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Hey athletes, I'm Haley Herdman, former D1 basketball player, mental health therapist, and mental performance coach for athletes.
Katie McNamara discusses mental challenges in gymnastics, including perfectionism, twisties, and overcoming pressure with Mental Training Room hosts.
Key Takeaways
- Perfectionism is a common mental challenge that can negatively impact gymnasts' self-worth.
- Mental blocks like the twisties disrupt the mind-body connection crucial for performance.
- External pressures from parents and coaches can add significant stress to athletes.
- Mindfulness and mental training are essential tools for overcoming mental barriers in sport.
- Leadership and peer support play a vital role in fostering mental health among athletes.
What the video covers
- Katie McNamara, former UCLA gymnast, shares her experiences with mental challenges in gymnastics.
- The discussion covers perfectionism and the pressure to perform flawlessly in high-level gymnastics.
- Katie explains how mental blocks like the 'twisties' affect gymnasts despite physical readiness.
- The impact of external pressures from parents and coaches on athletes' mental health is explored.
- Katie talks about balancing individual performance with team dynamics in collegiate gymnastics.
- The importance of mindfulness and the mind-body connection in gymnastics is highlighted.
- Katie shares her journey overcoming injury and mental setbacks during her gymnastics career.
- Leadership roles off the mat and their influence on mental wellness and confidence are discussed.
- The conversation includes strategies for building mental resilience and handling competition stress.
- Katie also touches on her transition to law school and future career aspirations beyond sports.
Chapters
- 00:00Introduction and Hosts Background
- 01:56Katie's Gymnastics Journey and Mental Challenges
- 04:25Perfectionism and Pressure in Gymnastics
- 07:15Impact of External Pressure and Self-Worth
- 09:58Mindfulness and Mind-Body Connection in Gymnastics
- 15:22Balancing Individual and Team Pressure
- 22:22Injury, Recovery, and Mental Setbacks
- 25:14Leadership, Confidence, and Future Aspirations
Full Transcript — Download SRT & Markdown
Speaker A
And I'm Naomi Y, also former D1 basketball player, athlete mentor, and mental health advocate.
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And we are the hosts of Mental Training Room. This is the space where athletes get real about the mental side of sport.
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Whether you're on the court, field, or just figuring it all out, we've been there.
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And we're bringing you the conversations we wish we had as athletes in hopes to help you become mentally elite.
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Let's train the mind like we train the body. Welcome to the Mental Training Room.
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Welcome back to the Mental Training Room. Today we're sitting down with Katie McNamera, a former UCLA gymnast, Pac-12 scholar athlete, and vice president of UCLA's student athlete mentors, a peer-led wellness group supporting the mental health and leadership among student athletes. Katie
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was a key part of one of the most storied gymnastics programs in the country, competing at the D1 level while also navigating the mental challenges that came with perfection-driven sports.
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Today we're going to talk about what it's like to be judged in front of thousands, how mental blocks can sneak in even when your body is ready, and why leadership off the mat can just be as powerful as what happens during a
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routine. So, let's tumble into it. Hey athletes, it's Haley Herdman, host of Mental Training Room, also mental performance coach and mental health therapist. If you're listening to this, I know you're putting the work into your physical game, but what are you doing
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for your mental game? That's where I come in. I work with athletes, teens, and parents to build confidence, handle pressure, and develop the mindset it takes to perform at your best and be considered mentally elite. Whether it's through one-on-one coaching, team
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sessions, or parent workshops, I'm here to help you train the mind like you train your body. Want to work together?
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Reach out on Instagram at mtr.pod or visit haleyherdman.com to get started. Katie, you are our first gymnast on the pod and I'm so excited to get to pick your brain about the mental challenges and triumphs that you go through as a
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gymnast and just being on that stage. So excited to be able to chat with you today.
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Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here. Of course. Before we start, we always like to start off asking our guests, what is one good thing that has happened to you recently that you want to share?
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So, I've been applying to law school and I got into USC. Yeah, I'll be transitioning to a Trojan for three years.
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Um, but yeah, that's super exciting. Awesome. I went to USC for grad school as well. What kind of law do you want to practice?
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Um, I'm thinking something along the lines of labor employment law. I was a labor studies major, so I studied a lot based on like workers, unions, management, all that like really intersects frequently and there's like a pretty good demand for it. I feel like
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regardless of the economy, where the country is, so I think that's potentially the goal, but USC does offer sports law. I don't know. I could definitely get roped in there pretty quick. We'll see. It's easy to fall back
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into the sports world because it's just something that it's so familiar and there's I'm sure so much love and passion for it too. Um, but it's always great to extend your scope and your interest and just kind of dip your toes
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in other um environments and see what what really speaks to you. But that's really cool.
