REFRAMING POOR PERFORMANCE: HOW SETBACKS CAN SHAPE YOU TO BECOME A STRONGER ATHLETE

Published: 08/04/2026 | By: David Van Wetherill

What if your worst performance wasn’t failure – but information? In this honest and personal piece, Paralympian and fitness ambassador David Van Wetherill explores how setbacks, injuries, and disappointing results can either break us or build us. The difference isn’t what happens – it’s what we choose to make it mean.

In my previous training article, I wrote about the psychology of racing. This time, it’s not about preparing for pressure, but how to respond when things don’t physically go to plan.

Mentally, it can be challenging. A growth mindset, rather than a fixed mindset, can really help shape our response to the emotional impacts of losses or mistakes in sport.

Remember, it is because we work so hard every day – and because we care – that it sometimes feels too much. It can feel deeply personal and shying away from that would mean becoming mentally defensive. To care so much can only be a good thing.

It’s definitely something I’ve had to deal with recently as I continue to strive towards my goal of becoming an IRONMAN on crutches. I had a total hip replacement in December, and the setbacks I have experienced have all been part of the journey. But that doesn’t mean it has been easy.

I’d love to share some of my thought strategies and learnings – not just from this setback, but from any setback I’ve experienced in the past as a professional table tennis player and a world record marathon runner on crutches.

Reframing perceived poor performances and shifting from negative self-judgment towards reflection and long-term improvement, is a key part of being a successful athlete.

IT’S NOT THINGS THAT UPSET US, BUT OUR JUDGMENTS ABOUT THINGS.

You don’t have to let this upset you. You don’t have to turn this into something more. I always think it’s helpful to remember that it’s not what actually happens, but our perception of it, which causes distress and creates blockers. It’s not the race itself that hurts the most – it’s what we tell ourselves about it afterwards.

It can cut deeply because sport is rarely just sport to athletes. We often build our identity around everything about it. So, when things don’t go to plan, it can feel like more than just a bad session or a bad result. When we invest hours into training, structure our lives around sessions, sacrifice comfort, and attach meaning to the process, a disappointing result can feel like judgment. It can shift from “that race didn’t go well” to “I’m not good enough.”

That shift is where the damage is done.

I’ve had performances where the result didn’t reflect the work. Sometimes we can train well, perform well, and ‘lose.’ Likewise, others can train poorly, perform poorly, and ‘win.’ What we give doesn’t always return, but what we give is always what we are. Our integrity, our virtues, and our character can always remain intact and uncompromised.

Choosing to see the learnings from a disappointing result gives us the potential to always find something positive. A poor performance can mean, “I’m finished,” or it can mean, “something needs to change.” A disappointing race can mean, “I’ve failed,” or it can mean, “this is information.” Poor performance isn’t the problem – the real difference between getting stuck and getting stronger is what you make it mean.

FOCUS ON THE PROCESS RATHER THAN THE OUTCOME

Sometimes we win, sometimes we lose. But if we give it our all and focus on the performance processes rather than the outcomes, we are inherently more relaxed and have greater clarity of thought, and we therefore make more informed, rational decisions. Ultimately, we are more likely to succeed – whatever success means to us.

I think we should even learn to congratulate ourselves on our failures. We can relieve pressure by realising that we will be absolutely fine no matter what. In fact, we can often gain more from our failures than from our successes. Failures can be something to celebrate. Don’t wish for things to happen the way you would like to, but wish for the strength to handle whatever happens. This realisation can start to shift our perspective on life, as we frame situations in our minds as either ‘good’ or ‘bad.’

Some of my best tournament victories as a table tennis player came after losing a match in the group stage. If anything, it taught me to let go of the outcome. I started to feel like I had nothing to lose, and that often resulted in me playing more freely. One ‘bad’ loss didn’t mean I was playing badly.

Before my hip replacement, my performance in marathons and HYROX races had been declining. I kept trying to squeeze more from a body that was already telling me the truth. Eventually, I had to face reality. At the time, it felt brutal – like defeat, like going backwards.

But upon reflection, even if it feels that way in sport and in life, there is no such thing as backwards (or even forwards). There is simply onwards.

Sometimes a setback is not there to stop us. It’s there to force honesty – to strip away illusion and make us confront reality, and then do something about it. The feedback is never-ending – both positive and negative. Learning is daily, but wisdom is an endless pursuit.

TURNING REFLECTION INTO ACTION

Let go of all that no longer serves you. Find peace in the present moment by recognising that everything that has come before – poor preparation, bad losses, minor niggles, or major injuries – does not have to affect the present or the future unless we allow it to. They have zero impact on our ability to bring our best selves into the present moment.

