Mental Block Please Help Asap!!

[blondegymnastxo]

Does anyone have any advice on getting rid of mental blocks on vault. I am 13yrs. old and i can't get myself over the vault. I have level 8 states April 13 and I'm supposed to be competing a tsuke and i just can't get myself to get over the table.... i can't even get myself to go on just a handspring anymore!!! ~ (IT IS GETTING REALLY STRESSFUL)~ (it was like all of a sudden, because at level 7 states in January i score a 9.775 and now i can't even get myself to go) *i just don't get it*
SO PLEASE IF ANYONE HAS ANY ADVICE PLEASE LET ME NO ASAP!!!

[xleahcarx]

Quote:
Originally Posted by blondegymnastxo Does anyone have any advice on getting rid of mental blocks on vault. I am 13yrs. old and i can't get myself over the vault. I have level 8 states April 13 and I'm supposed to be competing a tsuke and i just can't get myself to get over the table.... i can't even get myself to go on just a handspring anymore!!! ~ (IT IS GETTING REALLY STRESSFUL)~ (it was like all of a sudden, because at level 7 states in January i score a 9.775 and now i can't even get myself to go) *i just don't get it* SO PLEASE IF ANYONE HAS ANY ADVICE PLEASE LET ME NO ASAP!!!

This is a very difficult, I had the same thing when I was in gymnastics. I would only go over at meets though. The best advice I can give you is to maybe do some of the drills. Use mats to do the skills. When I was doing tsuks we had a hill set up and then we would go into a pit and progressed to the vault into a pit and so on. Maybe going back to the begining may help. Do it over and over again and then you can hopefully feel good about the vault again. The more you avoid going over the vault the harder it's going to be to overcome. Good luck and i hope everything worksout.

[Geoffrey Taucer]

Back up to basics. Back up as far as you need to to feel comfortable, and then work your way up from there.

A few months ago, one of my boys had a mental block on vault. Regional vault champion two years earlier, but now wouldn't go over the table. What I had him do was bounders over a p-bar block with a spot, then had him do a few front handsprings with the table down low, and after that he was fine. It may be this easy for you, it may not.

The most important thing is to stay positive in your own mind, and keep at it.

[blondegymnastxo]

ok thank you so much i will talk to my coaches and see what we can do. And yea i was just like you too i only went over at meets also.

[Valentin]

Hi

This is a hard topic, but i guess from a pure psychological point of view, its important to get to the core of the problem. I am no sport spychologist so can't offer any good advice. If i were the coach aside from feeling majorly frustrated for me and you, i would do as Geoffrey Taucer suggested and go back to basics, and as far back as need be.. including straight jumps of a board into a pit if need be.
Can you recall when this first started happening, and what are you thinking about when you have to vault. Try and locate to cause of the problem along with a possible solution (which as suggested is to go back to basics)

Let us know

[blondegymnastxo]

Thanks for the advice...but ... on thursday all my coach did was move me about 17 feet back on my run and now i'm vaulting again!!!! It feels really great not to be stressed out every time we go to vault. My coach is really happy too- she said that i can do any vault i want to because i'm so powerful, so i'm excited to go back to gym on Monday.

[Aussie_coach]

First of all check your mind set, mental blocks can be made worse when you are standing at the end of the vault run and thinking "oh no, what if I don't make it over". Make sure you are concentrating on going over, not on the fact that you dont think you will. Picture yourself going over, remember that you have many times before and beleive that you will.

Failing this back to drills and work your way back up to doing the vault. Stack mats up on the other side of the vault and do tsuk timers, as you get more confident take mats away slowly. Have your caoch spot you, if needed get two coaches to give a double spot. If you have a pit work timers into the pit. Go back to the original drills you did to learn the vault in the first place.

Failing that, one thing that can be insprining is to watch good vaulters at a comp. Can you attend a college meet or a higher level gymnastics meet in your area. Simply watching advanced gymnasts compete these vaults can restart your brain working out how to make your body do what you are asking it to.

[CoachL]

is your coach yelling or being a nice guy about it?

[blondegymnastxo]

Some of my coaches just keep saying that im not working hard and that i just don't want to do the vault, but one of my coaches is being soooo nice about it. She understands that gymnasts aren't like a puzzle, we are all different and may need a different type of coaching. And the one coach that understands is the head coach at our gym, so thats a good thing. She will go all out if she sees that your working hard and you aren't missing practice a lot. If you give 100% to her she will give 120% back to you. (thats what we all love about her)