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Thanks. Um, okay. So, you're obviously a gymnast. Um, being a gymnastics fan and former gymnast myself, not that I ever competed at a high level, but I did compete in gymnastics until I was like 10 years old. My mom was a cheerleader
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and really big into gymnastics. Um, and I always say that's where I got like so much of my athleticism from is just literally being in gymnastics from the day that I could walk. But even from those short years that I was in
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gymnastics, no, even as a 10-year-old, how much pressure comes with that sport and just knowing that those nerves or the anticipation um in being in the sport but then also watching it. So obviously I'm sure you are feeling it times a thousand. So, I
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kind of just want to dive into this more and see what it actually feels like to be the one competing on this stage and in one of the most amazing yet hardest sports out there. So, just to
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kind of start off, what are some of the most like common mental challenges that you or other gymnasts struggle with?
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I would say a lot of gymnasts definitely struggle with perfectionism when you're striving to be a perfect 10.0. Like that really is going to get you. Um, more often than not, I think it's really easy for gymnasts to be hard on themselves in
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that way. You can't be perfect every single time you do a routine, every single time you do a skill. So, that's definitely something that gymnasts are going to struggle with from day one until their very last day on the mat. I
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would also say that pressure definitely is one of those things that people have a very tough time with as you go more towards high school and college when your routines matter a lot more. In high school, you're trying to get recruited.
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So when you go out to competition, especially big ones that are regional, state or national, you're putting a lot more pressure on yourself to again like be as perfect as possible. So that's something where I feel like I personally
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managed it pretty well in high school because I had no other choice really to go out there and like do my routines best of my ability. But there are definitely some teammates that I had where you know they would be like
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throwing up before they go do a routine or the second they finish the routine just absolute wreck. But it really does come with the sport. It's just how it is. And you definitely learn a lot about yourself. You know, the thoughts
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that come into your brain when you're nervous. Yeah. I I would say the mental aspect of it is super challenging.
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Yeah. It's the physical definitely. And not to mention that the physical part is extremely difficult as well. So just to even think of having to experience something that's more difficult than actually doing a flip on a beam and like thinking of that alone,
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taking out the mental part of it is hard and then adding on the mental pressure, the pressure to be perfect just makes it that much harder. So, how do you feel like that struggle for perfectionism or dealing with the pressure to feel
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perfect all the time or to do a perfect routine, to do a perfect slip, whatever it might be, how do you feel like that impacted you as an athlete?
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I think it really it really kind of not forced me but influenced me to base my worth on my performance. Um, in high school, middle school, when I'm really trying to show my ability to college coaches, I was
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obviously very disappointed in myself when I made a mistake, but I also had some like pressure from like my parents to also do well. They're spending all this money, all this time. And not that that's necessarily um unjustified, like
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it absolutely is like frustrating to see your kids struggle out there, but it definitely added to my personal stress.
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And I think that I probably was I would I would be upset at myself, but I guarantee I was more upset than anybody else. And so when other people added their disappointment on top of it, I was like at a loss. I
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just didn't know what to do sometimes. Um, it definitely got better though in college with the team aspect kind of coming into play.
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Yeah. And I love that you mentioned that aspect of parents because there is that in high school specifically what you're talking about. There is so much pressure and emphasis on what other people are thinking of you, especially if you're
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trying to take your sport to college. So, it's like, okay, what are these college coaches thinking of me? What are my parents thinking of me because they're traveling with me? They're
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my teammates thinking of me? What are my coaches now thinking of me? Like, I want to get playing time or I want to do well on the mat so that these college coaches can see me. Um, and it's it's really
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although the pressure and the mental challenges are still there in college, it definitely is, I would say, probably like a different type of mental pressure when you're in high school cuz you're literally looking for your worth based on the opinions of other people. And now
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being a therapist and you know working on the mental side, it's like that's the last thing that we want to do as athletes is put our worth, our value, our identity into the hands of someone else because that means it can be easily
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stripped away or easily invalidated. What do you feel like played a role in helping you kind of manage this pressure a little bit better at the college level?
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I definitely went through periods of time in high school where I fell out of love with gymnastics.
