#7 The Power of Sport: Mental Resilience, Women Empowerment & Continuous Improvement with Datuk Nicol David

Episode 7 is joined by the one and only, Datuk Nicol David! An eight-time world champion, nine-time Asian champion, and a record of 108 consecutive months as world No 1 squash player, @nicoldsquash is an incredible source of pride and inspiration to all Malaysians. More importantly, she is a good person with a strong sense of self and despite all the accolades, is extremely humble and grounded with her principles. We discussed the importance of mental health and the ability to train your mind to perform at your best. We discussed the role of sports in empowering women and girls all around the world. Through it all, she spoke on the importance of continuous improvement and development. As she has been famously quoted, "Being number one is something I had to earn every day."This is an incredible episode on pursuing your passion, the value of failures, and the power of mental toughness. Datuk Nicol teaches visualization, humility, and positivity. We also discussed the following data points on mental health and female athletes with Datuk Nicol:1) According to a 2020 study by Stanford University and Strava, 22.5% of professional athletes reported feeling down or depressed on more than half of the days of the week compared to 3.9% of athletes reporting the same struggles before the pandemic hit. That’s an increase of 477%. The American National Collegiate Athletic Association examined the impacts of the pandemic on 25,000 college athletes and found that there were elevated rates of anxiety, hopelessness, mental exhaustion, and feelings of depression across the board.2) Elite women’s sports are predicted to generate US$1 billion in revenue in 2021. A Nielsen study found that 84% of general sports enthusiasts are interested in women’s sport. The 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup drew 1.12 billion viewers while the National Women’s Soccer League’s viewership swelled 493% in 2020. The U.S. Women's Open tennis final between Naomi and Victoria averaged 2.1 million viewers on ESPN.Full transcript here.