How being an athlete makes you a better submissive

Photo by Diego Corona on Unsplash

What are words that come to your mind when you hear the word athlete? Strength, endurance, sports, teams, discipline… These are all qualities that most athletes, in some aspect, possess. Over half of the population has reported participating in athletics at some point in their life. Whether that be consistently hitting the gym or rigorously training for a sport. As an athlete and submissive myself, I have noticed parallels between the two that I shall be sharing. More importantly, I saw how being an athlete and submissive at the same time can strengthen both skills independently.

To start, I will give a little backstory on my experience as an athlete. I played a specific team sport for over a decade now and reached a relatively high level for the sport. My training in secondary school consisted of multiple hours of training, almost every day, and travel for competitive competitions. It was a large part of my identity from primary all the way through University. Nowadays, I play in a friendly league designed for athletes who still want to enjoy the game but don’t play to try to go pro.

Update: this was written in 2025, and Charlie has since then moved, and while he has taken a little break from the sport, he is looking to join a small local group again! Exciting stuff!

I also identify as a submissive and have had a dynamic with my Master for over 5 years. During my time as a submissive with my Master is also when I was still practicing my sport regularly. As my submissive identity grew, I began to notice how similar playing on a team was to submission in quite a few ways, and how being an athlete allowed me to establish skills that strengthen my serving abilities.

Let’s get the obvious out of the way, and that’s physical strength and stamina. Consistent training allowed me to be stronger for my Master. It could be as simple as having an easier time carrying His backpack, or an even more spicy example of being able to do more in the bedroom. The higher endurance and muscle put on made physical service much easier.

Discipline is also a huge factor in both submission and being on a team. Coaches require you to stay stable, respectful, and tough throughout training and during games. Handling high pressure situations when someone is yelling at you or acting intensely is not easy for everyone. Having the practice of an authority figure barking orders at you makes taking orders from your Dom much easier\!

Degradation, surprisingly, can also be a large part of the sports environment. This isn’t the case for every team, and I’m not saying it's necessarily a good thing. If you get to a certain level as an athlete, especially on a team where the better you play the more time you get, you’re going to get insulted. This may be by an opposing player trying to get under your skin, your teammate if they feel you didn’t hold your own, or even your coach, as a strange way to motivate you. I’ve heard coaches say anything from “you’re being lazy out there” to “Your mother wishes you were never born.” Harsh, yes, and not exactly the healthiest, but you learn to have thick skin and not take any of the insults purposefully. If anything, it can motivate certain people to try harder and prove them wrong. Now, I’m not saying everyone is like this, and there’s a time and a place for this type of talk. Yet, if you and your Dom are into this and have actively negotiated it (unlike the sports environment\!), perhaps you already have experience in taking a chirp or two.

Speaking of which, let’s talk about punishment. It happens all the time in sports. Whether it’s getting benched, running lines for being late, or something else, punishment is a huge aspect of shaping up a team. Not all Doms punish, but if yours does, you’ll know what to expect, quickly understand what you did wrong, and be able to whip up and fix the problem fast. You don’t want to run lines again, now, do you?

Conditioning is also a huge part of being an athlete. I don’t mean endurance conditioning, either. Let’s take American football, for example. There are dozens of plays that the team has to remember. How do they learn them? By doing them over and over again. Reinforcing every aspect. Run a play perfectly? Good, water break, rest, let’s move on. Screw it up? Whistle, start over. Hm, positive reinforcement is a big factor too... Sound familiar?

There’s also a lot of team conditioning that takes place off the field. You suffer with your siblings on your team, and you grow close. Just like you may “suffer” with other submissives and feel a bond with them after. This term is called unit cohesion, and it’s very similar to what the military does to connect recruits with one another. By putting everyone in hardship, they will band together to get through it.

If you’re a competitive athlete, you will do everything in your power to get the job done. This competitive mindset will apply to servitude as well. You’re not necessarily competing against anyone, even if other submissives are involved, moreso, you’re competing against yourself. How do you push yourself to do it better next time? How do you “win”? How do you make your Dom, your “coach” in a sense, proud?

At the same time, maybe you’ve also learned how to lose properly too. Not all of us have won a championship or made the team during tryouts. I have played on teams that have won it all, and I’ve also played on teams where we’ve lost almost every single game. Learning how to lose is a different type of mindset that requires reflection. What did you do wrong? What could you have changed? How can you bounce back? A good athlete always pushes themselves further, even after failure.

Perhaps you didn’t think of this one, but being an athlete probably means you’ve gained some organization skills as well. You have to make sure you have all of your equipment, that you’re up in time for a match, and that you’ve arrived at your game with enough time to get ready. You’ve probably had to warm up, be on the field at a certain time, and prepare everything that you need. This is just another way to serve your Dom. Prepare what they need.. Whether that’s checking their bag to make sure they have their laptop or making sure their wallet has all of their cards. This will also teach you how to run a schedule and make sure your Dom is on time and you’re on time.

