IAAF Year in Review - Pole Vault

[rainbowgirl28]

http://www.iaaf.org/news/Kind=2/newsId=32971.html


Pole Vault

Paul Burgess jumped at ten meetings during 2005, all of his competitions were in Australia and seven of them in his home town Perth in West Australia. Burgess had recorded a personal best of 5.77m in 2004 following three successive seasons at 5.70m or better. In his second competition of the season on January 15, he cleared 5.91m and made three tries at 6.00m. He finally needed seven jumps at the magical height before clearing 6.00m on 26 February in Perth. Injury in the summer prevented Burgess from showing what he is capable of outside his hometown.

In the Grand Prix meetings there were almost as many winners as there were competitions. Brad Walker (USA) scored some good wins prior to Helsinki, winning the US Championships both indoors and outdoors, but was beaten in a World Championships final which was affected by difficult wind conditions and cold weather. Walker took the silver behind a surprise winner Rens Blom (NED) who tied his personal best of 5.80m to take the gold. Walker was even stronger after Helsinki, winning with 5.90m in Sheffield before setting a personal best of 5.96m in Rieti in late August.

The top US-duo from 2004, Olympic champion Tim Mack and silver medallist Toby Stevenson, were far from their level during last season and could not perform as expected during the 2005 campaign.

In 2005 there were 15 athletes at 5.80m or better, in 2004 we had 19 in 2004 and 10 in 2003. United States is clearly the best nation with 27 athletes at the world top 100, France is second with 14 and Russian third on 9.

Men's Pole Vault - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 12 Dec 2005 Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points
1. Brad WALKER 81 USA 1376
2. Tim LOBINGER 72 GER 1330
3. Rens BLOM 77 NED 1298
4. Giuseppe GIBILISCO 79 ITA 1289
5. Derek MILES 72 USA 1282
6. Toby STEVENSON 76 USA 1280
7. Igor PAVLOV 79 RUS 1278
8. Denys YURCHENKO 78 UKR 1255


Pole Vault

With her recent "a new World record every time" habit Russia's Yelena Isinbayeva probably has fooled us into believing that the women's Pole Vault is still a young event in a phase of rapid improvements. But just as for the High Jump the marks we read about in the headlines don't necessarily represent general trends. Just look at this table giving the 10th, 25th and 50th mark in the world outdoor lists for the last four years:

Level - 2002 - 2003 - 2004 - 2005
10th - 4.52 - 4.60 - 4.60 - 4.53
25th - 4.40 - 4.40 - 4.45 - 4.40
50th - 4.30 - 4.30 - 4.30 - 4.30

This pattern of stability is very similar to the ones we can find for the "old" events, not a pattern expected for an event supposedly still in its adolescence. But this shouldn't be so much of a surprise, because the Pole Vault is actually no longer a truly young event.

It has been around for about a decade with the first global senior title awarded over eight years ago (World Indoors 1997) which means that the current world elite mainly consists of athletes that have "grown up" in an era where pole vaulting was part of the standard programme of events for women.

So most likely Isinbayeva, rather than just as a forerunner of things to come, should be regarded as an all-time superstar of stature that perhaps in history will be likened to that of Sergey Bubka. Remember that despite the fact that Bubka first cleared six metres already twenty years ago, this is still today a level very seldomly attained.

Thus the current obvious levelling off in the women's Pole Vault quite probably should be understood as the event having reached "maturity" and that "take 1 metre off" could very well become the handy rule of thumb for future comparisons between men and women. So that we will view 5.00, 4.80 and 4.50 for women as we now view 6.00, 5.80 and 5.50 for men (i.e. as "exceptional", "championships medal contender" and "international class").

Women's Pole Vault - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 12 Dec 2005
Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points
1. Yelena ISINBAYEVA 82 RUS 1453
2. Monika PYREK 80 POL 1284
3. Anna ROGOWSKA 81 POL 1275
4. Tatyana POLNOVA 79 RUS 1207
5. Pavla HAMÃÂ

[Russ]

Love ya, Rainbow!

[vaultmd]

Russ,

You both are smiling too much in that picture. Get your hand off her knee!

[Jennapv]

I was going to post the same IAAF article about the event no longer being in its infancy and that Isinbayeva IS that good...thought it was v. interesting.