pole breaks

[~jj~]

I think multi max-grip lines should be a portion of the ASTM standard.
I have tested many kinds of poles over the past 6 years, and I have not yet seen a pole to which it can't be applied.
However, no such rule will be implemented by the HS federation until an ASTM standard is ratified. It would represent a huge savings to the programs that sponsor pole vaulting. It also may reduce pole sales, and for that reason may not be supported by some people on the business side of things.
In addition, a standard makes it far easier to switch between brands, since they would all have to be tested and labled the same.
To develop an ASTM standard the manufacture and dealers need to come to the table and participate in the process.

~jj~

[Bruce Caldwell]

RICHARD you are good at digging up those oldie but goodies
Good job GRIN
While the article seems logical and has some physics merit to it. Poles are different today than then. A browning skypole with the variable weight on the top had a sail reinforcement that went all the way to the top of the pole and was made thicker and out of only Economy glass and was on a bigger size mandrel than today.

When you convert a couple of layers into a taper to create a lighter pole to carry, one that is more conducive to technique you are determining where the energy for a set grip will need the most strength which is basically in the lower middle of the pole. Especially if the brand pole you have now bends low and you move your handgrip down you are now sending energy to a lower point in the pole and it will need reinforcement lower. The wider this area in the middle is the more a vaulter can be off but still maintain energy in that area. The Old poles were made with more glass from the top of the pole to the bottom and today to provide the athletes with a more tuned vaulting pole it has less wraps above the center of the pole. The industry has streamlined the poles to meet the needs and cries of the vaulting WORLD. We gain a more tuned vaulting pole and lose a pole that had more versatility towards weight and grip.

As I have said in a few other post you can adjust the pole within the grip area to account for style and pole timing, but you cannot gain a weight rating unless you adjust the inside of the pole too. Which of course is impossible
.
Manufacturers can today make a better Browning Skypole with adjustable weight ratings and grip ratios for those beginner vaulters. But to make one in longer sizes is not possible as it will be very heavy, made with cheaper less flexible glass to keep the price down, large in diameter and will not provide high performance, as it is the laws of design physics that prevents it.

You cannot adjust your handhold on the current vaulting pole made today to gain weight rating; without placing energy distribution in areas not capable of holding the load.
SO we have to make up our minds here, do we want a pole that performs well to give us the chance to jump our best or one that will work for everyone on the team to kind of get their feet up and have fun?
I called it a training pole or a low modulus pole but people went the other way and used the trainer in competition. They are cheaper to make, I invented the ez prep poles for them and they are still for sale at PORTaPIT in limited sizes for less than $150.00 each. No one is buying them; I could not sell very many of them, as no one liked them.
They weigh about 6-8 lbs each, have no sail, bend in the middle only, and give you very little energy back. You can hold them any way to work even upside down and it would be the same pole size.

[lonestar]

RICHARD you are good at digging up those oldie but goodies
Good job GRIN

When you move the sail down to provide a lighter pole to carry, .

I'm missing something here: seems to me that if you moved the sail down the pole, you would have more glass near the bottom, making the carry weight heavier, no? Conversely, it would seem that if the sail were higher that more glass would be nearer the handgrip/point of support, making the carry-weight lighter. Explain!

[~jj~]

I fail to see how lowering the grip 6"or 12" changes the load distribution, other than lowering it on the pole (to where most poles are slightly stiffer).
This is why the manufactures need to support ASTM, and come to Tampa. If engineers, experts, and manufactures agree that it can't be done on conventional vaulting poles, then it will have to be left off the ASTM.
~jan~

[Bruce Caldwell]

OK making a sail rather than lowering the sail.
In the case were the manufacturer of Skypole COSTA MESA in the past had a pole with no sail this pattern had a body wrap of 8-9 wraps of E glass for a 16' pole not sail.
It was discovered by Herb Jenks according to what I was told by Dan Heirdorn of Skypole of Costa mesa that if you lowered and tapered half of the wraps eliminating the glass between the handgrips the overall pole was lighter. It was then that they discovered that the pole was also easier to get back on and get upside down on.
SO if we go back to this style the poles will be heavier and the pole will be more difficult to roll over.
Two necessities require for a good pole now days.

[~jj~]

Well George Moore once told me that the sail-piece was simply introduced to reinforce the middle portion of the pole against breakage.
I think most of the engineers in the industry would agree....
~jj~

[Bruce Caldwell]

YES THANKS That is a simpler way of saying it!,
And in doing so as glass became better quality and designs emerged they reduce the body wraps to provide better pole thus the "S" glass poles of 1972 BLUE SKYPOLE and the GREEN CATAPOLE
Designs became less wraps as the glass became stronger and stiffer per sq foot
ANd you get a stiffer pole with less glass when you reinforce the center.