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I would be at such low points. They're like just my performance was not where it needed to be or I would just be not excited to go to practice. I missed out on so much like in high school and
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middle school never going anywhere. I would just be sick of it and I just started to hate it a little. But in my junior senior year, I kind of started to fall back in love with it. And I wasn't
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just doing it for the purpose of like going to college. I was doing it because I loved the sport. I found really good teammates. And I found really good coaches that instilled a lot of confidence in me. And then going to
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college, it was definitely a challenge because it's different coaches, different teammates. But I never lost that love of gymnastics again. And I think that college gymnastics, it can go either way. People have different experiences. Some people go there and they end up having the
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opposite experience that I did. But I think that the environment that it fosters allowed me to personally really love my sport and to keep that for all four years, which was really nice. Yeah, it is such a gift to be able to say that
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that you didn't fall out of love with it again because that is when we see so many mental challenges and like emotional fatigue in the sport when because we have to perfect our craft. We have to do something over and over and
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over again to be able to be really good at it. But that repetition can be super hard for people and super can become super mundane and it feels more like a chore than it does, you know, going to
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go to practice to be with my friends or my teammates or have a good time. But that's so great that you were able to find kind of what works for you in high school before getting to the next level
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because so many people experience that lack of love for the game when they are in the college level. And it's hard to kind of bounce back from that in that environment. But what were in with that shift that you experienced in high
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school and you said you're like your junior senior year. What do you think shifted in your mind that helped you kind of rekindle that love for your sport?
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I think that it started with a new environment. My junior year of high school, I switched gyms and just being in that new environment created an opportunity for me to have a clean slate. And my coaches there honestly
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like were so spectacular. My beam coach, her name was Ireina. She's from Ukraine and she just had so much overwhelm like an overwhelming amount of confidence in my ability on an event that I literally like resented so much was Beam. and her having that
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confidence in me helped me find it within myself and that produced better results when I competed. Having confidence impacts you so much in gymnastics, every sport. Gymnastics especially though, if you think you're going to fall, like you're going to
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fall. So, that really, really helped me find the performance that I think I needed to find confidence in my ability to go to college. And that gave me a lot of assurance. I knew that even if I wasn't going to get a scholarship, I
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knew I'd be able to compete on a division one team and I would probably like actually make lineups and stuff.
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So, it started to click and I'm really glad. That is so great. I love that part of realizing that, okay, you kind of had this like extra push from a coach who really saw you and really nurtured that
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confidence, but then you were able to use that as like a foundation to continue exerting that confidence and letting it shine at the next level. So it it just goes to show you too of like yes, the confidence is within, but
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sometimes it does take that like one special coach or like something that a parent or teammate would say to you to propel it and to help you get to that foundational level of confidence that you can then work on and and strengthen
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yourself. So that's really great and and you are so right of the confidence literally if you don't think that you're going to land the flip on the beam, whatever it is, if you don't think you're going to do it, your brain is
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going to tell you you're not doing it and you're not going to do it. And I think one of the things that I like to talk about when it comes to the mental side of things and gymnastics is
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literally if you and correct me if I'm wrong, but if you mess up one thing, it could result in some pretty serious injury. And we're not just talking like a busted ankle. Like there are some major things that could happen. So that
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pressure to have confidence is even heavier when it comes to a sport like gymnastics.
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And on that topic, we hear Simone Biles often uses the word twisties, and I know that she has kind of explained it before, but for people who might not have heard that term before, can you give us a breakdown of what that means?
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So twisties is like referring to like in figure skating, you know, how they like kind of like twirl in the air, right? So twisting is that motion. You're twirling in the air. gymnastics, you're upside down when you do it generally, but
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that's the motion versus flipping is like this way, like doing multiple flips at once. And so for someone like Simone Miles, she's doing both at the same time. She's flipping and she's twisting, but twisties is, say you're going for a
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scale where you do both, you just totally forget how to twist and flip at the same time. Like you could be doing a back flip with one full twist. So you should start in the facing the camera right right here and you should end
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facing that way because you do one full twist. But somebody who has twisties might jump backwards and end up facing the opposite way because they get lost and they just forget how to make that full twist and flip at the same time.
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So, it's definitely a hard concept to put your brain in because I can see it so clearly and I've had twisties before where I just literally I'm like, "Okay, I'm gonna go for a one and a half and I
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do a full and I was like, wait, I'm facing the wrong direction." But I think most people who have like tried to flip on the trampoline or like pretty much anywhere can kind of understand that like voice in your head can sometimes
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really mess with you and that mind body connection can just like completely disconnect. Yeah. So although twisties is an actual physical mess up would you say that it usually stems from kind of like self-t talk or a mental block? I would say
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twisties is really a situation where you can't connect your mind and your body to a point where you want to do the skill that you want to do. A mental block, at least in like the way that I use the term, is more of like
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you're not going for the skill. Like, you know, when you see videos of people who are like, I'm going to just try a black flip, and they just like jump and they don't do a back flip. They just
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jump because they're scared. That's like like bing. That's having a mental b. Whereas twisties is like you're going you're trying to do the scale but you're not communicating with your body to a point where you're executing. So they're
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like a little different because you can have a mental block on any single scale.
