Lifestyle Factors and Behaviours
Leisure time
Leisure time can be described as free time. It is spent away from work for example looking
after their child. An athlete could do many things during their free time, these can be split
down to 2 types of activities. Appropriate and Inappropriate activities. The athlete has to be
very careful what they decide to do and when they do it. For example, as a footballer you
wouldn’t want to go to a nightclub and drink a lot of alcohol the night before a match, as your
body will be badly affected and that will cause you to perform badly on the day of the match.
Appropriate activities
It’s crucial that an athlete will complete appropriate activities during their leisure time and
minimise their inappropriate activities as much as they can.
Appropriate Activities include:
● Taking part in a hobby e.g. going to play golf
● Relaxing e.g. staying home and watching TV
● Light Individual Training Sessions e.g. jogging/gym/swimming
● Spending time with family/friends
These activities are very relaxed and don’t include anything that can be negative for an
athlete that is soon taking part in a major competition. Appropriate activities will most likely
have a positive effect on the athletes performances.
Inappropriate Activities
There are many athletes that will take part in inappropriate activities which can result in
losing their place in the professional level due to drop in performance levels. However, some
athletes will stop and go back onto the right path of hard work and success.
Inappropriate Activities include:
● Regularly drinking alcohol
● Regularly going out to nightclubs
● Taking drugs
● Smoking
● Gambling
These activities will have a major negative impact on an athlete’s performance levels. This is
because doing things such as drugs, smoking and drinking alcohol will cause damage to
your body causing the athlete’s performance to drop as well as his desire to play the sport.
Pressures
During an athlete's career they will get pressured into many things that they didn’t want to
do. For example, a footballer could get pressured into leaving the football club by the
manager and being transferred to a team abroad. This will mean that he will have to move
Leisure time
Leisure time can be described as free time. It is spent away from work for example looking
after their child. An athlete could do many things during their free time, these can be split
down to 2 types of activities. Appropriate and Inappropriate activities. The athlete has to be
very careful what they decide to do and when they do it. For example, as a footballer you
wouldn’t want to go to a nightclub and drink a lot of alcohol the night before a match, as your
body will be badly affected and that will cause you to perform badly on the day of the match.
Appropriate activities
It’s crucial that an athlete will complete appropriate activities during their leisure time and
minimise their inappropriate activities as much as they can.
Appropriate Activities include:
● Taking part in a hobby e.g. going to play golf
● Relaxing e.g. staying home and watching TV
● Light Individual Training Sessions e.g. jogging/gym/swimming
● Spending time with family/friends
These activities are very relaxed and don’t include anything that can be negative for an
athlete that is soon taking part in a major competition. Appropriate activities will most likely
have a positive effect on the athletes performances.
Inappropriate Activities
There are many athletes that will take part in inappropriate activities which can result in
losing their place in the professional level due to drop in performance levels. However, some
athletes will stop and go back onto the right path of hard work and success.
Inappropriate Activities include:
● Regularly drinking alcohol
● Regularly going out to nightclubs
● Taking drugs
● Smoking
● Gambling
These activities will have a major negative impact on an athlete’s performance levels. This is
because doing things such as drugs, smoking and drinking alcohol will cause damage to
your body causing the athlete’s performance to drop as well as his desire to play the sport.
Pressures
During an athlete's career they will get pressured into many things that they didn’t want to
do. For example, a footballer could get pressured into leaving the football club by the
manager and being transferred to a team abroad. This will mean that he will have to move
