To lose weight or to gain muscle, that is the question.

[vault3rb0y]

Well i hope im ok at 5'9 160.... 2 Ibs over the MAX. I feel im able to still control the vault pretty well, lol at least i hope so!

[Lax PV]

yeah im about 185 so thats why i was just curious. thanks for the little calculator.. very cool

remember the scale is for a young undeveloped athlete... as someone matures... that number is going to have to change


Along that idea... many people argue that since mass is a 3D property, and muscular force output is linearly correlated to cross-sectional are of a muscle, as one increases mass, they will inherently loose some of their relative strength. Many contend (the NSCA included) that the relative strength ratio should be a formula looking more like this...

RS = Weight Lifted / (Body Mass)^(2/3)

We tried this out up in La Crosse with our guys, only one kid stood out in relative strength, which made sense because regardless of pole vault technique, all of us were about at the same training age (one guy was just a little smaller with a massive squat)

Food for thought... try it out... see what kind of numbers you get. We usually used a sum of Bench, Squat and Power Clean as the weight lifted. Unfortunatly I have no real data of elite guys and what they lift to get an idea... but that is a whole different argument that I will get myself into so I'll stop while I am ahead.

[spikey17]

i am 6' and 156.6 lbs. and i have a lot of muscle(like less than 10% body fat...which is rather unhealthy my doctor told me but i really didnt care muchdue to my lifestyle). the main goal in pole vaulting is getting the pole to vertical and the second goal is having a strong takeoff/plant. weight is not an issue if you have good form in your vaults. last year we had a senior at our school who was 5'11" and 165 lbs who had excellent form and made it over 13'6" easily....14' was hard for him though. so like i said, its basically your form that counts, but finding a happy medium between losing weight and gaining muscle is also another consideration.

[BRANDT]

So my question is, for vaulters, is it better to be really light or to be really strong because theres a girl who vaults at my club whos 14 years old and tiny and she fly's above the bar with total ease, or is it better to have more muscle, because I feel heavy when i jump, like it requires all this effort to even get off the ground (but i'm 5ft 7 and 123 pounds). I looked at Yelena Isinbayeva nad it says she 5ft7 but 140 pounds. What gives?

Catherine

I would say both are important, you need to be lean basically, while having strength at the same time. You dont need to lose weight for the vault. It should revolve more around body fat instead of losing weight vs gaining muscle. If your body fat percent is low but you weigh 140lbs like Yelena then that weight you know is from muscle. Whereas if you weigh 140lbs and have no muscle definition and your body fat percent is high then you know your weight from fat is high and you should lose weight. So overall you need to be a lean athlete, always trying to gain muscle and keeping that muscle toned and the body fat down.

If your feeling heavy when you jump then its probably 1 of 2 things, 1. your out of shape bottom line 2. Your body fat percent could be on the higher side of the spectrum even though you only weigh 127lbs. So basically what I would recommend is checking your body fat percent and seeing where it sits in the range for a standard female, and shoot for the lower end of the spectrum if not below the lower end. As a vaulter you want to have the best of both worlds to be honest, you want to be lean, but not lacking muscle either. Being lean but being weak doesnt make you an efficient vaulter, just like being muscular but being fat doesnt make you a more efficient vaulter, you need to be lean, and toned. My two cents.