Nick Mayhugh is a self-described goofball. A two-time Paralympic sprinter and three-time Paralympic gold medalist, Mayhugh has amassed a huge virtual following thanks to his eccentric fashion sense, vibrant hair colors and dynamic sense of humor.
“Laughing is my favorite thing to do in the world,” the 29-year-old said. “It’s the best medicine.”
Just a year after he began competing in para track & field, Mayhugh, who was born with cerebral palsy, stunned viewers at the Tokyo Paralympics, snagging gold medals in the men's 100m T37, 200m T37 and mixed 4x100m relay, as well as a silver in the 400m T37. He also shattered two world records, exploding for a 10.95-second finish in the 100m and a 21.91 second-finish in the 200m — both marks which still stand today.
He wanted more. He trained and trained, putting more and more pressure on himself until eventually he secured a spot on the squad heading to Paris last summer. He was going for more gold.
But the gold didn't come. Instead, he earned a fifth-place finish in long jump and seventh-place finish in the 100m. Mayhugh considered the performances a failure, but after some rest and time for reflection, he came to a conclusion.
“I was searching for that [euphoric high] in everything else that I did outside of my sport and my career, which messed me up big time mentally,” Mayhugh said. “It was tough, and I don’t think a lot of athletes are prepared in the right way going into the Games for both sides of the pendulum — on one, winning gold, breaking a world record, being celebrated … or not. I got a taste of both, and to be honest, they both felt very similar.”
So he’s been trying to find joy again — joy in competing, joy in his personal life, and most importantly, joy in advocating for the recognition of Paralympic sports by a wider audience.
Though Mayhugh's track and field career relatively is young, sports always have been a huge part of his life. A soccer player by trade, he was recognized for his dazzling speed even at the high school level. But when Mayhugh was 14, he experienced a grand mal seizure. He temporarily lost consciousness and suffered violent convulsions, and he was rushed to the hospital. There he received an MRI, which revealed a hole in the left side of his brain and a diagnosis of cerebral palsy — a brain disorder which affects body movement and muscle coordination.
“They didn’t find out [about the hole] until I had a seizure because I had so many other complications throughout my birth,” Mayhugh said. “My mom went through such a tough pregnancy with me that there were so many other complications leading up to my premature birth … Then, a few days after I was born, I had a complete blood transfusion. With the amount of things that were going on, they missed it.”
The diagnosis made some sense. Mayhugh long had experienced a numbing sensation down the left side of his body which affected movement in his left arm, hand and leg. But as an athlete, the news was earth-shattering. His doctors told him he would never play soccer again.
For a long time after, Mayhugh’s goal had been to prove himself. Unwilling to accept the fate his doctors had in mind, he stood up and left the office without replying; he was going to show that he still could be an athlete and that he still could compete at an elite level.
There needs to be somebody to really try to change that negative stigma around disability.
He then not only went on to compete at the Division I level at Radford University, but also joined the U.S. Para National Soccer Team and won the 2019 U.S Soccer Player of the Year with a Disability Award as well.
Soccer was left off the Paralympic program for the Tokyo Games, but Mayhugh’s prowess caught the attention of the higher-ups at Team USA Para Track & Field. When they asked if he would consider running track in Tokyo, he said yes, even though he never had competed in the sport before.
Evidently, that didn’t matter. Four medals and two world records later, Mayhugh had cemented his legacy as one of the greatest Paralympic track athletes of his era.
But in experiencing so much material success right off the bat, he began equating it with general success. In turn, he created an impossible mental environment for himself.
“Having put so much weight on winning and bringing as many gold medals home as possible or breaking as many world records — I was thinking once I did that, I [would] be happy,” Mayhugh said. “And then once I attained all that, it didn’t make me happy.”
Over the ensuing three years, he tried to find the happy feeling he imagined everywhere. It wasn't until he came home from Paris that he realized he needed to get healthy — not just physically, but mentally, too. As a result, he has spent much of the last year reframing how he views success.
Mayhugh's goal to educate viewers — supportive and not — about cerebral palsy and disabled athletes isn't new. His preparation for the Paris Games included dyeing his hair to match the scan which revealed the hole in the left side of his brain, painting his invisible disability in glaring neons.
