WAG When the gymnast can't stay on the beam...

[gymisforeveryone]

I have this one gymnasts who has literally not stayed on the beam even ONCE at a competition in FOUR YEARS! I know this sounds absurd, but it's true. She can stay on the beam at practice, but not when competing. Today we had once again a competition and she did fabulous job on every other apparatus but beam. She fell off twice again, even if her beam routine is so watered down that it's almost ridiculous now. I'm pretty sure that even if we made her compete two or three levels down she would still fall. I don't know why she keeps falling.

She is very fit, well conditioned and balanced gymnasts, one of the most talented gymnasts in our gym and on elite path competing now the first elite path level. She has already gone through 5 different levels at this point and her current skill level is between USAG levels 8-9 on different apparatuses. On beam her hardest skills are a back tuck, BHS LOSO (with mats), switch leap, front tuck from one leg (with mats), RO full twist dismount... And her competition routine is now simple mount, full turn, switch leap - split jump, cartwheel-RO, BHS, back tuck dismount. So very easy for her. We have taken away all the riskier skills. It's the bare minimum in her level. She has to get mobility score on each apparatus (all the composition requirements must be fullfilled AND at least 7.5 E score in the same routine) during the same season and she has easily got the scores on every other apparatus but beam. She's all the time on the podium on the other events and outscores the others so easily. Beam is just her nemesis and it feels like she's almost given up the hope of ever staying on the beam. And when she keeps falling, it keeps making her more frustrated and more miserable. She should move up to the next level but we have only 3 meets left and if she doesn't get the mobility score for beam she will have to repeat this level - AGAIN. She is already repeating.

I even mentioned her mom that seeing a sports psychologist might be a good idea. She needs tools to hold her nerves and to start to believe that she could stay on the beam.

Do you have any words of wisdom? Any suggest stories after similar experiences? She always falls off on different skills. It's rarely the same skill two competitions in a row.

I'm so sorry for her. I hate to see the empty look in her eyes after beam at every competition we attend. She doesn't cry, she's not mad. She just looks sad but tries to hide it, keeps cheering on the others. But her mom has told me how she really feels.

 

[ayyyrial]

This sounds really hard for her. I imagine there's all kinds of psychological things going on for her after four years of this, so I think your sport psych suggestion is a good one. The other thing to consider might be how competition-format warm-up and routine order impacts her. Do you do competition-style beam rotations in practice? E.g. everyone gets the same amount of time to warm up that you would at a meet, and shows their routines one-by-one. Can she stay on the beam during those? I'd also wonder if she is usually first/last/somewhere in the middle to compete on beam and if switching the order up might be better for her or at least provide something unusual to help get her out of this routine.

 

[gymisforeveryone]

It is really hard for her. She's a little shy and doesn't really talk about the things that are going through her mind when competing. We try to take the pressure off, we try to talk about the expectations and that falling off once is not the end of the world and she could still technically meet the 7,5 E score if she finished strong otherwise and got the connections. But it seems like when she falls down the first time she can't put her mind back on it, she seems focused but something is still missing.

We do competition set up at practice pretty often, not every practice but every now and then. She sometimes stays on the beam on those but she might fall off as well.

Unfortunately the competition order is always the same. It's alpabetical order, always. And she's the last of our gymnasts in her level. Just today she said that she hates being last. But that's something we can't change.

 

[CoachAlex]

Obviously the only info I am basing this on comes from your post - but if she really hasn’t ever stuck a beam routine in competition my guess is she has gotten to the point where she is subconsciously psyching herself out. She ALWAYS sticks in practice and NEVER sticks in a meet, so when she gets to a meet then she EXPECTS to fall. On top of that, if you are watering down (changing) her routine she doesn’t have the time to get comfortable and consistent with her routine. My suggestion would be stop watering down her routine (assuming she is making the skills safely at the gym) - this will give her a solid routine that is the same every time AND it shows her that you think this is a routine she can hit. She doubts herself, but if you give her a routine and stick to it that shows her that you believe she is capable of successfully competing that routine.

 

[gymisforeveryone]

To make it more clear - she doesn't ALWAYS stay on the beam at practice. But if she has 5 routines to do she usually stays on 3/5 or 4/5.

The watering down that we did after the first competition of the season was taking off her BHS-BHS and the BT. Last year she competed those. Those were the skills that gave her the most anxiety and the ones that she really needed time to warm up at meets. We took those skills off and she seemed happy, and she has had plenty of time to do her new routine because our season is very long. We made it clear that we believe in her and that as soon as she gets the mobility score she could add those more difficult skills to her routine again if she wanted to. She was completely on board with us and agreed that playing it safe was the best decision.

