International Tutors' Magazine April 2019 | Page 13

APRIL 2019
ATHLETES AND
SELF-CONFIDENCE
BY CYRUS LAU
Professional basketball player Michael
Jordan has said, “You have to expect things
of yourself before you can do them,” as well
as “Never say never, because limits, like
fears, are often just an illusion.” Believing in
yourself is necessary to a professional athlete.
Athletes who give up easily won’t be able to
reach their high goals. If they want to succeed,
the elite athlete has to keep on practicing
every day, even though they face obstacles. How do elite athletes overcome these
obstacles and keep up their confidence
in themselves? How does self-confidence
affect athletic success? Is there something
the junior athlete or even ordinary
person can learn from this? I asked
two fellow EdUHK students, who are
also professional athletes, about their
opinions on the role of self-confidence
in professional sports and life in general.
Chan Ken Ho Hin
Ken is a year 4 student in the Bachelor
of Science Education (Sport Science)
programme, in the Health and Physical
Education Department at EdUHK.
He plays a variety of sports, including
taekwondo, dodgeball, dragon boat, and is
currently on both the EdUHK dodgeball
and dragon boat teams. Ken is a former
professional taekwondo athlete and has won
many trophies in several competitions. He
was a representative athlete of Hong Kong,
China from 2011 to 2014 in the Hong Kong
Taekwondo Association and got on the
Chinese Taipei National Taekwondo Team
in 2015 to compete with other professional
athletes from other countries in many
regional and international competitions. Ruby Lee
Ruby is a year 1 student in the Bachelor
of Education (Physical Education)
programme, also in the Health and Physical
Education Department at EdUHK. In
contrast with Ken, Ruby much more prefers
focusing and practicing in one sport. She
focuses in Wushu, also known as Chinese
Kung Fu or Chinese Martial Arts. Ruby is
currently the junior elite Wushu athlete on
the Hong Kong, China National Team. She
has also been rewarded with plenty of medals
and trophies in several top competitions.
She first joined the junior national team for
the 9th Asian Junior Wushu Championship
in Korea in 2017. In this competition,
she was awarded with one gold medal,
one silver medal and two bronze medals.
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