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Whereas twisties is pretty it's pretty much tied to like twisting. This episode is sponsored by Defend USA performance and recovery apparel designed for athletes who know that the mental and physical recovery go handin hand.
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Defend's graduated compression technology enhances performance by improving circulation, reducing muscle fatigue, and increasing endurance during workouts. Designed for athletes of all levels, it also supports faster recovery by minimizing soreness and promoting better post-training blood flow. Just like we train the mind, we have to take
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care of the body. And Defend helps you do both. Check them out at dfndusa.com and use code mtr10 for 10% off. Train hard, recover smarter, perform stronger with Defend USA. What you mentioned of the mind body connection is so important
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and it's actually in grad school I did my final project on how trauma affects the mind body connection. And just to kind of give you a little synopsis of that is what trauma does is it literally it separates the mind from the body. our
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head can kind of be in the clouds thinking about some other place or something else because the environment that we're in might not be safe. So, we're trying to disconnect from our physical environment. And then obviously there's it can happen on a lower level,
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like a lower scale of um intensity, like it doesn't just have to be trauma, but if we're not mindful and if we're talking about it in sports, if we're not mindful, we can zone out. We can talking about it in basketball terms, we can
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have a turnover or we can be thinking of what happened the next play and not really being in the moment of the play that you're in. Even if it's like a game-winning shot, if we're thinking about the pressure of the shot and not
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being connected with our body being where our feet are, focusing on, okay, these are the controllables. I can get my form right. I can get my footwork right. If we're thinking about something else and we're disconnected, you know,
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you miss that shot. you miss being in the moment. And same thing with the twisties. It sounds like if you're not focused on exactly what you have to do in that moment, you're most likely going to mess up. And that just goes to show
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the importance of mindfulness in sports and that mindbody connection. Is that something that they teach you in gymnastics is the mind body connection?
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Honestly, I don't think that gymnastics is just like like I don't think it's natural. I don't think that like there's any way for somebody to just like throw actually that's not true. There are people who can like watch something and
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just execute it and do it. But I would say that mindbody connection is taught very gradually. We have like a whole set of like compulsory levels where you're doing like very gradual like progressions of basic foundational skills. And then you reach a point where
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you get to the optional levels where you're going to start doing skills based on what you want to put in the routine.
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The compulsory routines are all fixed. So everyone does the same thing. You're just building every level optional. You have like different requirements at each level that you have to meet, but you can meet those doing pretty much whatever
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skill you want. So I think that compulsory program is really what teaches you the mind body connection because you're really laying a foundation for basic skills to build on and it's like basically you start with like a round off and then like a round
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off back handspring and then a round off back handspring back handspring and then a round off back handspring back tuck before you move on to any type of twisting. So you're aware of the basic movements and then you start adding in
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like more difficult things. That being said, I don't think everybody is able to make the connection of twisting. Like some people go almost their entire career without twisting because it just messes them up or they did it and op did
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it for whatever levels required it, but then once they reach college, they don't even touch twisting ever again.
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Yeah. Well, it just sounds like if even if it's not even if the mind body connection is not explicitly taught, it's like you're going to learn it one way or another or else you're not going to be able to have a longevity in in the
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sport of gymnastics. But it just also proves that like that that connection is so important and that mental training side of sports should be more explicit to athletes to understand the physiological things that are happening within us when we are in these
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highle intense pressured moments because you can bring that awareness back to yourself and then kind of teach yourself how to regulate and control the thoughts. So yeah, mind body connection is super important. I love that you brought that up. I'm also curious to
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know coming from a obviously a basketball player and someone who's been it's basketball is a very team oriented sport. So in gymnastics you obviously you compete as an individual but also for a team. So I kind of want to get
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into what it's like to balance that dual identity of competing as an individual but also for a team because that's not something I'm totally familiar with. But what type of pressure comes along with this duality?
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So before you reach college, you're actually only individual. Like there technically is within clubs like team scores, but you're recruited alone. Like you're recruited based off your individual scores. You're never you're never really competing for a team in the
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grand scheme of things. It's individual. And in college, that difference is shocking for a lot of people because even though you're still out there individually, your score affects other people. Gymnastics is I don't know even know if I can explain it that well, but
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the structure of the scoring is like basically you have six routines and then five of them count. So one person score is going to be dropped. It's the lowest one. But say you have two people fall in your lineup cuz your lineup is six
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people each event. You're counting a score that has a fall and that's a huge pressure. So when you're going up to beam, if somebody falls in front of you, then your routine gets a lot more stressful. The same way
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if your team like you're the one that fell and then everybody else behind you has to nail the routine. It's it can be a lot for one person to handle and then there's that element on top of it of
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okay if you don't hit your routine this week somebody else can replace you next week and you don't have to compete at all. So I I think that part was especially difficult when I went to UCLA because I competed all four events at
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Washington. I was in lineups every week pretty much regardless of what was happening whether I fell or didn't. I was put up there because we just didn't have a lot of bodies. Whereas at UCLA, I'm competing for the same spot that
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Jordan Childs is competing for. So I would go up and in practice, you do like inner squads. You do equivalent to a scrimmage. You're doing the exact same thing as you would in a competition. And that routine for me was even more
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nerve-wracking than anything else because I had to prove in that moment that I deserved a spot in the lineup to go up and compete. And then you have the pressure of when you go and make that lineup. Okay, now I have to prove myself
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that I earned it and I deserved it for next week. So that is like it's just such different pressure again. Like Jo is all on you. You only affect yourself.
