Southampton Researchers Discover The Key To Andy Murray's Success

Researchers at Southampton have revealed how Andy Murray plans to get the best out of himself in order to have the greatest chance of lifting this year’s Wimbledon trophy.

The study, undertaken by researchers of both the universities of Southampton and Birmingham, found that athletes who realise when a goal is unachievable and focus their efforts towards a more realistic target have more success than athletes who compete on all fronts.

The study involved two experiments that asked over 180 cyclists to complete a number of cycling tests of which some were unachievable in order to measure how the athletes managed failure.

Murray, who has never fared well on clay, only reaching the semi-finals of the French Open on one occasion, pulled out of the tournament citing a back injury.

The decision to pull out of Roland Garros seems to be an inspired one, winning the Queen’s Club Championship and easing past his Wimbledon first round opponent Benjamin Becker in straight sets.

Murray and Clay: A Mismatch

Professor Constantine Sedikides, a social and personality psychologist at Southampton, said

Athletes with autonomous motives put in more effort and persisted for longer which helped them reach higher levels of performance with increasingly difficult but attainable goals.

And that

when the goal became unachievable, they had great difficulty realising this, which led to brooding over the failure as the athletes struggled to disengage from the goal.

The results of this research suggest that there may have been more to Murray’s withdrawal than a back injury. In accepting that his chances of winning in Paris were very slim, he elected not to compromise his bid for success at SW19.

Having come so close last year, losing in the final to Roger Federer, Murray will be even more motivated to go one step further this year.