[~jj~]

Over here in California, starting at the CIF rounds two years ago, (CIF qualify for the state meet), the officals brought out some one's bathroom scale and weighed the vaulters on some pavement next to the runway. Get this, the pavement was slanted at approximalty a 20 degree angle to horizontal! I'm sure simular things go on all over the country. I get e-mails from disgruntled coaches and parents about the enforcement of the weight rule with increasing regulariity. I can always tell when the qualifying rounds start at the individual states, because that's when the comments start. Last year during the month of May I addressed 64 such contacts. How can they weigh people on uncertified scales? How can they enforce a weight rule for which no standard exists? How do they account for the normal female weight gain during her menstral cycle? How do we account for poles that have no markings? How about cold weather, rain or headwinds?
I think the current weight rule works better when the coach simply signs the score sheet to certify the athletes approximate weight and the poles are inspected. When it is handled this way the liabiltiy rests with the coach and the athlete. It is they after-all who must make the decisions regarding pole size, grip and step adjustments, and they alone. If an accident results, and mis-representation was done then it is the coach and the athlete who must be accountable.
In addition, why have the colleges not yet adopted the weight/handhold rule? The catastrophic accident study we did three years ago indicates that the most likely group of athletes in the USA to have a catastrophic accident are college men. In fact, based upon participation numbers they are approximalty ten times more likely then any other group to have a serious accidnet. In addition, the typical pre-condition for these accidents was over-gripping on small landing pads, with unpadded hard surfaces around them.
I like the idea of multipal weight ratings based upon an ASTM standard. However, it will be a huge amount of politics amoung the manufactures to accomplish. So far Gill Sports is the only manufacture to agree to participate willingly and openly in such an endeavor.
Last season, in addition to my couple of elite HS girls, I had approximalty 10 other girls between 9' and 11' unable to jump legally on poles between 11' and 12'6 in length. The girls were all of average or slightly above average in athletic ability. The 20 poles we were using for this group represent approximalty 6 brands. Most of them had been jumping a couple years and were very proficent, yet none of them could jump legally all the time. Something is clearly not right!

The weight and grip rule was designed for coaches and athletes as a precaution against holding too high and bending the pole too much. But it does not take into account the dynamics of griping lower on the pole. It virtually makes anyone who short run vaults in practice illegal in HS! I personally find this hard to swallow, since short run vaulting is the corner stone of any technical progression.
The weight/handhold rule as it is currently written, makes the sport more expensive then it needs to be, and it actually makes the sport more dangerous under certican situations, when overly enforced with weigh-ins and hair-splitting.
In prinicipal I support the weight rule, and in fact for the most part, it has done its job.... I seldom see HS boys anymore that are over-gripping and jumping on a pole 20 pounds under their his body weights....like I saw so often in the 80's and early 90's. But the weight rule is far from perfect.
Its the practical applications that worry me.
Some people will lead you to believe that just because we increased the size of the mats that everything is now hunky dory. But we still have two huge problems to address if pole vaulting is to prosper in the school systems . One is coaching competency at the HS and college level, and the other is reliable weight classification and standardization in vaulting poles. I long for the day when I go to a HS or college meet and everyone is using a mid mark, no-one is over-gripping, and no matter what brand of pole it is, I can suggest that pole to someone with complete confidence that it is indeed the appropiate size.
Jan Johnson
National Safety Chair
ASTM Pole Vault Equipment and Facilities Task Force
www.pvscb.com
www.skyjumpers.com

[PVJunkie]

IAs I see it there is already a rule for max grip 3 inches from the top of the pole.

pg 58 of the 2003 NFHS rule book
"the competitior's weight shall be at or below the manufacturer's pole rating. The manufacturers must include on each pole: the pole rating that shall be a minimum or 3/4 inch in a contrasting color located within or above the top handhold position; a 1-inch circular band indicating the maximum top handhold position with the position being determined by the manufacturer".

While there is NO set rule that says how high you can grip on a pole, the fact that this info must be on there dictates that high schoolers cannot use ALL of the pole. So unless a manuf just "adds" 2 or 3 inches to put these labels on (thus confusing the issue even more) there is a part of the pole that only HS athletes cannot use. In addition if a pole IS made with the "extra" for the labels then that part IS unsafe to grip on for all the rest and the max grip line TRUELY is a max and should be followed. Go figure.

[Bruce Caldwell]

WHATEVER

[Bruce Caldwell]

It was late last night when I posted it and Earl Bell and I had been working on poles at the factory all day so I was tired.
[size=100]What I mean by the above comment or no comment whatever you wish to call it is this:

IN one post we have a rumor that;

[color=blue][b]A. “ Manufacturers are conspiring to market and hype you to shorter poles, as they make more profit.â€Â

[Barto]

WOW