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I have had a huge roadblock in polevaulting for the last year with getting upside down and the coaches keep telling me that it's because I can't get my butt up. Before, in my other topic I had stated that it was a problem with hip extension, but when I look at the picture comparison of a great rockback and my own, there is a clear difference in hip height. Can anyone give me any tips or things I can do to help me get my butt up?

GUARANTEED drill for hip extension!!!Find a rope and buy some ankle weights. Reach up and hold on the rope in a standing position with your drive knee up. Do not pull, but invert with the drive knee leading and get COMPLETLY inverted. Do not tuck back but go strait up to a FULL extension. 6x6 reps till you can do the reps without touching the ground!!!!!!! Coaches will ask you how in the world did you learn to get so inverted? You can tell them you learned it from an OLD 2 time master World Champion in Georgia that has had 51 region champions and 30 state champions in the last 3 years. I would say good luck , but you won't need any, because it works GUARANTEED!!!

You're pulling with your bottom arm. Looking at the picture, your left hand is well below eye level. It's in your left pocket. I've never seen you jump, so I have no idea what your strength level is. I've had kids that were weaker than puppy pee swing to the top simply because they had their hands in the correct position which allowed their lower body to do exactly what it should do.

Work on a pole, rope, high bar, etc...whatever you have access to, but do it correctly with your hands above your head and don't pull with the bottom arm.

Good luck!

charlie wrote:GUARANTEED drill for hip extension!!! ...

Charlie, I have no doubt that this is a good drill for a vaulter to improve his STRENGTH. However,
a coach of your stature would be better served in advising vaulters to learn how to SWING up to an inversion on the pole. Yes, you can learn this on a rope (or highbar or rings) ... but not the way you describe. And you don't need weights to make it an even more difficult drill than it already is.

Technique first, speed second, THEN strength third!

AVC, IMHO you're spot-on with the correct advice here.

In addition to the advice given by Charlie and AVC, I will explain what your focus should be in the way of an analogy. The analogy is re how to do a kip on a highbar.

YES, you can do a kip by muscling up A LOT (and by using very little technique), and YES the additional strength that you gain in your arms by muscling up will PROBABLY help you a LITTLE BIT in doing a kip with proper technique ... but you actually don't need much muscle at all to do a kip PROPERLY. It's all in the technique!

So sure, strength drills are fine ... but first, learn the proper technique! Ditto on the pole!

Also PR, you're looking at a still pic of Bubka (is it Bubka?) and comparing it to your still pic. It's good that you're analyzing and comparing body POSITIONS, but what's even more important is comparing the TIMING of these positions.

Not even having seen any of your vids, I'll bet you dollars to donuts that you're in this "flat back" or "dreaded V" or "dreaded L" position (whatever you want to call it ... search PVP for those terms, and you'll find several interesting, pertinent threads) for quite a few frames. I'll guess about a dozen! Tell me how close I am!

Whereas Bubka PASSES thru this position in a single frame! So the key is NOT to figure out how to tuck into a rockback position and then muscle up out of this position ... which is invariably going to be fraught with passivity (non-continuous motion) ... but to figure out how to SWING thru that position! It's all in the SWING!

Hmm ... maybe that's NOT Bubka. I see you refer to "a great rockback". But in the Petrov/Bubka model, THERE IS NO ROCKBACK!

Kirk

Thank you everyone.

Kirk- The thing that really jumped out at me in your advice is that it does not take that much strength to do drills on a high bar. My coach recommends that I do drills on a high bar to get the feel of a great swing, but whenever I try it, I feel like I'm not strong enough to get myself upside down. Maybe I'm not using that right muscles (like not enough arms or not enough core) but I just can't seem to get it at least once.

you can lead a horse to water, u you can't make him drink. I do not teach swing. I'm from the david Johnson school and teach the proper run with LIFT in the run and take-off the swing automaticly happens. I make these suggestionsfrom proven success.I believe you swing to the L position and pass through to vertical and not from a tuck position,and my rope drill gets you to that position!!!!