 

[CoachAlex]

Hmmmmm - if she wants to you could maybe find a sports psychologist - there might be some underlying reason but it could also just be that she gets really nervous at meets and beam is hard to compete - even in practice it is difficult to completely recreate a competition “feel.” Good luck!

 

[John]

Stepping out here so no offense. Maybe she wants to come off? Maybe she doesn't want or isn't ready for those beam skills that make her "nervous"? If she stays on she moves up and on too those scary skills.

 

[tpMom]

I'm obviously not a coach, but it seems to me that this situation could be dealt with in the same way a major fear or mental block would be dealt with. Maybe start by imitating and replicating the stress of a meet at practice as much as possible. Have coaches, teammates, whoever, score every beam routine you can while at practice. Have a group of people watch her while she does it. Have groups around the gym make noise, clap, cheer, whatever while she's up there too - whatever would simulate a meet environment. Increase beam practice time so she does the same routine over and over and over until she's almost bored with it. And maybe consider introducing some required, coached meditation before every beam practice where you walk her through a visualization of a perfect beam routine. That could probably be homework as well. At least 15 minutes a day she could find a quiet place at home and visualize her doing her beam routine perfectly. If she sees herself fall in her visualization (which will probably happen if she's had the same mental block for several years,) then you could encourage her to visualize getting back up on the beam and completing her routine perfectly - but she should try to visualize a perfect routine from start to finish at least a few times before she stops her meditations for the day. Since she will always be going last at competitions, she could use her wait time to continue this visualization - I think, since it's most likely a mental block, mental warm-ups and work-outs would be very beneficial for her.

Again, I'm not a coach. I can't really imagine suggesting to my daughter's coach that he includes meditation at practice. But since you seem vested in this gymnast's success, and since you asked, that's my two cents - for what it's worth!

 

[Splat]

Hmmmmm - if she wants to you could maybe find a sports psychologist - there might be some underlying reason but it could also just be that she gets really nervous at meets and beam is hard to compete - even in practice it is difficult to completely recreate a competition “feel.” Good luck!

This is a major one in my opinion. I used to get super nervous at meets. I could nail every routine at practice, but then at a meet I would freak out and wobble a lot which usually ended in falling. One of the things that helped me was recreating a meet environment at the gym, as then when at a meet it didn't feel as different.

I'm obviously not a coach, but it seems to me that this situation could be dealt with in the same way a major fear or mental block would be dealt with. Maybe start by imitating and replicating the stress of a meet at practice as much as possible. Have coaches, teammates, whoever, score every beam routine you can while at practice. Have a group of people watch her while she does it. Have groups around the gym make noise, clap, cheer, whatever while she's up there too - whatever would simulate a meet environment. Increase beam practice time so she does the same routine over and over and over until she's almost bored with it. And maybe consider introducing some required, coached meditation before every beam practice where you walk her through a visualization of a perfect beam routine. That could probably be homework as well. At least 15 minutes a day she could find a quiet place at home and visualize her doing her beam routine perfectly. If she sees herself fall in her visualization (which will probably happen if she's had the same mental block for several years,) then you could encourage her to visualize getting back up on the beam and completing her routine perfectly - but she should try to visualize a perfect routine from start to finish at least a few times before she stops her meditations for the day. Since she will always be going last at competitions, she could use her wait time to continue this visualization - I think, since it's most likely a mental block, mental warm-ups and work-outs would be very beneficial for her.

Again, I'm not a coach. I can't really imagine suggesting to my daughter's coach that he includes meditation at practice. But since you seem vested in this gymnast's success, and since you asked, that's my two cents - for what it's worth!

Visualizing my routines also helped keep me calm when at a meet. Another thing that hasn't been mentioned that has helped me is finding on skill on beam that the gymnast loves to show off and usually doesn't fall on, for me that is my switch leap. During a routine I focus on that skill and take the nervousness and put it towards the excitement of that skill. The other thing that helped me is just overall becoming confident on the beam and knowing that if i fall it might as well be because I went for it and wasn't afraid.

 

[coachmolly]

I was a terrible beam competitor as a gymnast, it is terribly frustrating. I know for me, I wanted it SO badly that I would put extra pressure on myself, combined with being a naturally very timid and nervous person, and it was almost always a disaster. I scored over a 9 once in all my years of competing. For me, all of my training, prep work, key words, etc. would disappear and as I went into skills I would just say to myself, "I hope I make it." No confidence in my abilities or the fact that I had done in hundreds of times, just the thinking that it was a gamble that I would stay on and one that more often than not did not work in my favor.
It's unfortunate you can't change the competition order. I have an 11 year old who is very nervous and after playing around found that her sweet spot is going 1st up on beam. Not a lot of time to wait around after warming-up and no time to sit and get herself worked up about the routine ahead.
I would continue to suggest a sports psychologist, if there isn't one in your area I think many are now willing to do video sessions.
I think with how long this has persisted, any quick fix that is effective for the average kid (visualizing, key words, pressure sets in the gym) just isn't going to cut it.