Taking care of your equipment is another big factor that some of the athletes reading this might possess. Take sports like hockey, golf, and cycling. All three of these sports, and many more, require expensive gear you need to handle with care. This safekeeping of equipment will give you the necessary skills to treat your Dom’s possession with care.

So, yes, being an athlete can absolutely make you a better submissive. Obviously, you don’t HAVE to be an athlete to be a fantastic sub. Musical theatre, artistry, cooking, and any other extra curricular all provide skill sets that can make you a better submissive. You can read more about how different hobbies can help you be a better sub here.

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But let’s get back to athletes, now. I’ve talked extensively of how being an athlete can make you a better sub. Well, is the reverse true? In my experience, yes.

I play a position in a sport that requires a lot of mental focus and training. In fact, the position is often said to be mentally tougher than physically. An athlete, in any sport of physical activity, requires just as much mental strength as they do physical. Unfortunately for me, this was my weak spot.

An unconfident athlete is a weak athlete. Just the ability to believe in yourself can up your game by a crazy amount.

My Master and I worked on my confidence through my submission. It could be as simple as Him coming to one of my games, where I felt I was playing for Him. He didn’t care if I won or lost, but He cared that I put in the effort. Almost any time my Master came to my game, I got out of my own head about how I was playing and focused on having a good game for Him. As time passed, my confidence grew through my submission. Part of this was my Master literally conditioning me to have more confidence. The larger part was finally being comfortable and feeling strong in my subspace. The more confident I felt outside of the sports and just confidence in myself as a person, the more it translated into my play.

I had teammates and audience members alike come up to me after games and tell me they could see the improvement in my play and that I must be working hard at it. The only thing that changed was my level of confidence, and I have my Master to thank for that one.

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Athletes require intense focus as well. For most team sports, games can be at least an hour long. For some sports, it can even be days long\! This requires a lot of mental fortitude and focus during intense situations. Another weakness of mine was paying attention for the entire game. I felt myself drift off into my thoughts, especially against weaker teams or less action-heavy games. This caused me to make simple mistakes that should be routine at this point. By my Master building my patience, it also translated to my focus during games. At some points, my Master makes me kneel for long periods of time, edge, or suck Him for an impressive amount of time.

At first, I was pretty antsy during these rituals. I would get bored, want to move on, or drown in my own thoughts. Over time, though, I learned how to focus on the task, even if monotonous, at hand. Part of this is when my Master ordered me to stop watching short form content, which greatly improved my submission. This applied to my sport, too, where I could stay in the game for long stretches of time.

The biggest way my dynamic impacted my play was simply staying grounded. If I did make a mistake or we were losing a game, I struggled with anger and self hatred. I always felt like it was my fault, and would spiral, making my play worse. A mixture of confidence building and focus training definitely helped, but learning how to stay grounded and contain my spirals impacted my life as a whole. Taking a moment to breathe, saying mantras about my submission, and allowing my thoughts to clear was a huge part of regulating during scenes for me. It’s what got me through scenes where I got physically overwhelmed and felt like I couldn’t push past it. I didn’t want to safeword but for some reason, my brain would spiral as soon as I started getting overwhelmed which made it hard for me to relax. In those moments, those mantras are what allowed me to hold on and push through until my brain calmed, and only then was i able to enjoy it. This mentality applied to my games. I couldn’t safeword out of a game, so I had to play through it, and grounding in my submission turned my thoughts from “red” to “green”.

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Now, let’s get to the fun, kinky stuff. Coach x jock scenes, dynamics, and even life styles is a niche group in the kink community. Of course, either the Dominant or submissive having athletic experiences can greatly enhance this play. In fact, both parties actively participating in athletics can be a part of the dynamic. Just make sure to do it in a safe-for-work way around others. A Dom pushing their submissive at the gym, creating a workout routine, or simply examining them as their sub plays a sport are all ways to incorporate athletics into the dynamic. On the flip side, requiring that a submissive attends the Doms games, subs tracking their Dom’s performance, or making sure all their equipment, snacks, and water bottles are filled is another way a submissive can serve an athletic Dom.

During intense periods in my dynamic with my Master, He would control when I would wake up, create a weekly workout routine for me to follow, and measure me weekly to see progress. He would also control my calorie intake, what foods I ate, and ask for progress reports at the gym and during my games. This is a higher level intensity that is very similar to what a personal trainer or coach may require, and a very fun and intense way to add some athletics to your dynamic.

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So, next time you’re at the gym, lifting weights, or going on a run, perhaps think about how what you’re doing can serve your Dominant, and watch how both areas of your life, submission and athletics, mutually benefit one another.