Charlie,

I'm not saying your rope drill won't help. I'm saying that if he tries to get inverted on the rope the same way he's trying to get inverted on the pole it will never happen, making your rope drill null and void. I guess I'm not from the old school of David Johnston. My main vocus is teaching the swing. Some kids are natural swingers and some are not. The kids that are not must be taught. The run is important but it won't make you swing if you don't know how to swing.

I'm a firm believer in rope, rings, and bars. But, I know that I'm going to have to teach some kids how to use them.

PRinthePV wrote: ... My coach recommends that I do drills on a high bar to get the feel of a great swing, but whenever I try it, I feel like I'm not strong enough to get myself upside down. Maybe I'm not using that right muscles (like not enough arms or not enough core) but I just can't seem to get it at least once.

It's easier to learn how to swing on the rings than on highbar or rings, so try that first.

It's a chicken and egg problem. You do need a certain amount of strength to be able to execute the drills ... but it's not as if you can't do the drills at all if you lack the strength. Anyone has enough strength to do simple swings on a highbar or rings ... even if you don't swing very high or very quickly. You will find that over time ... as you gain strength ... you'll be able to improve your technique.

But the point I was making about the kip ... which I think you got ... is that technique is more important than muscles. And by doing drills that are technically similar to the PV, you'll develop the right muscles to improve your technique.

A certain amount of bicep and pec strength in general is just fine, but you don't need to bulk up in these 2 areas. You need core strength, and the lankiness of a highbar specialist. This is what Steve Hooker does. He purposely avoids weight lifting in ways that will cause his pecs or biceps to bulk up. He's tall and rather slim, but his strength-to-weight ratio is phenomenal! And if he wasn't so danged tall, he'd probably be a pretty good highbar specialist!

Consider the fact that you're having difficulty in doing the highbar drills properly. So if you can't swing properly on a highbar, how do you ever expect to learn how to swing properly on the pole? The best way to improve your core strength and your swinging technique is on the highbar, rings, and rope. Learn it there, and then do the same thing on the pole! You can do a lot more reps in the gym in the same amount of time. And you'll be developing the RIGHT muscles as you develop PROPER technique.

Don't expect overnight results. But if your train hard now, and right thru the summer and winter, you'll be a much better vaulter next spring!

Kirk

"the swing automaticly happens." No it does not automatically happen Charlie! Those sorts of statements are simply going to confuse young athletes - especially if they actually believe the story you peddle

Claiming that the value of your ideas is reflected by the performance of your athletes is a dangerous path to travel down. Let us see some film of your athletes so that we can make up our own minds about that.

Rope and rings will certainly help build the timing and strength to invert. But also realize that when you are on a rope/rings/highbar, you have the convenience of being in a "free" position the entire time. You don't have to worry about setting up a free take off in which you are completely behind the pole before you swing, because there is no "first phase" on a ring/rope exercise. So you could do 1000 bubkas on a high bar, but if your take off is pretty far under, those 1000 bubkas won't help you nearly as much as if your take off is on. It becomes exponentially easier to swing the better your take off is.

So you can do a ton of exercises to improve your inversion, or you can fix your take off and those exercises will become 100 times easier. I just don't want to see you fighting an uphill battle on your inversion when the solution could be as simple as setting yourself up behind the pole before you swing. If you can post some video we can help you a lot more.

vault3rb0y wrote:So you could do 1000 bubkas on a high bar, but if your take off is pretty far under, those 1000 bubkas won't help you nearly as much as if your take off is on. It becomes exponentially easier to swing the better your take off is.

exact same thing recently happened to me. now i just have to get comfortable with a free take off and that should really help my swing. i had one free take off last practice and the jump was like magical, till i got to the top and didn't know what to do got a meet thursday gonna try and get it down then

KirkB wrote:

charlie wrote:GUARANTEED drill for hip extension!!! ...

Hmm ... maybe that's NOT Bubka. I see you refer to "a great rockback". But in the Petrov/Bubka model, THERE IS NO ROCKBACK!

Kirk

Kirk, can u explain me this with some pic or videos