Author: Dr. Jim Taylor

Recent Posts

The Gift of Raising Ski Racers: A Must-Read

Just read a wonderful commentary about having ski racing children by former Burkie, Jesse James. If you have kids in ski racing, you’ll nod knowingly and perhaps even shed a tear (as I did). If you’re not a ski racing parent, but rather a parent of an athlete in another sport, you’ll still relate to […]

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Every Day Can Be a Good Day of Training

One of the most frequent comments I hear from the racers I work with is: “I had a lousy day of training.” This statement was almost always accompanied by a variety of emotions that are neither pleasant nor helpful including frustration, anger, worry, doubt, and disappointment, and, occasionally, despair. Moreover, I saw that this assertion […]

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5 Things I Hate to See Racers Do in Training

I’ve been in the ski racing world since I was six years old. The first 20 years, I was a racer learning the ups and downs of ski racing the hard way, mostly through trial and error, and sometimes painful failure. That, I can say with 20/20 hindsight and absolute certainty, is no way to […]

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Take Risks for Ski Racing Success

In the last article in my series on the gifts that Mikaela Shiffrin gave to ski racers for the holidays, I described how I have seen her evolve from consistent and rock-solid racer (and, of course, incredibly fast) into a risk taker on skis (who is now freakishly fast) as evidenced by her improvements in […]

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Mikaela’s Holiday Gift #3: Risk

My first two articles in this three-part series on the gifts that Mikaela has given ski racers for the holidays from her World Cup lows and highs in Aspen in November focused on how to react to disappointment and the importance of fight to ski your fastest. In this last article in my series, I […]

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Psychological Rehab of Ski Racing Injury

The U.S. ski racing community was saddened to hear that Mikaela Shiffrin had injured her knee while free skiing before the World Cup in Are, Sweden and that the injury, a torn MCL of her right knee, might keep her out for the entire season. With this injury, and the many others that have sidelined […]

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Taylor Interview about Fear of Failure

I was recently interviewed by TrailRunnerNation on the topic of my  three-part series on Fear of Failure.

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Mikaela’s Holiday Gift #2: Fight

In my last article, I explored the first of three holiday gifts that Mikaela Shiffrin gave to young ski racers for the holidays, namely, the power of disappointment to fuel your ski racing efforts. This article will introduce you to holiday gift #2 from Mikaela, the importance in a race of to fight no matter what. […]

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Mikaela’s 3 Gifts for the Holidays: Gift #1: Disappointment

Mikaela Shiffrin is truly a gift that keeps on giving. And during this holiday season, Mikaela (without realizing it) gave ski racers the world over three gifts from her World Cup races in Aspen. Today, I’ll talk about Gift #1: Disappointment. As most of you know, Mikaela was three gates from her first outright World […]

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Importance of Giving During the Holidays

I was recently interviewed about the importance of giving during the holidays by a non-profit organization called Operation Warm that is dedicated to helping families in need. During the holiday season, particularly for those of us who have so much, it is a good reminder to give to those who have so little. It is […]

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