Pole Vault Clinic, Part 2 Video Problem-Solving and the Search for the Magic Cue (An interactive, coach-participation session using video examples) Dave and Judy Raub Prospect Girls Track and Field The pole vault (in our humble opinion) is the most technically-difficult event in track and field. Our coaching challenges, in curing problems, are: 1. Know how to cure it; 2. Explain it to the vaulter, keeping it short and simple. (The cue. ) We all know our vaulters can t be thinking about more than one main thing (and maybe one minor thing) as they come down the runway. We also know they usually have many simultaneous problems, especially beginners. So we try to pick the problem that matters most, and give the athlete just a few words to keep in mind, which will magically cure the problem. (We wish.) And it s all the more fun and challenging because a cue which works like magic for one vaulter may completely flop for another. In this session we ll show quite a few video examples of (mostly) high-school vaulters in action. Please join the discussion, after each film clip, of what the main problem is, how that problem should be fixed, and what cue you might use to help the athlete fix it. (We ll give our own version of those answers, but we think all the coaches here would benefit from hearing diverse suggestions.) Low Plant Of course every coach could write a book about this problem! Achieving a good, high plant at high speed is almost the definition of pole vaulting. But for most athletes it s a very hard thing to do well. One of the worst things that can happen to a good vaulter, in our opinion, is to have early success despite having a low plant (because she is fast and strong.) We have seen first-hand how difficult it is for such a vaulter to undo the bad muscle memory built in by years of vaulting with a low plant. Executing a high plant is a coordination problem: arms are doing something entirely different than merely counterbalancing the running legs, which is instinctive. Each beginner seems to land somewhere on an innate plant coordination spectrum, ranging from very little to not bad. (We joke that our current top vaulter was born with a perfect plant, but we ve never seen any other beginner like her.)
Raub s cure: shorter runs and lighter poles in practice. For beginners, don t let them move back (2 steps to 4, 6, 8 steps, etc.) until their plant is almost always high. If it s low at 4 steps, it will be worse at 8 steps. For advanced, bring them into whatever run allows them to plant high; practice; then move back 2 steps at a time. Raubs cure: walk plants and pole runs. (Breaking our no drills rule!) Other coaches cures (notes below:) Count your steps. Go! (meaning hands up) on 6 in 8-step run, for example. Be tall! (Everything: hips, knees, chest and hands.) Create space! (Space from chest-and-shoulders to hands-and-pole.) Taking Off Under 1. Under because she s running well, has a tailwind, downhill runway, etc: Easy. Move start mark back. 2. Under because she wants to be under: Not so easy. In this case of course the vaulter will stretch out her last one, two, three or more steps to get under where she wants to be slowing herself down and lowering her center of gravity at plant, all bad. Raubs cure: short runs, again.
Other coaches cures (notes below:) Put your feet down, last two steps! (Meaning quick short steps.) Accelerating step tempo through the plant! Keep your hips up! Come up off the ground at take-off. The Helicopter Raubs Cure: must be balanced at take-off. No upper-body lean right or left. Vaulter s center-of-gravity must aim directly at the pole s center-of-gravity. That is, there must be as much force (mass times momentum) aimed past the left side of the pole as the right side (right-handed vaulters.) When a vaulter leans left at the plant, or has his top hand too far left of his right shoulder, he will spin around the pole just like a kid on a playground who might run past a pole and stick out a hand to swing around it. Other coaches cures (space for notes below):
Top hand over that shoulder, at the plant not over your head. Beginners, don t try to jump past the pole push it ahead of you. Stay straight and tall through the plant. No leaning right or left. Landing Off-Center Raub s cure: Aim center, not right or left. (A vaulter can t change direction in mid-air, so if she lands left, she aimed left at take-off. Sometimes you can see in slow-mo that her take-off foot was pointed off-center. Or sometimes you can see that her leading knee was pointed off-center.) Other coaches cures (notes below): Aim everything straight down the middle, or rather, straight ahead: toes, knees, chest, hands. (If that doesn t work) Over-compensate: aim right, if landing left. Don t think too early about turning over. At plant, think only about driving chest and shoulders straight in and up: into the pocket.
Running Through (also known as The Dreaded Running Through! This is a tough problem. One of the best college coaches in the country told us recently that he feels like there s practically been a growing epidemic of running through among high school vaulters, over the last several years. We ve even seen a startling amount of it among DI college vaulters! Not easy to fix, in our opinion. Raubs cure: shorten the run start mark and/or steps and lighten the pole in practice. If a vaulter feels he ll be out even with his good run, he ll be more likely to cancel and run through. Raubs cure: jog in with the pole, forget counting steps, accelerate when you feel like it and jump over a very low bar (all in practice.) This is all about rebuilding confidence, gradually. Raubs cure: we think that much of the time when a vaulter runs through, he knew he was going to run through before he even began to run. Instead of feeling aggressive and confident, he s anxious or fearful about something. After awhile, he might be anxious or fearful about... being anxious or fearful. So we must help the vaulter put only one dominant thing in his mind: a kind of happy aggressiveness about what he s about to do. Raubs cure: speed mark 2 or 4 steps from start mark. Real purpose is to help the vaulter fix his mind on the run, not on other concerns. Other coaches cures (notes below:) Stop thinking ahead! Think only about each step of your run, as you take them. Ignore the wind! If it blows you right off the runway, you may cancel your vault otherwise, finish it!
Inconsistent Run Raubs cure: mostly just practice, of course. But many beginners need to think, standing there at the top of the runway, about how they re going to run: counting steps, quickening tempo, shoving into the ground steps 1 to 4, coming up tall and popping off the ground steps 5 to 8, etc. So their main idea, many trips, is just that: think about how to run, and nothing else. Other coaches cures (notes below): Shove into the ground, then pop off the ground. Don t scramble out of the back! Put force into the ground. 90% power, 10% relaxation. Landing Short Many coaches here today will be thinking, Why, that s the simplest thing in the world to fix! And in a way, we agree. Yet it s remarkable how many vaulters we all see in competition who land short over and over again. Raubs cure: Grip lower or smaller pole, or fix an under or out run (the obvious cures.)
Raubs cure when that doesn t work: focus vaulter s mind on driving up and into the pocket at plant, no lean-back with head or upper body. Raubs cure: standards always deep in practice; and tending toward deep in meets. Other coaches cures (notes below): Eyes down at the plant! Chest and shoulders into the pocket! Don t rush the swing. Hit the pocket, then swing.