Emotional intelligence, fitness, running activities, athletics, sports performance

Abstract

The importance of this concept in particular in endurance and high voltage sports, such as running activities in the square and the field, which requires complex interference between physical and psychological factors to achieve optimal performance. From this standpoint, the current research aims to study the relationship between emotional intelligence and physical fitness among the runners of running activities, revealing the level of each of them, and the nature of the link between the two variables. The researcher adopted the descriptive curriculum in the style of correlation of relations to be suitable for the nature of the research goals, and it was applied to a sample consisting of (30) runners from Baghdad Athletics Clubs, whose ages ranged between (18-23) years, and they exercise regularly during the Sports Season 2025. The emotional intelligence measure dependent on the Bradbury and Graves model (2005), which consists of four skills Main: self -awareness, self -management, social awareness, and relationship management. A group of fitness tests were also applied to measure the most important fitness elements associated with running activities, namely: endurance, speed, explosive strength, flexibility, and agility. The results of the research showed that the sample personnel have a high -level level of emotional intelligence, as the results showed that there is a positive correlation with statistically significant intelligence and physical fitness, indicating that athletes with high emotional intelligence tend to achieve better levels of physical efficiency. This is due to the ability of these runners to organize their feelings, control their emotions and motivate themselves to continue effort and training, which reflects positively on their physical performance.