Having a provider who understands your sport is vital to receive care tailored to help you return to play. We spoke with Spooner Coppell physical therapist McKenna Stanley PT, DPT, about her experience as a NCAA All-American gymnast and how that shaped her as a physical therapist:
When did you start gymnastics and what was it like?
I started gymnastics at three. My parents always wanted to enroll me in soccer because that was the sport they grew up doing, however, you had to be 5 to be in organized soccer. I kept hanging on shopping carts and flipping around the house, so my mom felt it was safest to put me in gymnastics so I could be watched while doing these types of activities. My favorite event was the uneven bars. For me, it was always the most fun and I felt comfortable on that piece of equipment. I would always be on the monkey bars at recess when I was in elementary school- I just couldn’t get enough of it. It was also my best event throughout each level, so I feel like whatever you’re best at is automatically going to be your favorite.
The sport of gymnastics is subjective. You don’t win based on scoring the most goals or getting the most touchdowns, which is more objective. It is scored based on what the judges feel like you deserve. There are a lot of specific rules in how you make up your routine, and, once you get to the higher levels, not every athlete’s routine looks the same. To make a routine, there is a code of points where each skill gets a letter based on its difficulty. Letter A is the easiest skill, and letter F is the hardest skill. From here, you can be creative in how you design your routine with guidelines of how many A, B, and C skills are required to start from a 10.0.
Depending on the event and the level the athlete is in, the routines start closer to a 9.5 rather than a 10.0. From there, you have to add-in bonus based off how you combine certain skills based off their difficulty. For instance, if you do a B skill connected straight into a C skill, you might receive .1-point bonus. This is the part that makes it fun when you are creating your routines because you can come up with endless possibilities and find what works best for you. There are so many different skills you can choose from.
What was your experience as a college athlete?
I always knew I wanted to go to college for gymnastics. When you’re a kid, you’re basically presented with two routes – the Olympic or college path. Ever since I was a little girl, I loved watching college gymnastics, and I knew I wanted to be there someday; therefore, I chose the NCAA route. College gymnastics is much different than club gymnastics. When in club, it is a very individual sport, and you are competing for you and you alone. If you have an off day, you only affect yourself. However, when you are in the NCAA, you are now a part of a team, and you win and lose as a team.
For every meet, scores are added up from each event with the highest possible team score being 200. In each event, six girls compete, and five scores count giving you an opportunity to drop your lowest score. With that being said, every week in the gym you are essentially competing against your teammates to make line-ups so that you have a spot come meet day and it might change every week depending on how your training went in the gym. In some meets, I would be competing in all four events, while in others I might not have made line ups in some events. It truly was a fight to get into line ups.
Another difference that was noticeable was the amount of hours we were allowed to practice mandated by the NCAA. In club, you could practice as much as you wanted, and, at some points, I was in the gym about 35 to 40 hours a week and barely at school. In college, you’re only allowed to practice 20 hours a week. Within those 20 hours you had to also include any team meetings, weight training, or random team events, therefore, you have to get really good at making sure your time is efficiently used. For me personally this was a hard transition at first because I banked on the amount of time I was in the gym. However, with this cap, I had to make sure I was utilizing the time I had for quality training rather than quantity driven.
One last thing that is different from club to college is the number of meets you compete in. In club, you would compete maybe every 3 weeks and the only meets that truly determined your ability to make it to Nationals was State and Regionals. In college we would be competing every weekend, sometimes twice a weekend for 10-12 weeks straight, and your score was tracked for every meet to see if you would qualify for post-season.
How were you introduced to physical therapy?
Even though I was heavily involved in a rather dangerous sport I was never a patient in the world of physical therapy. I always knew I wanted to go into the medical field, and it wasn’t until I was in college that I was drawn to physical therapy. I was actually going between becoming an athletic trainer and a physical therapist because I loved the idea of treating athletes and getting them back on the field. Being a college athlete, I had the opportunity to work very closely with my team’s athletic trainer. She was at every practice, team meeting, weight training, competition travelling with the team, as well as treating us in the training room before and after practice. She was vital in keeping our team healthy throughout the year. As I was continuing to make my decision what ultimately drew me to PT was the stability and the ability to have multiple athletes from multiple sports in my care. I wanted to be able to work out of a clinic and not have to travel to onsite events every weekend as well as it a joy to work with so many different types of athletes.
How does your background as a college athlete affect your approach as a PT today?
As far as gymnastics, not a lot of physical therapists have gone through specifically what I experienced so I am again able to relate to the demands of the sport. There is also a vast range of vocabulary that gymnasts use that would be confusing to those who have not been immersed in the sport.
Since I have such a unique background, it has helped shape the way I treat. My passion is treating high school athletes. I think it is such a pivotal time in their sport as they are either ending their career or attempting to get recruited to compete at the NCAA level. I am able to step into the lens of an athlete and truly relate with them while also having the knowledge to get them back in the game.
Overall having a high-level athletic background, I am able to utilize my experience and incorporate it into the patient’s plan of care. I also find that depending on what type of athlete you are treating you can tailor the exercises to their respective sport by adding in some of their equipment.
Spooner therapists are well-versed in the sport that you play. Schedule an appointment today to learn how physical therapy can help you move, feel, and perform better.