 

[gymisforeveryone]

Yeah, it has been going on for so long that there is no easy fix. She doesn't look wobbly or shaking on the beam, she just does a skill and usually lands a little off balanced and jumps off. I don't think that she does any of this falling on purpose. It has been like this 4 years so it's not like she never wanted to move up levels and go for the harder skills. She doesn't dislike beam at practice, she doesn't avoid it, and she usually don't need too much "rituals" to go for her harder skills at practice. She's not one of the most fearless kids on any event, she might need a day or two to think trough a new scary skills that she's about to try but when she gets over it she usually can go for it again. She just got her beautiful double back on floor and is training release moves on bars and even if those are scary skills for her she can be brave enough to try everything. She is scared of some of the big stuff but can be surprisingly strong mentally and calmly put the pieces together in her head and venture new skills.

I gave her mother one sport psychologist's name so they could make an appointment. One of my gymnasts have seen her (she had mental block issues) and she really liked her. I hope that they will go there, but I understand their hesitation. It's pretty expensive and I'm pretty sure that the kid would not be thrilled about the idea because she's so private person and shy in general and pretty much only talks to her family.

 

[John]

I hope she finds an approach that lets her succeed. I think visualization may help. FIngers crossed.

 

[gymisforeveryone]

A little update.

We had another competition where she competed in two different categories. At first she competed in a qualification for Nationals. She is a junior and for nationals she had to compete under FIG juniors rules. That competition was on Saturday and then she had her normal level competition on Sunday.

Her routines on Saturday were harder, she had to add difficulty to meet the FIG composition requirements. She doesn't have full difficulty on all the events but her difficulty and execution were still pretty good. For beam, we added the front tuck and back tuck. She left the acro series out because she's not consistent with that (needs one flight and one hands free flight skill so BHS-LOSO for her but she has not trained that seriously for long enough). At this time, she was the first one on the beam in her group. In warm up she stuck all the skills. She actually looked confident! But when competing, she jumped off from the front tuck, but that's relatively new skills so it was kind of expected. Otherwise her routine was really good, no wobbles or anything. She was really happy after that routine. She won vault and was 3rd AA so she qualified to the nationals (TOP 3 on each event and AA qualified). It was a good day.

Then came Sunday. She was still happy about her good performance on Saturday and everyone was complimenting and congratulating her. Everyone was telling her how confident she looked on beam. She told us it was because she had no pressure to do well, she already knew that she had done the best vault in the competition and there were no other gymnasts going after her who could have beaten her there. So she knew she was already qualified for the nationals, and that was her goal after all. So she could do her beam routine without any pressure or expectations. On Sunday it was different. She had all that pressure over her, she NEEDED to get that mobility score on beam. We tried our best to not put any more pressure on her. We were encouraging, relaxed, tried to make her laugh etc. Beam was the last event and she was the last one to go again. She fell. Twice. I don't even remember what the skills were. It didn't matter. When she was off the beam and saluted, I could see her empty eyes. She walked calmly straight to the other corner of the gym, put her warm ups on, drank water and sat down. She didn't cry, just sat there alone and stared in the emptiness. Her team mates knew to leave her alone. After a while I went to her, just sat next to her and tried to talk to her. I just simply told her that even if it now feels like there is no happy ending, everything will be all right. That her time comes and then she looks back to all this and thinks "thank God I didn't give up then". She said nothing, just sit there. I saw her mother in the audience and she was devastated. Tried to be encouraging though.

We have two competitions and the nationals left. This week at practice I asked everyone in the gym to come and watch her beam routine while I judged her. After that routine I asked her how she felt and she said she wasn't nervous and that the situation was different from competition. That the difference is the pressure that she puts on herself when she is actually competing. Practice routine like this was not the same thing because she knew it wasn't a "real" situation where she could receive the mobility score.

Her parents have not taken her to the sport psychologist. I have talked about it to her mother more than once, but after all, I can't make them go there.

 

[Jard.the.gymnast]

Is there no way she can get the mobility score with a fall?

 

[gymisforeveryone]

Yes there is a chance to get 7,5 E score with a fall, but that would mean otherwise almost perfect routine. At this point, this is actually our goal and she agrees. Unfortunately, 2 falls is always too much. And she has fell twice pretty much at every competition we have had this season. The qualification was an exception.