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College is not it's literally a whole different ball game. It sounds like it is. And I think that I guess it's not super comparable, but like golf is somewhat similar. They do have like individual NCAA awards which technically gymnastics
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does too, but that's not definitely not the main event and golfers end up going pro and like competing individually again. So, it's a little bit different but I think that dynamic of club you're just doing it on your own going to
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college and then you get together with a team. It's similar. It's pretty similar to that for for golf. Yeah, there is and again coming keep coming back to the word pressure but that pressure to compete for yourself and then like you
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said you add on the pressure of okay I need to do good also for my team and that is obviously a new feeling that you have coming into college cuz like you said that doesn't necessarily exist when you are competing in high school and
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then also having that when you were saying all of that I also thought of like wow you go from being like doing this sport kind of like if we're talking in basketball terms, it's like a club team. You have your high school team and
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you have a club team and that's representing that community. Obviously, you're representing your gym, but there's I mean, I always know that I felt a difference like playing club basketball versus and like representing that organization versus representing my
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school. Like that was something that was I took a lot of pride in and like your friends come watch you and there's like a whole community around it. Did you notice any mental shifts when it came to that as well?
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I think I noticed that difference really early on because you know in I think that I was separated from the people that I went to school with the second that I got to middle school because everybody in middle school got to play
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sports together. And I would leave school, you know, you went to MBMS, right? We had like seven periods. I'd leave before lunch and I would go to practice by myself. And same thing in high school, I did independent study, so I would leave
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after the third period and go to practice alone. And then my sophomore year, I I homeschooled just just that year by itself. But I homeschooled cuz my gym was so far away and I would only go to school for three periods. And so
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that difference was loud. I also had a twin sister who did dance team at school. She she played soccer with the people she went to school with. And I just never had that same connection to people at school. I mean, I'm not
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necessarily mad about it because I had such a great community at the gym, but for those three periods at school, I'm like, who even are you people? You know, like I never see you outside of class.
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And I mean, that definitely affected me socially. Um, and then going to college, it was interesting because everyone else was kind of used to that team environment and used to like having their policy, you know, but for like for
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me it was so special to go into practice every single day, have classes with my teammates. That was my favorite part like having classes with my teammates. I would beg them to be in my class because we get to hang out at practice and then
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go walk to class like sign me up. Yeah, exactly. So, I mean, I I don't think I'd change anything necessarily, but I don't know if people necessarily understand like when you play an individual sport like golf, tennis is
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similar as well. In gymnastics, you don't really have the ability to, you know, even be the same kind of like regular high school student as other others.
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Yeah, it is a very isolating experience to be a high competing athlete. And I reflect on my high school experience thinking of how isolated I felt at times, but comparing it to what you just said, it was nothing similar because I
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obviously was I was going to school. I was never homeschooled. I was playing for the school team. And although I might have been like isolated from maybe like my social friend group, I obviously still had the team to fall back on. And
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I remember missing like literally every single dance except my senior prom because of tournaments or practices or whatever it might be. Again, I was with a team. I was with people. But to think of doing all of that on your own,
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sacrificing so much of your youth literally to put so much energy and dedication into something that you loved so much and you had this goal.
