rate, sometimes we’re consolidating. Sometimes we might be needing to take a step back. There’s no need to be down if you’re not progressing as fast as someone else because what you need to do is become as good as you can be.
Canterbury teamed up with the nation’s leading rugby experts and players to host the ultimate rugby training experience. Find out more about the day and Canterbury’s new training range at: www.canterbury.com
