The Prince and Princess of Wales visited Bisham Abbey National Sports Centre in Marlow on Thursday. Their visit is part of a series of engagements held this week to mark World Mental Health Day which takes place annually on 10th October. During their royal engagement, the couple shone a light on the interaction between mental health and sport.
They attended a mental fitness workshop run by SportsAid in conjunction with SportsAid’s charity partner BelievePerform. The workshop aims to support young sports people and their families to manage their mental well-being and understand how they can help themselves and each other to build the skills for happy and healthy experiences in sport and beyond.
During a candid chat with a group of young athletes, Prince William, 41, said: “For me, resilience is a mindset. When things go wrong, I go into a different gear.” Laughing, Kate turned to her husband, saying: “William will know that I take quite a creative approach to resilience.
“As a mother, making sure I’m speaking to my children and raising the progress and the effort involved I think is quite hard to do, and I think an important message for youngsters is that this growth mindset is so important for all the different challenges they face.”
During their visit, Princess Kate, 41, joined sessions with young athletes and parents to observe how their mental fitness is being boosted by SportsAid. Paralympic swimmer Ellie Simmonds and Commonwealth champion netball player Ama Agbeze were both on hand to help with the sessions in their roles as SportsAid ambassadors.
Later in the morning, Prince William and Princess Kate joined young athletes and took part in two practical sessions designed to foster mental resilience. The duo took part in a challenging exercise that saw them attempt to score points in a netball hoop whilst up against the clock.
Princess Kate went head-to-head against her husband and attempted to shoot as Prince William defended the goalpost, though she missed four times.
Finally, William and Kate took part in a game of goalball – a visually impaired Paralympic sport whereby all participants are required to wear opaque eyeshades at all times to ensure fair competition. The sport was invented in 1946 to help rehabilitate veterans who had lost their sight during WWII.
Princess Kate got well and truly stuck in, temporarily discarding her blazer for the Paralympic sport. The royal appeared to be in her element as she deftly tossed the ball whilst wearing a black eyemask.
While Kate managed to successfully put a ball past the goalie, Prince William’s attempt was saved. Reflecting on the challenge, William said: “It’s really hard, so disorientating, I imagine it’s a fun game though.”
For the special visit, Princess Kate looked her usual polished self in a bold cobalt blue Zara blazer which she teamed with a pair of dark skinny jeans and her trusty Veja trainers. She elevated her outfit with a pair of gold star hoop earrings and highlighted her features with a sweep of pretty pink blusher, lashings of mascara and nude lipstick.
Kate was also pictured sporting a minor finger injury, just weeks after the royal was snapped with her fingers taped up following a trampolining accident at home with her children.
At the time, a spokesperson for Kensington Palace said it was “a small injury,” and “nothing serious.” Meanwhile, Kate said: “I was jumping around on the trampoline,” before adding: “I did put it on just to keep it safe,” whilst gesturing to her plasters.
Prince William, meanwhile, cut a casual figure in a navy jumper, comfortable jeans and mocha-hued trainers.
The duo also spoke to a group of athletes about how to cope with stressful periods and how to build up resilience. Musing on the importance of mindset, Kate said that being able to change your mindset is a “really important skill.” She went on to say: “It’s a skill we could teach our youngest kids that would help our children later in life.”
William, meanwhile, said: “For me it’s mindset – I have to get myself in a certain zone. When things start going a bit wrong, I click into a different gear. I see the end goal and I try and work out a path, like a maze, to get there, and I prioritise.”
The Princess of Wales has been Patron of SportsAid since 2013 and in 2022 Their Royal Highnesses visited SportsAid’s Team England Futures programme at the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.
As a couple, William and Kate have been working hard to support children’s mental well-being for a number of years. Back in 2016, Their Royal Highnesses launched their Heads Together Campaign in an effort to tackle the stigma attached to mental health and to encourage people to speak more freely about mental well-being.
At the time of its launch, Prince William said: “When Catherine, Harry and I launched Heads Together, it is fair to say that we were ambitious about what it could achieve.
“It was Catherine who first realised that all three of us were working on mental health in our individual areas of focus. She had seen that at the core of adult issues like addiction and family breakdown, unresolved childhood mental health issues were often part of the problem.”
