Petruchas put Saskatoon vaulters in pole position

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http://www.canada.com/saskatoonstarphoe ... 2203a5e3d5

Couple puts Saskatoon vaulters in pole position
Bob Florence, The StarPhoenix
Published: Monday, February 04, 2008
A QUICK KELSIE HENDRY STORY:
At age 18, six weeks after taking up pole vault, she went to Montreal for the 2000 Canadian junior track and field championships. Being new to the event her technique was raw. She didn't carry the pole down the runway, she pushed it. In profile she looked like an extra from the Iwo Jima Memorial.
Although green, Hendry was game for a challenge. Thinking nothing of having to compete in a summer rain, she ended up winning a silver medal.

"A freak," said her coach Rick Petrucha. A vaulter himself since the 1970s, he'd seldom seen anyone jump so high, so soon. His eyes were as big as a discus.
Fast forward two years, with Hendry now on the verge of being world-class. As he watched her write on a piece of paper after a training session one day, coach Petrucha did a double-take.
"Do that again," he said.
"What?" she said.
"Write something."
Hendry continued as before, writing with her left hand. Odd. For two years Petrucha had been instructing her to vault with a dominant other hand. He always assumed she was a righty.
"I thought you knew," she said.
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There are higher profile teams in the city, but is there is a better program than Rick and Susanne Petrucha's flying circus? For 10 straight years their pole vaulters have won medals competing for the University of Saskatchewan Huskies at the Canadian university championship. Since 1998 the Petruchas have been a leading supplier of vaulters to the national track and field team, the made-in-Saskatoon label showing up everywhere from a Pan American junior meet in Barbados to the world senior championships in Helsinki.
Hendry, the lefty who still vaults as a righty, is Olympic potential. Add Adrianne Vangool and Leah Vause and you're talking three of the top-10 women vaulters in Canada, all under one roof.
The vault group trains weekdays at the Field House. Practice usually goes from late afternoon, when Rick arrives at the end of his shift as a journeyman carpenter with the City of Saskatoon, and extends through supper hour. They stick to the same daily schedule in summer, training at Griffiths Stadium. Aside from a two-week break near fall, the group trains year round.
"It keeps me young," said Rick, 53, a volunteer coach with the Riversdale Athletics Club.
"I get to be around these energetic, success-oriented people who are intelligent and fun and entertaining. Seeing their commitment and conviction makes me want to help build on their success. I know whatever I give, they give back."
Rick and his wife Susanne are coaching almost 30 vaulters this season, with an assist from Scott McCubbing, another vaulter, and from sprint coaches Ivan Tam and Caren Reindl and from Bruce Craven, a sports scientist. The athletes in the group range from prospects like Kara Engele, who is also a promising baseball player, and Janelle Garchinski, an accomplished dancer, to the seasoned, high-performance vaulters, readily identified by their stomachs which are as flat as a skillet and their bulky shoulders, as square as a Fridgidaire.
Dana Agar-Newman and Paul Selzer, both from B.C., and Rene Gauthier of Quebec ran away from home to join the Saskatoon circus. They are part of the senior vault group, which also features brothers Dillon and Taylor Petrucha, who have been coming to the daily workouts with their parents Susanne and Rick since they were nose high to a Port-a-Pit.
Some of the vaulters are in their early teens, others in their mid 20s. It's a group with varying skill, but singular purpose. They all want to see how high they can fly.
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A quick Rick Petrucha story:
At his peak, Rick was one of the best vaulters in Western Canada, but felt he never got respect from the East, the power broker in pole vault in Canada at the time.
One year, by finishing second at the Canadian indoor championships, he qualified to represent the country in a dual meet against the U.S. Making a national team was huge. That was his dream.
He was told a short while later he'd been bumped from the team by another vaulter, an Eastern athlete who hadn't even competed at nationals, but who had a better track record than Rick.
"That was a hurtful day," Rick said, and he burned about it for years.
Fast forward to 2006. His son, Taylor, made the national team for world juniors in Beijing that year.
Said Rick: "When he returned he handed me his Canada warm-up jacket with the big Maple Leaf on it. He said here's your jacket for the team you should have made."
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It's funny, when Hendry first started training with the vault group 71/2 years ago, Rick made a point of setting her poles out by the track each day, lined up pretty as you please, while the veteran vaulters had to schlep their equipment over from the storage room all the time.
"Everyone (in the group) was calling me Princess," Hendry said of what the others perceived as preferential treatment, but is something Rick says he does for all the new vaulters. "McCubbing, he'd say 'Hey Princess, is your limousine coming today?' "
That's the cool thing about the group -- they're high achievers, but they're not over intense. They shine, but they don't strut.
And though they all fly solo, with the vaulters there is this abiding sense of team.
"It's the atmosphere Rick and Susanne have created," Hendry said. "Everybody wants to see everybody else succeed. It's like family. You know they'll do anything for you. I've received e-mails from Rick at three in the morning; he's been up working on a funding application. I tell him, 'Don't worry, it'll be fine.' 'No,' he goes, 'it has to be just right.'
"Whether it's (competing in) Canada West (conference) or the Olympics, they're here to help you achieve your goal. They give the same effort to everyone. To me, that shows their passion for the sport."
She'll even forgive Susanne and Rick for making her carry her own poles to workouts now.
Right Princess?