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That is such a hard thing to do. in the moment. Obviously, like you said, looking back, wouldn't want to change anything, but high school is a even if you're not an athlete, high school is a hard time. Do you feel like comparison
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kind of came in a lot for you and made things hard? Yeah, I mean I I definitely think once I got to high school, I kind of took a step back and kind of just like leaned a lot more heavily on my
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gymnastics friends and teammates had I'd moved gyms quite a bit. So I had friends pretty much all over Southern California and I'd make time to see them outside of practice and school if we didn't train together still. But I think that at
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school I really had a hard time just feeling like I belonged anywhere because I had like one or two friend that friends that I could just hang out with like in between my classes but I was never there for lunch. You know I wasn't
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somebody that people expected to see at the lunch table and I never had time like to go to a party or wasn't allowed to either. Like there were different standards for me with my parents because there's different expectations, you
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know, like I want to go division one. I mean, there were times though that it was to a point where my mom would be like, "Why don't you just, you know, go have some fun, whatever." And it was
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like a point where she was like, "Okay, you need a push. You need to get out there." But I feel like I was just like so far like reserved that I had a hard time like trying at a certain point. I feel like I
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do kind of have like a label of being like pretty shy and reserved and antisocial. A lot of gymnasts are antisocial. Like I'm not I'm an introvert and I love to chat with my people like so comfortable doing that. I
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will talk your ear off, but people I don't know. I I don't really speak and I don't really I have a low social battery, too. So, well, it it totally all plays into the energy you are exerting, going to class,
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thinking about your routines, you're literally like always on. You have to be eating well. You have to be getting your rest. All of those things like really go into your social battery. And I also remember having a very low social
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battery, more specifically in college than in high school because of the daily grind, literally having to be on 247.
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And going back to the experience that you were talking about in high school, especially for highlevel competing athletes, just because our lifestyle is different, doesn't mean it's bad. And I think that that's what a lot of people kind of deal with is
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thinking that they're like, "Oh, this is bad." Or, I don't know, like you said, not really fitting in. But it highlights the importance of creating that community within your sport to really have those people that you do rely on
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and that you can facetime with, that you can hang out with on the weekend, before practice, after practice. And also, like you said, having other people around Southern California, like that also is a part of being an athlete at such a high
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level is people are going to be from other areas. It's not going to all be in your community, which again makes it even harder. But knowing that you do still have those people and those people are still around you to support you. And
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again, just because your social life might look different doesn't mean that it's bad doesn't mean that you should judge yourself doesn't say anything about you. You just have different goals than the people around you. And that's totally okay. It's just so hard to deal
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with because in high school we all kind of want to assimilate and be the same and fit in and have that group. And for athletes, it's not always like that. So being able to take pride in, you know,
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in your work ethic, in your social life, it might be spending more time with family. I know I was always, my social life in high school was like family dinners, birthday parties, whatever it was, because that's kind of what I prior
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like sport, family, friends. And so like being okay with that social interaction even though it might be different from those around you and remembering that even though you might feel isolated at times there are people who want to be
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around you and who want to support you. Um and that's always always so important to remember and kind of Absolutely.
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Yeah. And talking about that isolating factor a lot of athletes feel isolated if they experience injury and I know injury was something that you also dealt with in college. Can you kind of walk us through what your injury story looked
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like, what happened, and how you feel like that impacted you? Absolutely. Well, I was a junior when I got injured. It was my second season with UCLA. I honestly like my junior year was one of my honestly I think it
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was my favorite year. We had new coaches and I think it kind of created again a clean slate. I know I talked about that a little bit before, but this opportunity I think our team used as a way to just have fun with the sport
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again. And that was our goal is just to have fun and love gymnastics and just do our best to like enjoy competing. So, I had so much fun that year. It was a grind during preeason. And then I was in
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our floor lineup for the first three meets, which you know the UCLA floor lineup, if you know anything about gymnastics, I had no business being there. Like truthfully, like I had no business being in that lineup, but I was
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ready. Other people weren't ready to go in. And that was kind of my role on the team at that point was okay, if other people aren't going to step up and have their routines ready by January, then somebody else is going to take your
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spot. and that person was me. I took a lot of pride in that. And then after that third meet, we were at practice and I did my dismount off bars, hyperetto my knee, big pop. I'd had knee surgery when
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I was 11. Um, and it used to lock a little bit and then once I like straightened it out, it would like be fine. So, I just tried to do that. I was like, "No, it's fine.
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Like, I just need to straighten it out and it'll be okay." But nothing happened after I straightened it. And I was like, uhoh, uh, that's not great. So, we kind of knew it was like our our trainer did
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like a test and he was like, "Yeah, you you tore your ACL pretty much." And so, I was really in denial, I would say, for the two weeks in between when I had the injury and when I got my results back
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from my MRI. I was just being really optimistic and being like, I can walk on this. I could probably run. If you asked me to do gymnastics right now, I would do it. The pain isn't that bad. I don't
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think that it's torn. Deep down, I probably knew that that wasn't the case. But that's kind of how you react, you know, in that situation.
