Ella Zirbes could feel it brewing inside.
The Utah sophomore gymnast has been plagued by performance anxiety at different times this season.
It caused Zirbes to lose her balance during a tumbling pass of her floor routine in the nationally televised meet. It’s caused plenty of unease.
And, last week, she could feel herself getting anxious again during Utah’s warmups.
“Obviously I’ve had some performance anxiety this season, and it hasn’t come out the past couple meets,” Zirbes said. “But it started to come out during warm up, so I kind of just had to stop what I was doing and just kind of ground myself, and if that means less warmups, that means less warm up. So I just go and sit down.”
Utah head coach Carly Dockendorf has come up with another way to get the best out of the young gymnast, too.
Homework.
“Carly makes an anatomy test for me to do,” Zirbes said.
Whenever Zirbes feels anxious at a meet, her coach quizzes her to distract her from the moment.
“We just try to distract her,” Utah’s coach said. “I don’t know the quiz she did on her shoulder. I can’t even pronounce the words, but we [had] some good laughs. We just try to keep her mind light. It’s important to remind her that, even when she feels like that, she’s proven that she can still go out and have a great performance. I think that’s important for her to remember.”
“It calms my mind,” Zirbes said. “It obviously works.”
Clearly. Zirbes finished with a 9.925 on vault, Utah’s highest score in that event, and a 9.9 on floor last week. Her performance helped the Red Rocks earn their highest score of the season (198.075) and the Big 12 regular season title in their win against Denver on Friday night.
“She was having a little bit of trouble with her last pass, and I think she started doubting herself,” Dockendorf said. “And at that point, I just reminded her that the two last passes that weren’t perfect were out of the thousands that [she’s] done, and I just gave her a little reminder of that.”
