Sophie Dowson
The Pursuit Of Mastery
On the road to becoming an expert at any skill, one encounters tedium, stress, and occasionally, boredom. Conditioning a set of movement patterns or responses requires hours of repetition, refinement and adherence to routines that work – and this process is rarely ‘fun’ at all times
Elite sport is perhaps one of clearest examples of this reality. Whilst the quest to improve is punctuated by moments of accomplishment, satisfaction, and euphoria, an athlete also becomes deeply familiar with the psychological load that accompanies training and competition. As an athlete moves from learning to mastery, the initial rapid curve of improvement slows. Plateaus appear. Mental battles emerge. Frustration builds.
These outcomes are not a personal failing but often feel as such. They are, however, a predictable consequence of perpetually activating the same neural circuity, experiencing the same neurochemistry, and rehearsing the same movement.
So the question arises: what can an athlete do to alleviate the psychological load and disrupt neural repetitiveness, without abandoning the pursuit of excellence?
Enter neuroplasticity: the brains ability to rewire, reconfigure and adapt. One of the most accessible ways to access this is through exploration and low-stakes, novel movement.
The “Newness” To “Sameness” Paradox
To understand why these factors are involved with neuroplasticity, we’ll briefly explore how the brain changes in response to motor learning.
Throughout the journey from novice to expert, repeated practice leads to motor habituation - the fine tuning of neural pathways that support skilled movement. As movement patterns are rehearsed, relevant synaptic connections are strengthened, and inefficient ones are pruned away, forging circuits that enable fast, reliable, efficient execution. In early learning, this process is supported by widespread brain activity: attention, monitoring, and decision-making systems are highly engaged as the athlete processes feedback and refines performance. With practice, a dynamic shift in brain activity occurs. There’s a narrowing of neural resource allocation as control is handed over to motor-specific and subcortical structures that allow movement to run with minimal conscious oversight.
This shift is the essence of mastery. Yet it is also where the paradox emerges.
The very ‘neural sameness’ necessary for consistent, high-level performance of a skill also limits the time spent in an exploratory, open, neuroplastic brain state. The athlete becomes exceptionally good at what they already know how to do, but less exposed to conditions that allow new solutions to emerge.
The Internal Neuroplastic Environment (Or Lack Thereof)
Neuroplasticity does not occur uniformly across all contexts. It is heavily shaped by the internal environment created during an activity. Importantly, these internal neural states are tied to subjective experience, shaping motivation, confidence, and perceived effort alongside learning itself. What you feel is not separate from what the brain is doing - it is the reflection of the internal environment.
Low stakes, exploratory, novel movement produces a very different neurophysiological landscape than high-pressure deliberate training or competition. This environment is characterised by flexibility in neural signalling, altered neurochemistry, and broader engagement across brain networks. In a couple of words, the brain becomes ‘change ready’.
This state could be particularly valuable for athletes navigating: Performance plateaus, persistent technical errors, mental blocks, or motivational fatigue.
It is well established that physical activity, learning new skills, and play all tie in with markers of neuroplasticity, but there is a critical question for elite sport:
Is this plasticity likely to be induced during daily practice of a highly technical skill that relies on the same neural circuitry used for the past 10 years?
For many athletes, the answer is: rarely.
Without novelty and exploration, the nervous system is deprived of one of its primary drivers of adaptation. You’re training in a state that consolidates the known but rarely permits the emergence of the new. This balance between repetition and exploration reflects the brain’s ongoing effort to reduce uncertainty by updating its internal models. Whilst playing other sports or engaging in other activities may carry perceived risks, i.e. injury, time diversion, interference with sport-specific patterns - for some athletes, it’s worth the risk...
The Neuroplasticity Formula
Here we’ll (briefly) explore some key findings in neuroplasticity research that can conceptually be applied to overcoming challenges and frustrations encountered in high performance.
To begin with, it’s important to acknowledge the strong body of research showing that physical activity is a key driver of neuroplasticity. There are extensive pathways through which exercise influences the brain, and one that is well established is the production of Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF). BDNF is involved in the survival, growth, and maintenance of neurons, and plays a central role in plasticity. Research has time and time again shown that physical activity sparks the production and action of BDNF helping to create the biological conditions that support downstream learning and adaptation. Of note, these effects are particularly evident in the hippocampus, a region critical for memory and learning. The action of BDNF here supports the formation of new representations and updates existing ones -
processes that are critical when adapting movement patterns or breaking out of entrenched responses.
In adulthood, the brain continues to change in response to learning something new, much as it does in early development. This is where novelty comes in. Without a new challenge, there is little reason for the brain to update existing networks. Research has shown that novel experiences - whether cognitive, sensory, or motor - can yield both functional and morphological brain adaptations. In this way, novel skill learning could allow athletes to capitalise on the same principles that once supported the acquisition of their now well-learned skills, but in a context allowing recruitment and expansion of different neural circuitry, particularly those involved in forming new representations.
As humans, we operate by reducing uncertainty. In sport this is partly true, or at least we plan for it, by controlling the controllables. Particularly, this is the case in closed-skill sports (such as tack and field events) where performance depends on limiting the range of possible responses in order to produce highly repeatable performance in the face of changing internal or external conditions. In contrast, team or other open-skill sports inherently require athletes to sample from a broad repertoire of responses, making exploration a more built-in feature of training and competition. However, even in closed skills, the nervous system must continually update its internal models to account for changes such as fatigue, context, or pressure. When athletes rely exclusively on narrow, well-rehearsed solutions, the system has little capacity to adapt if that solution stops working. Exploration and novelty are not at odds with reducing uncertainty, but are in fact a natural and necessary part of adaptive behaviour. Periodic opportunities to explore, encounter novelty, and engage with a wider range of possibilities are not only refreshing but can reopen neuroplastic capacity allowing athletes to become unstuck, adjust to change, and return to a more robust and refined expression of their primary sport.
Lending itself to the point above, the prefrontal cortex (PFC) plays a central role in flexible thinking, adaptive control, and decision-making. Its engagement is highly dependent on the brain’s internal neurochemical state. To optimise for neuroplasticity here, it's important that the environment is low pressure. As arousal increases and situations are perceived as high-stakes, the amygdala signals an increase in stress-related neurotransmitters such as dopamine and noradrenaline. When these chemicals rise beyond optimal levels, PFC network activity can rapidly disengage, reducing its influence over behaviour. The functional result is a shift away from thoughtful, top-down control toward more reflexive, bottom-up processes driven by well-learned skills. This state is effective when an athlete is executing a highly mastered skill, but less helpful when they are adapting to change, or stuck and searching for a new solution. Low-pressure environments help preserve PFC engagement, maintaining the neural conditions required for exploration, flexibility, and learning.
Adaptation In Harmony With Refinement
So, the paradox resolves itself. These activities don’t replace foundational practice, they support neuroplasticity by encouraging new thinking, adaptation, and engagement, ultimately complementing the primary discipline.
Sustaining motivation in highly repetitive disciplines, navigating mental blocks, or responding to a dip in performance are all part and parcel in an athlete's career - and each requires adaptation through the emergence of new pathways, rather than further repetition alone.
By giving athletes permission to be beginners again - move for the joy of it, engage without the weight of expectation, and explore new possibilities - the nervous system can reorganise. In this way, low-stakes movement, novelty, and exploration may be amongst the most neurobiologically sophisticated tools for unlocking performance.
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