'Keeping it together: attentional focus It is clear so far that, as performers learn movement skills, they also must develop the ability to del with pressure and anxiety. When a skill that is nor. mally performed at a high level breaks down under pressure, we say that the performer has 'choked', One of the first places to begin, before discussing methods or strategies for dealing with choking, is with an understanding of what it is about pressure and anxiety that seems to result in the loss of automated movement control. The previous section 1 pointed to attentional focus as a potential mechanism for the impact of anxiety and pressure on perfor-mance. Furthermore, a breakdown of the temporal ) patterns (or rhythm) underlying movement may explain some of the behavioural characteristics described above (MacPherson et al 2009). In the second half of this chapter, we will review there. concepts and discuss some of the implications for skill training.