Dragila on the Comeback Trail (WCSN.com article)

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January 31, 2008 7:15:00 AM PST
Dragila on the comeback trail
By Dave Ungrady / WCSN.com

Stacy Dragila felt a revived passion for pole-vaulting while she attended the 2007 outdoor world championships in Osaka, Japan. (AP)

Last weekend, in her first real competition since dropping out of the Reebok Grand Prix meet in New York last June, Stacy Dragila had hoped to soar over the pole vault bar under the radar. Dragila, the first Olympic champion in the women's pole vault at the 2000 Sydney games, wanted to shake off a little competitive rust in preparation for the Millrose Games that takes place Friday in New York.
But Dragila soon discovered she could not escape her fame during the Blue & Orange Classic indoor meet featuring mostly college athletes in Boise, Idaho. "I'm glad I went to the meet, but they went on and on, announcing, 'Here's Stacy, the Olympic champion,' " Dragila said with a laugh during a phone call earlier this week. "I said 'are you kidding, I just want to jump.' "

You can't blame Dragila for her desire to complete some quality leaps. Since she failed miserably to defend her title at the 2004 Athens games and won the U.S. outdoor title in 2005, Dragila has endured an injury marred period that threatened to end her pioneering career. But now, the first global star in the women's pole vault thinks she is finally back on track toward an Olympic medal-winning performance at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Dragila won the meet in Idaho after she cleared 13 feet, 11 inches, drastically lower than her personal best 15-11 and her indoor American record of 15-9.5. But it was a one-foot improvement over her winning leap the previous weekend at a smaller meet in Pocatello, Idaho, when she used an eight-step approach to gradually reunite herself with the event.

" I ran great [in Boise]", she said. "It didn't feel hard."

Friday night, the environment will be drastically different for Dragila, who will compete in the Millrose Games in New York City for the first time since 2005 when she won the pole vault with a leap of 14-8.25. Dragila hopes to reach near that height Friday.

"I can't go from 13-11 to breaking a world record," she said. "I have little goals in mind. I'd be ecstatic if I jump 14-5."

Dragila, who will be 37 in March, expects to set measured objectives for the next few months as she prepares for the Olympics. Since she won the U.S. outdoor championships in 2005, Dragila has endured repeated physical setbacks that prompted surgeries on both Achilles tendons.

But her woes began during the 2004 U.S. Olympic Trial. Earlier in that season, Dragila set a personal best and an American record 15.925 and won a silver medal at the world indoor championships. She also set an outdoor American outdoor record 4.83 meters (15-10) at a meet in Ostrava, Czech Republic. After winning 15 of 18 competitions that year heading into the trials, Dragila felt great about her chances of winning another Olympic gold medal.

But her Olympic quest was drastically altered when calf problems materialized during the trials. "I woke up the morning of the finals and my calves were super tight," she said. "I thought it was just nerves. They got tighter, but I'm stubborn and I needed to go for a world record."

Dragila won the trials easily, jumping 15-7, but she did not feel like a winner. "I walked off the track not knowing what I did," she said. "The next day I couldn't walk."

At some European meets after the trials, the calves bothered her so much she says she could barely get down the runway. During a meeting with her coach when she broke down crying out of frustration, they discovered the culprit was a new pair of track shoes she first tried the week before the trials.

"Someone told me later that's like putting bad oil into a car," she said.

Following a week off to recover, Dragila returned to training with her old pair of shoes, but the damage had been done. She lacked the confidence needed to compete well at the Olympics, and managed to jump only 14-1.25, finished seventh in qualifying and failed to make the final.

"I should have been on the podium," she said. "I should have been fighting for at least second and I did not even get third. That fueled my fire. I was not going to end my career like that."

Dragila won the 2005 U.S. outdoor championships and another ticket to the world championships, which she won in 1999 and 2001. But she competed through pain in her right Achilles tendon leading up to the competition in Helsinki, and failed to qualify for the final.

Dragila considered surgery, but instead chose physical therapy to repair the tendon. While preparing to compete for the first time in 2006 at the U.S. outdoor national championships, Dragila discovered she had torn the tendon and finally opted for surgery.

"I though if I come back, I'm not that far out of it," she said. "The other [U.S.] girls had not escalated to a height that I can't handle." Only two U.S. pole vaulters, Jenn Stuczynski and Jillian Schwartz, have cleared 15 feet.

Dragila returned to competition in late April 2007 at an outdoor meet in Provo, Utah and started to feel like her old self again. But during practice the week before the Road to Eugene meet on May 27, she felt soreness in her other Achilles tendon, thinking it was just tendonitis. Hampered by the discomfort, she managed to win the meet with a mediocre 14-9 jump. During an attempt at 15 feet, she felt her left Achilles tendon pull and stopped short on the runway.

Dragila tried to compete the following week at an IAAF Grand Prix meet in New York City, but backed out after she felt crippling pain during warm-ups. She found out a few days later that she had torn the tendon. This time, she opted for surgery immediately.

"Before the meet, I thought I was way ahead of my game," she said. "But when my other Achilles decides to go, I thought I can't do this anymore."

But Dragila persevered, motivated in part by wanting to clear 16 feet for the first time. It helped Dragila that in late 2006, she returned to Idaho to work with Dave Nielsen, her first coach at Idaho State University who she left in 2003.

Nielsen had noticed a change in the way Dragila approached her sport. "Some athletes when they start really getting into their sport, that can work against them," he said by phone from Idaho. "She became much more engaged that way and as a result at times overt thought stuff, and lost some of her confidence. A little bit of knowledge can be a scary thing. You can try sometimes too hard."

Last summer and fall Dragila spent most of her time in San Diego, CA working to rehabilitate the left tendon. But she felt uncomfortable with the environment there and decided to return to Idaho in early January to continue therapy. Last week a visit to a sports orthopedist yielded a landmark discovery for Dragila. For years she had been baffled by tightness in her left buttocks muscle and thought it could be a contributing factor to her Achilles problems. The orthopedist discovered that a bulging disc in her lower back was causing the discomfort in her buttocks and helped cause improper flexion of her left foot. Dragila feels that problem forced her to favor her left leg while training and competing, creating the problems with her tendons.

After she returns from the Millrose Games, Dragila will receive a cortisone shot in her back. She hopes the treatment will finally cure her lingering physical woes. Dragila plans to compete in two meets in Idaho following the Millrose Games before jumping at the U.S. indoor championships Feb. 23-24 in Boston. She hopes to qualify for the indoor world championships, which she won in 1997 and earned a silver medal in 2004.

Nielsen feels Dragila can still compete with the top vaulters in the world.

"You never know," he said. "She's at the age where things are more sensitive to injury. But as far as being fit and a good vaulter, she certainly has it. She's solid physically and still has the speed. The biggest challenge really is just confidence right now."

Dragila felt a revived passion for pole-vaulting while she attended the 2007 outdoor world championship in Osaka, Japan, as a U.S. athlete liaison.

"When watching the competition I thought I can be in this mix," she said. "I felt I deserved to be here. If I can get healthy I can stay with those girls and be on the podium again. I thought, 'you're not done yet, Stacy.' "