Michael Phelps Tactics for Great Public Speaking

So what lessons are there from Michael Phelps that might be appropriate and helpful to people trying to learn how to be better speakers, better communicators? After all, he's an athlete. He's a swimmer. We don't think of him as some great public speaker. I was watching the Olympics last night with my wife and daughter and was struck when the video camera zoomed in on Michael Phelps. This was after he won one race, was about to run another, and he wasn't closing his eyes, meditating. He wasn't eating some sort of soy product. He wasn't getting another one of those suction things on his arm and body. No, he wasn't doing any of that. He was watching video on a computer screen of swimming. Now, I don't know if he was watching his own race, although I suspect that it was. It could be that he was watching strokes of his competitors in another race. But to me, that is extraordinarily relevant to what good public speakers should be doing. You want to get ready for your speech? Watch a video of yourself already having given that great speech. Michael Phelps has never won any race in the Olympics, swimming any stroke, without having watched video of himself doing it exactly the way he wants to do it, stroke by stroke, breath by breath. The number of kicks and strokes down each way of the pool and back. He's counted out. He knows what it is. He's watched it, he's seen it. He has a firm vision in his mind of exactly what he wants to do. And it's not his mind's eye, it's not a metaphorical vision. He's actually stared at it on a computer screen right in front of him. And that, I think, is also the absolute best advice for anyone trying to get ready for a speech. Literally watch a video of yourself giving that speech or that rehearsal. Do that, and you might not win gold medals, but you'll do well.