More recently, Mayhugh has been using his social media platforms to change the narrative around disabled athletes with humor. He places engine sound effects over his wheelchair-bound teammates competing in universal relays, and he mocks ridiculing commenters. He highlights disabled athletes in and out of practice, and he showcases their ability to train with able-bodied ones.
“I like to use my social media to kind of reel people in with humor, with comedy, and then, once I have your attention and I get you laughing, then I want to educate you,” Mayhugh said. “The world is only gonna move forward if people are open to learning and open to laughing with us, not at us.”
His goal, he said, is to make able-bodied people more comfortable with being curious and asking questions.
“Whenever I speak to somebody that doesn’t have a disability that finds out that I do … they kind of just lean down and change their tone of voice and kind of talk down to you. And it’s not that they do it in a way to hurt you or insult you. They just want to be cautious,” Mayhugh said.
“I just encourage people to ask questions because we can very easily tell between when somebody is genuinely wanting information and asking a question because they’re curious and when somebody’s trying to be insulting.”
So far, his mindset shift seems to be yielding results. At the U.S. Track and Field Para National Championships in early August — which marked the first time the USATF Outdoor Championships and the Para National Championships were held together — Mayhugh posted a season-best performance in the long jump (6.18m) and the 100m T38 (11 seconds), claiming gold and bronze, respectively. His mark in the 100m just was five-hundredths of a second off his personal best and world record from Tokyo.
Both showings secured him a spot on the team heading to New Delhi, India, for the Para World Championships at the end of September, where he’ll look to make his first international podium in the long jump.
His focus never really left the track. The reason for his focus, the "why," is what changed. He still has something to prove, but now, it's not all about him; it's about representing cerebral palsy at the highest level of elite sports and proving disabled athletes are elite athletes, too.
“I found so much greater joy in the messages I’ve received from other athletes’ parents — disabled and not — of them finding motivation in what I do or how I speak on my social media,” Mayhugh said. “Now, I feel like I have a responsibility to continue to compete to represent people that are like me that don’t have a voice.”
Happiness isn’t the feeling I should be yearning for — it’s joy in why I’m doing what I’m doing. If I don’t find joy in what I’m doing, then what am I doing it for?
Though the 2028 Los Angeles Paralympics still are three years away, Mayhugh already has his sights on making it back to track and field’s biggest stage, and his mental training isn’t the only regimen he’s changing. He recently moved into a new house in Clermont, Florida, where several of the world's biggest able-bodied track and field names — including Noah Lyles and Jereem Richards — primarily train.
During his second season at the National Training Center in Clermont, Mayhugh still is getting used to the elite athletic talent surrounding him. He’s taking in all the lessons he can, and he’s pushing his body more than ever before.
“It completely changes every aspect of training,” Mayhugh said of joining the crew in Clermont. “Growing up and playing soccer at the highest level that I could, I really understood what training for soccer at the highest level looked like — all the intricacies and the little tedious details and all those little things that I noticed growing up and playing soccer every single day … It’s just such a pleasure to be able to watch these athletes do what they do on a daily basis and learn from them every single day because there are so many things that I just don’t understand or would have never noticed without them pointing it out.”
But he’s also reminding himself to have fun.
“Every single day at training, Noah and I line up next to each other, and I am talking smack every single time,” Mayhugh said. “… As soon as that gun goes off, is Noah going to beat me? Yes. Am I ever going to run past him? Absolutely not. But I am going to continue to talk smack, continue to keep that competitive edge there and just try to get in his head.”
At this point in his (admittedly short) career, Mayhugh has carved his spot among track and field’s elite. He’s earned the right to train with the likes of Lyles, and he’s created a platform to educate and advocate. Of course, some more hardware would be nice, but from here on out, everything else is a bonus.
“This past year, I’ve really just gone to the track and found joy in being there and being around some of my best friends … I find joy in working out, hitting faster times and knowing I’m still getting better. That I’m 29-years-old — I’m one of the oldest guys in my group — but I’m yet to run my fastest and jump my farthest, and that’s what gets me excited. Because no matter what, if track and field was a video game, I beat the game. I won.”