Pole Vault Power recently celebrated its 18th birthday, and I wanted to share a few thoughts about where I have been and where I am going.
I started PVP when I was 20. I had just transferred schools and was finally getting to experience being on a college track team.
I had experience on other message boards, and wished there was one for pole vaulting, so I made one. Word spread by word of mouth, and it grew quickly and organically.
I never had an agenda or a goal. I just loved pole vaulting and loved bringing people together to talk about pole vaulting. And we did that! For so many years we had so many wonderful discussions and I have so many fond memories of our times together.
Being young and mobile, I was able to travel all over the country. I met so many of you in person, and had such a blast in the process. Transferred schools again and ended up living in six states over about a six year timespan.
Over time, my interests evolved. I attended my first USATF Annual Meeting while I was still a college student. I kept talking to people and learning new things.
After college I moved back home to western Washington and got involved with my local USATF Association and local track club. I’ve competed. I’ve coached. I’ve officiated. I’ve been a meet director for everything from beach vaults to tiny local track meets to modest USATF National Championships.
I got burned out on my message board. Years and years of moderating increasingly aggressive discussions about pole vaulting technique grew old. Social media picked up steam and the _need_ that once existed for my message board faded.
My focus gradually shifted to other platforms, like Twitter and Facebook, and while I continue to report on the happenings in the pole vault world, my scope has greatly expanded. When USATF’s CEO decided in 2016 that suing volunteers was how he was going to resolve their differences, I abruptly quit the roles I held in my Association in order to focus on the journalism side of the sport.
But being a traditional journalist doesn’t suit me, because I am not content to sit back and report dispassionately on what is happening. If I see something that can be _done_ to make a difference, I am going to make an attempt to _do_ it. Sometimes that means making a Facebook post or tweet. Sometimes that means submitting a rule change or bylaw change to USATF. Usually it means a lot of phone calls. A reporter suggested that activist is probably the best word to describe me.
I read Little Girls in Pretty Boxes in high school. Athletes started telling their stories of abuse before blogs and social media were a “thing,” but no one listened. For decades they tried and it never mattered, unless the stars aligned and criminal charges happened, and even then, that didn’t always stop predatory coaches.
I watched USATF gradually move toward recognizing the imbalance of power between athletes and coaches, and shift toward adopting policies that prohibited the abuse of athletes.
I learned that you can have amazing experiences with someone who turns out to be a predator. I came to recognize that just because I have had wonderful experiences with someone, it can also be true that they have done something terrible to someone else.
I learned that predators groom the adults around them, not just the victims. I learned that some people had been kind to me because they wanted something from me, not because our friendship was genuine.
I did the right thing when no one was watching, no matter the cost to myself. While I never reached the point of wanting to harm myself, the pain and trauma that the Center for SafeSport put me through made me understand why someone would cut themselves, why causing yourself physical pain might seem like a better alternative than not being able to escape the pain deep in your soul.
Very few people know what I have spent most of my energy on the past few years. A major media outlet wanted to write about it, and I turned them down. That story will come out someday, but that time has not come yet.
I have made Facebook posts that have cost me longstanding friendships. I would post them again in a heartbeat because it was the right thing to do.
For every Facebook post I make that costs me friendships, I get multiple private messages from people telling me their secrets. Some of them tell me things they have never told anyone before. Abuse from coaches and officials. Eating disorders. The sport exploiting them.
My “why” these days is to help move our sport, and all Olympic sports, toward being an environment where athletes are not abused and harassed and where they are not financially exploited by the powers that be.
I am 38 years old now. I am married and have two kids. I am amused by allegations that I am unhappy, that I am attention seeking and that I am jealous.
My life has purpose. I am where God wants me to be.
I have been blessed to come from a privileged background, which made it easier for me to land in a privileged place today, and I try not to squander or waste my position, but to use it to make our sport a better place for the marginalized and disenfranchised.
I am happy and I am not jealous of anyone. Some will read this post as attention seeking, but I have so many friends here that I have known for so long, I wanted to give you all an update on my life.
I am a little sad that some have chosen to spread lies about me, and disappointed that there are some of you who are reading this who have chosen to believe the lies of others over your own personal experiences with me.
But my happiness and self-worth are not tied to others’ opinions of me. I know the difference that I have made, and I am continuing to make. Many of my peers in this sport are still twice my age. I am still often the youngest person (excluding AAC members) in many of the meetings I attend. I am in this for the long haul.
So cheers to the first 18 years of Pole Vault Power, which has grown to be about so much more than pole vaulting. I am looking forward to many productive decades to come.