Stuczynski aims to end Russian vault domination

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http://www.cbc.ca/olympics/athletics/st ... ynski.html

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Athletics-Pole vault
Stuczynski aims to end Russian vault domination
U.S. pole vaulter works in Spartan setting in western New York to prepare for Beijing Olympics and Russian champ
Last Updated: Friday, June 13, 2008 | 1:40 PM ET

Paul Gains CBC Sports
Jenn Stuczynski of the US competes looks at the wind to win the women pole vault event at 4,90m, May 18, 2008 during the Adidas Track Classic at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California. (Gabriel Bouys/Getty Images)


Jenn Stuczynski would like nothing better than to end the freakish dominance of Russian pole vaulting sensation Yelena Isinbayeva, the reigning Olympic, World and European champion.

Earlier this season, 26-year-old Stuczynski broke her own American record in the event with a jump of 4.90m at the Adidas Track Classic in Carson, Calif. Not satisfied, she had the audacity to ask that the bar be raised to 5.02m -- one centimeter higher than Isinbayeva’s world record.

Though she missed on all three attempts she came out of the competition with an appreciation for what it takes to break a world record.

“I think a lot goes through your mind at the same time,” Stuczynski says. “You are attempting a height no one has jumped before and you want it so badly. You know you can jump it. It’s almost like you tense up because you want to make it.

“I equate it to golf. When you think you need to swing harder than you do the next thing is you end up shanking the ball left or right If you had just stood there and had a smooth back swing and followed through you would have had a perfect shot. That’s how it is in vaulting.”

Country girl at heart

Not for a moment does she doubt her ability to one day get the record. She plans on jumping at the record height in practice as many times as possible.

While Isinbayeva splits her time between the tax haven of Monte Carlo, her training centre in Formia, Italy, and her home town of Volgograd, Russia, Stuczynski is a country girl at heart, never straying far from her home in western New York.

Born in Fredonia, New York, she attended Fredonia High School before graduating from Roberts Wesleyan College in nearby Rochester with a degree in sports psychology. Today she lives in the village of Churchville (population 1,800) upstairs in a house owned by her coach Rick Suhr.

Compared with the excellent training facilities enjoyed by her competitors, Stuczynski’s is Spartan to say the least. Winter training is done inside a steel building that resembles an airplane hangar. The floor is concrete, the runway made of wood. Two propane heaters are fired up to keep some semblance of warmth near the landing pit. She uses a local fitness club for weight training.

It is how she has functioned ever since she took up vaulting seriously four years ago. Until that time she had been a star college basketball player, averaging 24 points a game. Coach Suhr, the track coach at Roberts Wesleyan at the time, convinced her to focus on the vault at the expense of basketball. Within two years she was the U.S. outdoor champion.

“Honestly, I don’t miss basketball,” she declares. “I played all through high school and college. Once I was done I never looked back. I enjoyed my teammates and my coach, but when I got into vaulting I never turned around.”

Owns a four-wheeler

A year ago, she went to the 2007 IAAF world championships in Osaka, Japan, but an ankle injury limited her technique and she finished a disappointing 10th. Isinbayeva won that one. But Stuczynski rebounded indoors to take the silver medal at the world indoor championships in Valencia, Spain. Isinbayeva won that one too.

Stuczynski’s grandparents, parents and her brother and sister remain in Fredonia. They operate a family grocery store and delicatessen, a place she worked from the age of 15 until three years ago. She likes living in a rural setting.

“I have a four-wheeler,” she reveals. “I am not a daring four-wheeler, I love pole vaulting and I want to keep vaulting. I don’t go over any jumps. I go out in the fields and my dog Tundra chases me. It gives him a chance to roam around.

“I love camping. We camp a lot -- not hard core in the Adirondacks where there are bears -- but a kind of state park. Anything outdoors I like to do.”

With Isinbayeva yet to open her season it might be reasonable to ask has Stuczynski peaked too early? After all, she has at the time of writing the three best jumps of the year, but she believes things are going according to plan. The U.S. Olympic trials are foremost in her mind. Making the team is the primary concern.

The U.S. trials are brutal. Stuczynski knows she has to be at her absolute best at the trials, then, if she does, find a way to come back and peak again in Beijing.

“It’s a little hard because you have to come back then and peak again for the Olympics,” she says. “We have a plan for that. Last year at this time, I jumped 4.88m at the Reebok meet. Afterwards I was tired and was done. I kind of peaked out. This year is not like that at all. I feel better now than when I was jumping at those meets. I definitely haven’t peaked yet.”

Sleeps on the infield

That should serve as a warning to athletes, though Isinbayeva never gives the impression she is fazed by anyone else in the field. So relaxed is she during competition that she appears to go to sleep on the infield while the mortals duke it out at the lower heights.

So what does Stuczynski expect this season? The Olympic gold medal?

“It would be stupid to say I don’t have a goal,” she responds. “I do and it’s written down. I try not to look too far ahead. It would definitely be disappointing not to win a medal. I have very high goals for myself and that is one of them.

“I will try to go to Europe before that, get some meets in and get used to the idea of competing overseas. Then I will come back to get ready to go to China. So I have plans but I also have to be ready for the trials.”

In the history of the women’s Olympic pole vault there have been just two winners. Stacy Dragila, whom Stuczynski has supplanted as top American vaulter, won the inaugural Olympic competition. Isinbayeva is the only other.

Reading between the lines, Stuczynski wants to be the third.