Jeffrey Swarr teaches mental toughness techniques to help athletes and teams improve their performance. His previous experience as a college baseball coach did not go well, but he has since developed methods by obtaining an advanced degree and reading many books. Coaches from Ephrata cross country, Manheim Township discus thrower Alex Zimmerman, and the York College softball team saw success after working with Swarr. His teachings include developing routines to get in the right mindset and focusing on positive thinking. Both athletes and Swarr have benefited from their collaborations.

1. JOHN WALK
JWALK@LNPNEWS.COM
His lone stint as a
head coach came about
a decade ago, when Jef-
frey Swarr took over
as the lead man of the
Millersville University
men’s baseball program
in 2006. His time there
would last all of two sea-
sons.
“I don’t think I had
that mental toughness
going in there whatso-
ever,” Swarr recalled re-
cently. “On the outside I
was a confident person,
but on the inside I really
wasn’t. And it became
that way because it was
more about me.”
Millersville baseball
went a combined 28-
65 in Swarr’s two years
at the helm. But he had
the obstacles stacked
against him from the
outset considering the
Marauders were just be-
ing handed a two-year
probation when he came
on board. And Swarr, a
Solanco grad, still had
his own growing pains
to go through as a head
coach.
“What I learned from
that situation at Millers-
ville,” Swarr said. “Was
thatwhenyouputthefo-
cus on me then you end
up taking everything.”
Fast forward to
2015 and Swarr, hav-
ing learned from those
previous growing
pains, has found suc-
SPORTS PSYCHOLOGY
Building toughness
KIRK NEIDERMYER | LNP CORRESPONDENT
Jeffrey Swarr gives a seminar on mental toughness to the
Ephrata cross country team in August.
Jeffrey Swarr helps local teams and
athletes get tougher between the ears
SWARR, page 4
Swarr: Teaching mental toughness
cessasacoachinadiffer-
ent role: mental tough-
ness.
Nobody close
His teachings have
been catching on.
There’s discus thrower
Alex Zimmerman, who
finished second-to-last
at the District Three
meet as a junior at Man-
heim Township High
School before working
with Swarr and going on
to place fourth at dis-
tricts and sixth at states
hersenioryear.Zimmer-
man is now competing
at NCAA Division I Vil-
lanova.
There’s the Ephrata
cross country team, a
mostly .500 program
before head coach Mike
Hershberger called
Swarr in during the 2014
season. The Mounts
boys’ and girls’ cross
country runners each
went 17-4 in Lancaster-
Lebanon League compe-
tition this past fall.
“And these last two
years we’ve sent nine
kids to states, seven of
them different kids,”
Hershberger said. “No-
body in District Three is
anywhere close to that.”
And there’s the York
College softball team,
across the Susquehanna
River.
“His(Swarr’s)firstyear
working with us was last
year,” York College soft-
ball coach Jen Petteys
said. “We went 23-19, the
most successful season
York’s had since 2010.
And we did it with 11
freshman, four sopho-
mores and one senior. It
was an extremely young
team.”
All credit Swarr’s
teachings in the mental
game as playing a role in
their turnarounds.
Preparation
So what, exactly, is
mental toughness? No.
It’s not about just visu-
alizing yourself on the
medal stand before you
get there. Or taking a
deep breath at the free-
throw line. Or fighting
off fatigue in the closing
minutes.
“Here’s the thing peo-
ple often don’t under-
stand: they think ‘I’m
just gonna come up to
the plate and get ready
to hit.’ Well, no. There’s
a preparation for it,”
Swarr said. “What are
they doing in the on-
deck circle? What are
they observing? Are they
committing to that so
that when they step in
the batter’s box they own
that batter’s box? When
theysteponthepitcher’s
mound they own that
pitcher’s mound?”
Swarr, who has also
spent time as an assis-
tant baseball coach at
Franklin & Marshall and
Lampeter-Strasburg
over the years, works
full-time as a learning
support teacher at Lam-
peter-Strasburg High
School.
But he has been devel-
oping these mental tech-
niques — from what he
learned when obtaining
a master’s degree from
Millersville in sports
management and coach-
ing, through his own
coaching experiences
and from the countless
books he’s read —and
applying them in the
last couple years in his
part-time role as a per-
formance enhancement
coach at Spooky Nook
Sports complex for base-
ball and softball players.
From there, it’s mostly
been through word of
mouth over the last two
years that folks like Zim-
merman, Hershberger
and Petteys heard about
Swarr and brought him
in.
‘Conquer the
mind’
A lot of Swarr’s teach-
ings deal with devel-
oping a routine, which
helped turn around the
college softball career of
Warwick grad Vanessa
Mendez at York College.
Mendez had the physical
tools but just needed to
get out of her head when
coming to the plate, so
she developed a routine
to clear her mind, first
looking at an emblem of
the United States on her
bat.
“I would look at it ev-
ery single time,” Mendez
said. “And then I would
think just see the ball,
hit the ball, take a deep
breathandgetinthebat-
ter’s box.”
After struggling might-
ily in her first three years
at York, Mendez went
on to set career-highs in
games started, plate ap-
pearances and batting
average in her senior
campaign.
Then there’s Zimmer-
man,whobenefitedfrom
Swarr’s advice on posi-
tive thinking.
“Honestly I think Jeff
really helped me so
much to where I don’t
think I would’ve gotten
to states if he wouldn’t
have shared the tech-
niques like conquer the
mind and you conquer
your body,” Zimmerman
said.
“Am I ecstatic Alex
succeeded at the state
meet?”Swarrsaid.“Sure.
But I’m also ecstatic I
have a relationship with
her family. They’re the
biggest backers of what
I do with kids. That’s the
biggest thing for me.”
And as much as he’s
played a part in improv-
ing the performance of
localathletes,they’redo-
ing the same for him.
“There’s gonna be
people who read that I’m
doing this and they’re
gonna be like ‘Really,
this guy?’” Swarr said.
“Because if you had seen
thewayIhadactedinthe
past as a coach ... even
when I was at Millers-
ville, it’s totally different.
But it’s been something
that I’ve needed.”
Ephrata’s cross country team at a mental toughness seminar by Jeffrey Swarr at Ephrata Middle School in August.
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