 

[coachmolly]

Poor kid, she has to be so defeated by all of this. It's unfortunate the parents won't agree to at least try a sports psychologist, it sounds like she's a very talented athlete. Have you looked into any of the gymnastics specific mental training workbooks? It might be a sort of in between step between where she is now and a sports psychologist, and maybe if she sees a little progress her parents will reconsider the psychologist. Some of the authors of these books offer Skype sessions, but I imagine those come with a pretty large price tag.
Do you or your club have any connections to a sports psychologist? I wonder if you could have one in to do a general session with the team and parents just so they can meet him/her, she what sports psych is all about, and then provide contact information? We had a few gymnasts with nagging injuries and started to build a relationship with a PT- he came in and did a session with parents, does sessions with the girls on injury prevention, follows up about injuries- and just getting him in the door and meeting the parents really sparked an interest in our parents being proactive about setting up appointments for their children's various injuries. So I'm curious if her parents aren't really jumping at the sports psych idea because it's an unfamiliar concept to them, possibly they have some wild ideas about what a sports psychologist actually does or that there is something mentally "wrong" with their child. Maybe if they could see a mini-session in the gym they would change their minds.

 

[JBS]

I have this kid... she is my daughter. Take this as you want... but this is what we are doing and it is working.

1. This may sound very simple... just work on landing. Landings "only go down"... this is done to "lower your center of gravity and increase stability". Work zero wobbling... just absorbing downward. Besides skills on the floor and beam... we also stack large spotting blocks next the the beam (about 2 feet above the beam) and jump off of them and land on the beam. Just a very simple landing drill that the kids can do over and over very quickly.
2. We rarely coach this type of athlete on beam right now. We give as much time on beam as needed for this type of athlete to work through their issue and gain confidence.

3. Beam is just her nemesis and it feels like she's almost given up the hope of ever staying on the beam.

   This is where we were at too... spark some emotions and get her back in fighting mode.

Also... in my opinion this is not good for this type of competitor...

But if she has 5 routines to do she usually stays on 3/5 or 4/5.

1/1 or 2/2 would be good... anything at 100%. Go back down to skills and just hit skills at 5/5.

 

[eucoach]

Sounds horrible....

A few short term suggestions (wouldn't do all of them, just a few ideas):
- Change the composition of her routine. Switch skills around and change the choreography. Maybe she will focus more on not forgetting her routine and forget about worrying about the skills? Might backfire, but if you are really desperate, it might be worth a shot.
- Make her do "mock sets" that focus on the set up and ending of the skills and not do the skills themselves.
- Try to find something that distracts her completely before she goes up and competes. F. ex. let her choose a song or songs that she can listen to with headphones on while she is waiting for her turn. Or make her do something ridiculous like a small crossword puzzle or math problem before going up.
- What about talking to whoever is responsible regarding letting her compete at Nationals anyways? If she is doing so well on the other events they must be interested in her as a gymnast.....so maybe she can get the opportunity to compete at least hors concours?

A long term solution might really be a sports psychologist who can change her mindset when going into a routine in a competition situation. At the moment she is probably sure she is going to fall (even if she says otherwise) and she needs to change her way of thinking.

 

[JBS]

This one is harsh... but I gave ours an almost impossible assignment... 10 routines... fall or wobble and it doesn't count. She tried for 2.5 hours the first day... made it to 2. The second day she made it from 2 to 7... took another 1.5 hours. The third day and 1 hour later she hit 10. 5 hours over 3 days for 10 routines! This was rough... lots of crying. We took the rest of the week off of beam.

The next week we came in and went to beam... she was already in "give up" mode. She got her assignment...

• Hit 1/1 routines... and you get 3 chances. Hit the first one and you win... and you are done with beam.

Her questions...

1. How do I go 1/1 if I miss the first routine?
   • Simple... you get reset to zero each time.
2. What if I miss all 3 chances?
   • Simple again... you are still done with beam... but you lose.

Beam took 4 minutes this day... 1/1 on the first try. She smiled and went and ate yogurt.

That was it... that was the conversion point for us. She does beam quicker than I have ever seen now.

 

[eucoach]

Oh and one more idea.

During practice, give the gymnasts the following team challenge. I have tried this and it works really really well:
Have a group of girls do a routine one after the other and let them decide beforehand how many falls they think they will have as a group. Also let them decide on a "punishment" (f. ex. everyone has to do 5 extra press handstands) if they exceed the number of falls and a "reward" if they have less. Let her compete as the second or third gymnast so she doesn't get the pressure of being last right away. Keep doing this challenge until she can go up last and not crumble under the pressure.