This is something disability has certainly taught me. We work with what we’ve got. We let go of everything we can’t do, everything that has happened before, and we focus on what we can do now. We find solutions in the here and now. Nothing else matters – certainly not a disappointing result that has upset us.

When we do the things that we can do, we will find a way. Onwards, always. Since I couldn’t run much, I’ve had to pivot. I’ve put in a lot of adapted movements, volume in the pool and on the bike, and small hip activation exercises. I’ve celebrated the little wins – the tiny milestones, the baby steps.

It’s a process – both physical and mental – which is not new to me, and one I’ve come to embrace. Not just in terms of accelerated rehab, but performance more broadly. If we focus only on what we’ve lost, we stay stuck. If we focus on what we can do about it – responsibly, with discipline and intention – we begin to find a way forward.

Since my surgery, I’ve competed in multiple HYROX races in quick succession, including an all-adaptive relay and a double crutch doubles race. I’m now building towards the London Marathon and continuing towards my dream of becoming an IRONMAN on crutches. These are all things that many people called impossible – before, during, and after every setback I’ve faced. But what once felt impossible can transform over time.

Much like poor performances, the body doesn’t need to ‘forgive’ wounds in order to heal. True healing comes from authenticity – acknowledging reality without diminishing it. Inner peace creates harmony in how we relate to ourselves, and that is the most profound healing of all.

JUST A FEW OF MY BIGRULES OF THUMB – WHERE REFRAMING BEGINS

• Review based on our performance processes rather than our performance outcomes (try not to tie our emotions and feelings on whether we ‘win’ or ‘lose’)
• Prioritise long-term growth (success doesn’t come overnight - losses and setbacks, and the subsequent learnings, are all part of the process)
• Learning is a daily thing. Wisdom, an endless pursuit
• There are two minds: one that curses fate and one that loves it. Amor fati. Love only what happens – there is no greater harmony
• What stands in our way becomes the Way
• When we do the things that we can do, we will find the Way – simply believe in the power that’s within us and start to use it
• It is not our struggles but our response which defines us – it does not matter what we bear, but how we bear it. It does not matter what they say, or think, or do. Only what we do.
• We are strong because of difficulties and not despite them – if we have passed through sport or life without a struggle, a setback or a poor performance then how can anyone, even ourselves, know what we are truly capable of?
• Logic and rational thinking over emotion – how can we learn from this? What is this trying to teach us?
• Thoughts aren’t facts – there is no such thing as ‘should’ only ‘could’. When you step outside yourself, when you put things bigger and more important than yourself first, when you see ego for the menace that it is then you will be great and do great.
• Emotions are transient. Like clouds passing through the sky, they move. They change shape. They come and go. We are not our emotions. We are witnesses to them
• The real battle is always within – our inner fortress, our brain, our mindset. It is not destroyed by what actually happens but by our judgments – choose not to feel harmed and we won’t feel harmed; don’t feel harmed, and we haven’t been
• When inevitable force of circumstance upsets our equinimity, lose no time in recovering our self-control – revert at once to ourselves, our purpose, our values and don’t lose the rhythm more than we can help. The rhythm never gets lost, only we do.
• Get back up when we fail, celebrate behaving like a human – the right path always remains open and we just have to keep going back to it.

RECONNECTING WITH PURPOSE

One of the most powerful ways to reframe setbacks is through purpose. Goals matter, but purpose carries you further when motivation fades and outcomes disappear. If our identity is tied only to performance, then poor performances will keep breaking us. But if our purpose is bigger than the result, we can endure far more.

It is never just about one race, one result, or one moment. A personal best is a feeling, not just a time. This is especially important in endurance sports and HYROX, where numbers can dominate how we see ourselves. Of course, goals matter – it’s about the clock, but it’s not only about the clock. If we reduce sport to performance alone, we miss everything else it offers: growth, perspective, resilience, and self-understanding.

It is always more than just a race.

FINAL THOUGHT

Do not judge yourself by your successes, but by how many times you can fall and get back up again. You will have poor performances. You will have races where nothing clicks, training blocks that go flat, results that sting, setbacks that feel unfair, and moments where your confidence disappears.

That is not proof that you are failing. It is proof that you are in it. So, feel it. Be honest about it. Learn from it. But don’t let it define your identity or compromise your values. Because the best athletes are not the ones who avoid poor performances – they are the ones who know how to respond, and how to get back up again and again.

Always.