Indoor pole vaulting an uphill battle (Maine)

[rainbowgirl28]

http://morningsentinel.mainetoday.com/s ... 3841.shtml

Indoor pole vaulting an uphill battle

On the list of Maine high school athletes, those competing in indoor track seem to have it the toughest, as far as practice conditions go. The typical practice consists of doing sprints in the school hallways and jumping onto mats in the cafeteria.

Although the tiled floor of a high school hallway will never be mistaken for a track surface, at least you're able to run on something. Pole vaulters are forced to make do and wait for spring.

"We're lucky to have this once a week," said Waterville Senior High School track coach Ian Wilson, pointing over his right shoulder at the pole vault pit at Colby College's field house during Saturday's high school meet. "It's tough to simulate."

The differences between indoor and outdoor track are subtle. The indoor sprints are shorter, and on the shorter track, the 400 meters is a two-lap race instead of one. The pole vault is still the pole vault, however, and the ability to fling yourself over a bar with a flexible pole takes practice. It's not easy to become a human slingshot, and it shouldn't be.

Once a week, central Maine high school indoor track teams are able to practice at Colby's facility for a couple of hours. By the time a pole vaulter has warmed up, he or she might have a good 45 minutes of actual pole vault practice.

Forty-five minutes? More time is allotted each week to "American Idol." Indoor track pole vaulters in Maine are just American Idle.

It's tough to be any good at anything if you only get to practice it 45 minutes per week. Give a basketball player 45 minutes a week on the court and watch his game deflate. Let a baseball player see pitching for 45 minutes a week and he'll start looking like a "K." Of that I speak from experience.

Forty-five minutes a week isn't practice, it's a light hobby, and that's what makes the elite high school pole vaulters in Maine, like Waterville's Will Yankowski and Cony's Bethany Dumas, so amazing. Just a sophomore, Dumas won the University of Southern Maine Invitational with a vault of 10 feet, 2 inches. At the Brown Invitational, she jumped 11 feet, a state record. At Saturday's meet, Yankowski won at 12 feet, six inches, a foot and a half better than second place Craig Holm of Belfast, but a foot lower than his personal indoor best of 13-6.

"It's hard without a pit (for practice). The best I've done is 11-6 in the gym," Yankowski said. "We're planting on wooden boxes and they snap all to pieces."

Even if Wilson thought Yankowski needed to be pushed, what could he do? Make him practice 47 minutes? It helps that, to excel in a sport like pole vaulting, an athlete needs to have a strong inner drive.

"I rode (Yankowski) pretty hard as a freshman," Wilson said. "Once I realized he's highly self-motivated, I leave him alone now."

Pole vaulting during the indoor season is about muscle memory, about doing what you learned in the spring season. If you want to really learn the sport, wait until spring.

"You can practice your approach, your take off position, those things in the gym," Wilson said. "You can do drills that help younger guys, but there's not much for veterans like Will."

"It's all feeling. Once you get the feeling down, you've got it," Yankowski.

Finding time to get that feeling, that's the hard part.

Travis Lazarczyk -- 861-9242

tlazarczyk@centralmaine.com

[PVgoalie101]

yup that exactly what it's been like for me this indoor season so far. i've only been able to get up to one jump meet @ usm and then the regular meets. i wish we could have somewhere to practice all the time down in southern maine

[fx]

yeah massachusetts is pretty tough too. i haven't jumped since like the end of december and that was in an open meet. besides meets, i cant pole vault at all and theres only meets like once a month.