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Great for it's a denial stage. Exactly. But I think I was just in such a good place mentally that year. It didn't phase me too much. Once I got the operation, started rehab. ACL surgery, you basically are in the training room
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the very next day. So you start rehab, you get cut open, and then the next day you start rehab. So I think that was nice because you have a purpose directly after you're injured. Your purpose is to get better. My biggest challenge was
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when I was starting to do gymnastics again. I was not the same athlete and not the same in the sense that I hadn't been in the mindset to fight for a lineup in like out of what it was like
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almost probably like 9 months. And not only that, I was doing cartwheels. It wasn't like I was like actually competing for lineups. I was very far away from where my ability was like the year prior. And I literally can't jump
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off of that knee the same way that I used to. I still feel a difference when I run. So trying to do gymnastics when I felt that difference was just it was hard because I wanted to have the
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expectation for myself that I could come back and get a routine together. Even if it wasn't ever a routine I would compete, but I wanted to get it back. I wanted to be able to say that I fully
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made the comeback. But getting there was just challenging cuz I physically wasn't I wasn't the same athlete. I think I kind of had an epiphany on like New Year's Day. Season was starting in about a week and I had a really hard time
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pushing myself to do the big scales. My main goal was like focus on beam and like get beam back cuz it was kind of lowering impact. There's not like a super big landing. And I had a I had a
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hard time because I used to have mental blocks on beam. And it wasn't necessarily that I was having mental blocks, but the motivation to push through any like remnants of a mental block is pretty mentally challenging. And I had a
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hard time motivating myself to do that work. But New Year's Day came and I was like, it's now or never. This is my last season doing gymnastics. If I'm going to ever do a routine again, it's going to
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have to start now. Like, I'm going to have to do the hard stuff. And I got to a point where I was able to do routines in practice. I still had those like inner squad moments where I would just
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fall apart cuz I was so nervous again. But I was able to exhibition during like the tail end of our season.
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And exhibition is basically like you know your sports and count but you get to go and compete in front of the whole crowd and everything. So I got to do that twice. I competed once. The routine that I competed was like not very good,
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but I made it back and that was my goal and I was very happy about it. But I would say the comeback affects people at different moments and some people are isolated from the very second that they get injured and I felt that isolation
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when I was climbing back. It's person dependent. Yeah. One of the things that like we talked about a lot that year in SAM's like student athlete mentors club was just trying to create a space for injured athletes to get involved
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elsewhere. I was lucky that during my sophomore year, the end of it, I became involved in Brewan Athletic Council. So, I was already involved in a club and then a month later I joined SAMS. And then during my junior year, before anything
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ever happened, I became vice president. So I kind of started to have roles before I got injured and got to put more energy into them after I got injured. So that was a goal of ours is kind like try
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and encourage student athletes to start, you know, find identity outside of it. I definitely dedicated a lot more time to school and enjoyed it a lot more, too.
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Yeah, I love the proactiveness that you just mentioned about your identity because so many people pay attention to that part when it's almost too late. So, we have we see like someone gets injured, the sport's taken away, they have an
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identity crisis that if you get injured and your sport's taken away, the identity crisis is going to happen whether it's small scale, large scale.
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But for you, it sounds like you did have those other things to kind of rely on outside of your sport. And why I love that so much is because it sends the message to athletes of like, yes, put
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yourself out there. Be able to get involved in other things. Your sport is obviously going to be priority and take priority over a lot of other things if you're a student athlete in college, especially at the D1 level, but that
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doesn't mean there is no time for anything else. being able to invest in clubs in whether it's like maybe learning a new skill on your own or reading or making friends with people in your classes who aren't on your team. All of those things
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are such important aspects that pour into the overall well-being of an athlete. And something else that I thought was really interesting that you mentioned was first of all getting back from an ACL tear as a gymnast, you just
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use your body so much in gymnastics in ways that people can't even imagine. So that is one again talking about the physical and then adding on the mental challenges. That physical part I'm sure is so hard in and of itself, but the
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kind of like it sounds like you struggled a little bit with like the competitive mindset as well. Would you say that's correct? Yeah, I think that I had a hard time believing that I could be competitive on my team because I
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wasn't, you know, it was already hard. I was already No, I don't want to call myself bottom of the barrel, but like being on a team where your teammates are Olympians, national team members, like yeah, you know, you kind of are. And
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then not even being at that level, I just wasn't really sure if there was a point.
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And you just always have to believe in yourself. Like even if there isn't a potential for you to compete, you owe it to yourself. Or at least I owed it to myself, my past self, who always dreamed about being on like a division one team
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to do my best. If I failed, I failed. But at least I did try. That's I think that's an epiphany a lot of athletes end up having. But sometimes it's at a point where you're kind of too late to make a
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huge move and then you don't accomplish the goal, but you did your best, so you can rest easy.
