PoleVaultPower.com

today at practice i was havin problems swingin and gettin upside down. My dad and coach Goss told me to narrow my handspread. I narrowed to about shoulder width apart and first jump I noticed a huge difference. I was able to get upside down a lot better and I made 13' from my short run. The thing is that I'm thinkin it will prevent me from keepin my bottom arm out and it might collapse. I dunno i just wanted to see what you guys think is a good hand spread.

when i was able to invert, i had my hands about 2 feet apart. Then i moved them out to like 3+ feet, to keep my arm out better, and get more bend, but i cudnt invert/ rockabk, anything with that grip. so id sayt around 2 feet or so.

mcminkz05 wrote:when i was able to invert, i had my hands about 2 feet apart. Then i moved them out to like 3+ feet, to keep my arm out better, and get more bend, but i cudnt invert/ rockabk, anything with that grip. so id sayt around 2 feet or so.

i think it was 20-22 inches after i narrowed it.

yeah, that sounds pretty good. i said botu 2 feet, didn take an exact measurement of mine.. but i shure never shudda changed it..

Your grip really shouldn't be much more then shoulder width. A narrower grip allows you to swing easier. I don't think you need to worry about bending the pole with a narrower grip as long as your technique is good. I've seen people jump with a bent pole with only about a foot between their hands.

One of the drills we are doing is close grip short runs, we go from around 50ft im gripping 13 on a 14 180, and jumping 14. We are supposed to keep our hand grip around 8-12 inches. I even did one at 6inches on a smaller pole. You can still extend your left arm, it looks funny because it comes back almost past your head. My grip normally is around 20- 22 inches, wider =softer and more control, narrow =stiffer easier to rotate. To wide =lowplant and swing problems. To narrow= stiff and less control.