MENTAL HEALTH: Trick Your Mind into Being a Better Vaulter

By Leah Deforest Granger

Our minds can deceive us. What if we use that to our advantage?

Each time we repeat the movement of vaulting, our muscle memory of the jump is strengthened. This is the reason that trying to vault on your bad side makes you feel silly and trying to change your step feels frustrating. In this article we will go over the basics of how the brain learns, how your brain has understood how to pole vault, and how you can use that to improve your performance.

There is still much to be discovered about how the brain learns and remembers. What we do know is that there are specific hubs for storing memories, namely the hippocampus and the cortex. We also know stored memoires are intricately connected to associated memories throughout the brain in what we call networks. The memory you have of putting on chalk at pole vault practice for the first time may be connected to the memory of your last bar routine from your gymnastics days. This ability that our brain has to associate memories helps us to trigger memories when we need them. Next time you have to memorize a list of words, try associating each word with a part of your vault - it will help! Each time an association is made, the connection in the brain is made stronger.

Since pole vaulting is such an unnatural movement, the muscle memory network built has little overlap with other networks. Even pro vaulters cannot usually jump on their non-dominant side. It is not the lack of muscles but the lack of muscle memory that holds you back. The benefit of doing such a unique sport, is you are more coachable when you do not have prior incorrect practice. If you do not know how to do something, you do not know how to do it wrong. At every practice, you are connecting neurons to create a muscle memory network that is new and improving.

The downside of doing a niche sport, is that it is difficult to learn. When a network is not overlapped with many other networks, it cannot rely on past memories to know what to do. Even more importantly, once this network is strong, it is harder to change. For example: if you began jumping your sophomore year of high school with your final step a foot in, by the time you get to college a few years later, you have thousands of repetitions of this step in your muscle memory. Of course, it will be difficult to change.

If you are getting worried, I have good news for you. This is a situation most vaulters encounter, including Olympic Champion and recent World Champion Katie Nageotte! Katie has been a commendable example of how after years of practice you can still have great success making changes to your vault. On March 5th, 2021, she posted on Instagram about the improvement she made to her takeoff position over the previous years. In the photo from six years before, her drive arm is bent and lower body is sucked under her. In the photo from three years before the post, her arm is significantly pressed out, though her hips and lower body continue to be further into the pit than she wanted. The most recent photo shows her takeoff at the time, a powerful position that sets her up for the swing that has been bringing her the gold. The way she did this was by changing her neuronal network, and you can do the same. The three steps are:

1) Stop practicing the old habit. This will stop the connections you do not want from strengthening, and without use they will weaken on their own.

2) Start the new habit. Each time you take off at your new step that is connecting the run and swing, you know well with the new step you’re learning.

3) Use visualization. Picturing your practice of breaking habits is way more important than it feels. Even thinking about what it feels like to take off at a new step is helping to build the new network connections.

Drills are your best friend. They are a perfect example of something that is avoiding the bad habit, repeating the new habit, and can be visualized before a jump.

Once a new habit is solidified into the network of your jump, it can be triggered by even a one-word cue. Let’s say you are practicing a new step on the slide box. Because of the way your brain works, you can associate this new step with the word banana. Each time you practice it, you picture a banana on the runway and that helps you keep the step out. Then when you go to the pit, you can just think of the word banana, and you are more likely to succeed in getting the new step on.

Don’t do it until you get it right, do it until you can’t get it wrong. Your mind is powerful. Instead of letting it take over, find how you can master it.