PoleVaultPower.com

Here's the list of guys that have jumped high, but didn't qualify:

18'0"--Bobby Most, Texas Tech
18'0"--Giovanni Lanaro, Fullerton
17'8"--Trevor Woods, Oregon
17'8"--John Takahashi, Cal Poly SLO
17'8"--Trent Powell, BYU
17'8"--Rocky Danners, Tennessee

I imagine all six will go to nationals.

Yeah should be the six guys who have jumped the highest but didn't place in top 5.

zack wrote:Yeah should be the six guys who have jumped the highest but didn't place in top 5.

yea thats what i mean. those heights are what they've been over this year. They all just choked at regions.

Choked or gave that all important "honest effort" and are hoping that thier decending order mark will get them in (in the case of the guys you mentioned thats a given). Saw an awful lot of "honest efforts" this weekend...............and its a little disturbing that jogging (limping) down the runway, gimping into the pit, looking dissapointed and then scratching from the comp is considerded an honest effort. Yes it is within the rules but lets be real.........................For those of you who dont know the NCAA says you MUST compete in the reg meet to make it to nats. Their def of compete has this little thing called the HONEST EFFORT rule. All this meas is you must start the event and you have competed. So in this case if you were injured for the region you could run through, scratch and rest/recover for 2 more weeks to be ready for nats.

I dont like the rule and saw a lot of it this weekend (not just in the vault), just venting.............thanks.

Yea, I think I saw one leg fall off and another girl compete on a broken leg. I don't like the rule either, but oh well. LB

i agree with u, it kind of taints the meaning of the meet, when people are saying they dont need to jump

lonpvh wrote:Yea, I think I saw one leg fall off and another girl compete on a broken leg. I don't like the rule either, but oh well. LB

Must have been quite a sight!

First, I would like to say that I believe that the honest effort rule is good, for the basic reason that it forces everyone to compete and gives everyone a shot at going to nationals. I believe that's good for the sport and will encourage many younger vaulters that might not be quite good enough to hit that 5.30+ jump to work hard and if they can beat some of those upper guys on a given day then I believe they've proved themselves worthy of going. This meet and rule forces everyone onto a fairly even playing field where anything can and usually does happen.

Second, I would like to address the little incident that PVJunkie spoke of. The kid that limped down the runway was my teammate. The second day after he jumped 5.15 in a head wind at our conference meet he had an accident on the track and ended up pulling his hamstring. He had been rehabbing for almost 2 weeks and it still wasn't ready to run on. He wanted to scratch from the competition but our coach forced him to limp down the track and "miss" an attempt so he could get that little piece of paper saying he was actually injured and was unable to compete because it was still mathematically possible for him to go on an at large big at 5.25 (just unlikely). He hated having go out in front of everyone and make himself look like that, but you can't tell me that if you or any one of your vaulters were in the same position you would not have had them do the exact same thing.

I have one hope for this post. I hope that if nothing else the people that saw the incident that PVJunkie described understand a little more of what happened and don't share his biased opinion of that action. My teammate is one of the greatest people you could ever meet, and probably would never respond to something like this (although he can't now because he's working with kids at a Christian church camp all summer long) and I just hope that no one thinks less of him because of his forced actions.

-UAVLTR

Choked is not really the way to put it. Everyone has bad days. Im sure youve jumped you PR in every meet youve ever had right?? Especially when your jumping heights as high as they are, it becomes difficult to repeat all the time. You also dont know anything about conditions, injuries. Things happen all the time. Jeff Hartwig didn't go to the last Olympics if you will recall.

VTechVaulter wrote: Jeff Hartwig didn't go to the last Olympics if you will recall.

yea, he didn't go. he didn't go because he choked. the only region vaulters could have NOT choked but not gone was the west. And the only one to do that was Trent Powell who jumped 17'3" which would have won the east, and placed second at the other two meets. He just got screwed for being in the hardest division in the nation. However, Takahashi only jumped 4.90, 20 inches under his season best. In my books thats a choak. And Trevor Woods, my teammate, mentor, inspiration, and friend, pulled a big NH. It was a self proclaimed choak. Anyone who has jumped 5.40 from the east, mideast, or midwest and didn't make it definately choaked. The highest height to qualify of the three of those regions was 16'10" in the mideast, and 16'7" in the other two. Thats 12 or 15 inches under their PR at a minimum, and its a big meet where the juices are flowing.

I would imagine it can be difficult to jump well when you are competing at the end of a 6-7 hour competition

I would imagine it can be difficult to jump well when you are competing at the end of a 6-7 hour competition

No kidding.....Our warm-ups (midwest) began at 9:00am. The competition concluded at 3:00 or so. Made for a reallllly long day. Not to mention the swirling 15mph winds. By far the most challenging competition I have ever jumped in.