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Yeah. And it's all about to sometimes there is the point in your career where it's like, okay, my goals might not be the same as they were a year ago or when I was 16 because you are, like you said,
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you are a phenomenal gymnast. You were are a UCLA gymnast. But when you get to that next level, it's like, yeah, you're right. I'm competing with and behind Jordan Charles, which is like that's top dog. Like that is really
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really hard to compete with. But that doesn't it doesn't change anything about your worth or your performance. It's just okay, let me maybe adjust my goals a little bit here. Adjust the role. I might not be top dog on my team anymore,
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but I can still be top dog for myself. So, let me kind of adjust the roles. And going back to injury, it's like, okay, I might not be able to do, like you said, I might just have to be focused on being
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right now instead of all of the other events that you competed in. But focusing your mind on what you can do, focusing on your mind on what's in your control will help you feel that like sense of accomplishment. And I'm kind of
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working I'm working with an athlete right now who is also experiencing an ACL tear and she's not close to coming back to play at all. But we're literally talking about this of like, okay, my goal showing up to practice today is
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like, can I give 50 high fives to my teammates? And finding pride in that and adjusting that goal. Okay, can I be the loudest teammate today? Can I ask my coach a couple questions about the offense to get to understand it a little
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bit better? And just because you're not competing or showing up the way that you might be used to doesn't mean you're doing a bad job or doesn't decrease your worth or value at all. You're just showing up in a different way. And being
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able to find pride in that is super powerful and can again pour into that overall well-being of your athletic identity.
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For sure. Yeah. For sure. I like during my ACL tear, I had the benefit of starting rehab so early that I was in the gym from day two of recovery and I was literally just sitting on the training table as I'm pretty much just
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icing like half the time and I'm just cheering across the gym. And like my biggest accomplishment from that year, like although I made lineup and although like I had other things to be proud of was end of the year banquet, I get the
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energy award because I was cheering even though I was I mean that was my that was my job pretty much the rest of the season and my coach would like talk to me like the first travel meet after my surgery.
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They're like, you know, like we really want to take you, but I don't think the training crew is going to allow it, but like we really just want your energy there. and and that stuff is just like I'm doing you know what I I've bought a
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reason to be here and even if your coach doesn't recognize it or maybe your teammates kind of just like I don't know even if they don't say anything about it like you are speaking loudly just by participating and cheering everybody on.
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I was going to say props to your coach for recognizing you and giving you that encouragement because it is so hard to be on the sidelines, but to get that validation from your coach and to literally be told we want you here, I'm
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sure felt so great for you. Energy is a huge part of a team. It's a huge part of what makes a great team and it sounds like you just had such an important role being that energy giver and I am so so
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happy to hear that that was also appreciated on the other end of things. Something else that you mentioned which is what helped me a lot when I was struggling mentally in college was connecting with that younger version of
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myself and talking to her and really embracing that spirit and that energy of my inner child of my younger self. Um, and kind of to just round things off here, I want to go back to that and ask
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you what is one piece of advice that you would give to your younger self?
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You know, I feel like it's hard because a lot of my struggle when I was a kid was not fitting in outside of gymnastics. Like, it was such a prominent I feel like that I just didn't really like have a community at school.
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But I think that I would just tell myself to be grateful, like really really grateful for the people that I had at the gym and the people who are constantly rooting for me, who literally still root for me to this day because
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they were my friends, you know? It wasn't like I didn't have friends even though I would probably cry about it like all the time like I have no friends, but I had tons of them. They just weren't with me at school. So, I
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think I would just kind of like remind myself like just because they're not your school, just because you're on a different path doesn't mean that you are not like that you're a loser. You're not pathetic. You have people and even if
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you don't like say you're you're a golfer. I keep using that as an example, but you're traveling just with your parents. If your parents are your best friends, that's a bragging right. You know, a lot of people one don't have
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parental figures that want to support them in sports. They also don't have parents they enjoy being around, you know, regardless of who is your who's your, you know, when you're a kid, like you're probably really lucky and you're
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you're not a loser. I feel like is my biggest biggest piece of advice. Yeah. And I like what you said about the gratitude is like because specifically gratitude it's some people think it's like a lifestyle type of thing but
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scientifically gratitude can rewire our brain in so many impactful ways. So you mentioning that is I'm sure so beneficial for a lot of young athletes who feel like there might be a lack of something because they are so involved
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in their sport. But again, shifting that mindset of being grateful that that is what you're involved in can really help encourage and motivate certain athletes.
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So, thank you so much, Katie, for everything that you shared with us. That's it for today in the mental training room.
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Make sure to follow us on Instagram at mtr.pod to stay uptodate with all things mental training.
Topics:Katie McNamaragymnasticsmental healthperfectionismtwistiesmental blocksathlete mental trainingmind-body connectionsports psychologymental resilience
