Paddy Upton Warns Of Mental Illness Due To Extended Stay In Bio-bubble

Former India mental conditioning coach Paddy Upton has revealed the importance of conducting extensive studies and preventing athletes from developing mental illnesses due to extended stay in bio bubble. Paddy Upton complained about sports governing bodies not doing enough research to address the mental toughness going around for the players in the bio bubble. International players and athletes had to stay in a bio bubble due to the COVID-19 pandemic going around which is not easy as it looks.

He also mentioned the large scale interventions like ICC, BCCI, etc taking fewer measures to get feedback from the players. He also predicted that we may see a lot of mental illness due to the bio bubble in the near future. The sports governing bodies must look into the problem as soon as possible to take measures that will prevent the mental illness of players.

“Because we haven’t done enough research to get feedback from different players what were their unique challenges we have all these medical people saying we can’t approve this drug and that drug until we do the trials, but have we gathered the research? “ Paddy Upton maintained.

“I Don’t Think We Have Seen The Fallout Yet” – Paddy Upton

Paddy Upton claimed that we haven’t seen the real picture of the psychological problems associated with staying in a bio bubble. He said extended bio bubble could be disastrous for the players and it could be too late for the measures to be taken. The preventable measures are going to be of no use after the consequences had taken place and might not work in the favour of sports governing bodies, concluded Paddy Upton.

“There have been a lot of bio-bubble around the world but I  haven’t seen a large-scale intervention where the ICC, badminton guys, football people or BCCI say let us do an extensive study to get feedback from players to understand the dynamics,” Pady Upton stated.

“I don’t think we have seen the fallout yet. There is a potential we will see more fallouts with more mental problems and illness because of extended bio-bubble. I think some of them are preventable but we are not doing all we can to prevent them, so we have to wait until that happens which is unfortunate for the athletes,” added Paddy Upton.

Upton Feels Extroverts Are More Affected

Paddy Upton felt that the extroverts have been more affected by the bio bubble and a lot of factors have to be researched which have to be done in course of time as soon as possible. He said introverts might be happy with the restriction while extroverts need people to get them going and they will be impacted more through the bio bubble.

“If players are left alone, your mind goes all over the shore. If you have the disciple to find a good distraction or you get caught up in anxiety and emptiness, especially extroverts are struggling more in a bio-bubble because they need people, introverts are happy in their own space,” he added.

Paddy Upton mentioned about the youngsters who are in the bio bubble might end up losing the integration with the team culture and he praised Rahul Dravid for emphasizing positive culture.