Rebound : Train Your Mind to Bounce Back Stronger from Sports Injuries

Written by a leading mental skills coach and a contributing editor to Runner's World, this is a practical guide to building the mental skills athletes need to recover from injury and rebound stronger.

Weaving together personal narratives from athletes, scientific research, and the specialized clinical expertise of mental skills coach Carrie Jackson Cheadle, Rebound contains more than 45 Mental Skills and Drills athletes can use at every phase of their recovery process. These same strategies can help athletes who aren't currently injured reduce their vulnerability to injury and enable any individual to reach new heights within their sport and beyond.

Injuries affect every athlete, from the elite Olympian to the weekend racer. In the moment, a traumatic crash, a torn muscle, or a stress fracture can feel like the most devastating event possible. While some athletes are destroyed by the experience, others emerge from their recovery better, stronger, and more confident than ever.

Not everyone can recover swiftly enough to notch a winning performance in two weeks, of course. However, anyone can toward a swifter, stronger comeback using mental skills, psychological tools that enable them to take control of their recovery and ultimately use the experience to their advantage. Injury and other setbacks are inevitable--but with training, you can learn to overcome them skillfully and confidently, the same way point guards and forwards practice rebounds.

“From this day forward, Rebound will be assigned reading for every athlete I coach who gets injured. The evidence-backed guidance in this long-overdue resource is as crucial to managing the mental side of injury as good healthcare providers are to managing the physical side.” —Matt Fitzgerald, author of 80/20 Running

“A refreshingly innovative approach to injury rehab. Rebound teaches athletes how to leverage the power of mindset to face injuries head-on, harness their own resilience, shift momentum, and journey down the most direct route to recovery-skills that are invaluable long after the physical wounds have healed.” —Mackenzie L. Havey, author of Mindful Running

“Successful athletes overcome injury with the same tools they use to reach peak performance, including good goals and the right mindset. Rebound teaches the strategies to best weather your (temporary!) setbacks.” —Scott Douglas, contributing writer for Runner's World and New York Times best selling author

“As a mental performance consultant, Rebound will be my go-to guide for injured athletes. It provides the essential mental skills to help athletes thrive in recovery in an easy to use, practical guide. A must-read!” —Cindra Kamphoff, PhD, Certified Mental Performance Consultant, Speaker and Author

“This book is an outstanding resource for not only for those in the process of bouncing back from an injury, but for every coach, athletic trainer or parent who aims to help their athlete navigate the psychological aspects of rehab. Carrie provides insight on what to expect when you get injured and action-oriented steps on how to not just come back, but to come back stronger than you were before.” —Justin Su'a, M.S., Tampa Rays Mental Skills Coach

“Rebound is essential reading for any athlete that is injured or going through the physical rehabilitation process. This book is basically a psychological playbook about how to not only recover from the injury setback, but also to thrive during the process to come back stronger and better than before the injury took place. This book needs to be in every athletic trainer and physical therapist's office.” —Joshua Lifrak, M.S., Director of Mental Skills Program for an MLB Team

“As a pro athlete who recently endured a devastating injury, and as a coach who has supported athletes through injuries and on the road back, I found Rebound to be a wealth of knowledge and resources. Rebound provides athletes of all levels with actionable tips and mental skills to guide them back to a healthy mindset while they rehab and recover. A must-read for the injured athlete, and highly recommended for coaches as well-I plan to utilize the mental drills in Rebound in my own coaching.” —Kaitlin Gregg Goodman, pro runner for the Boston Athletic Association High Performance Team and adidas, coach at Training Joyfully

“I promise that if you read this much-need and well-executed book and put its guidance into practice, your injury experience will suck less, and you will love the sport you love all the more.” —Matt Fitzgerald, 80/20 Endurance

"Whether it’s your first or 10th injury, however, you know that it is always hard to sit on the sidelines, missing your favorite activity. Cindy Kuzma and Carrie Cheadle understand this, which is why they wrote Rebound in hopes of making the tough period of injury lay off just a bit easier." - NBC News, Better

"[Rebound] is a fantastic resource...I really wish there had been a resource like this when I struggled tremendously with injuries in my early 20s. I can imagine the book being a great pick-me-up, either for oneself or a friend going through injury." - Fast Women