Choosing the right poles for a college

[VaultPurple]

Right now I am coaching at a college that I thought had an unlimited supply of poles. That was until one of our guys decided he wanted to start doing stuff right...

The vaulter I am referring to is almost 6'4 and is about 175 lb. Recently he has worked back to 8 lefts, where he went from on average using a 15' 180 to a 16' 185 gripping about 15'6.

And the twist to this is.. Because we were building a new track this year we have been forced to practice at a high school where the runway is very slow and always into a massive headwind. In practice he can never run more than 6 or 7 lefts and his biggest pole he can us is about the 15' 185 due to such bad conditions. But at meets he moves back to 8 and blows through every pole until the 16' 185. And next year we will have a very nice pole vault set up with a double sided pit so we will always have good conditions as far as wind and a much faster track to practice on, so I think he will start moving through poles even faster.

But back to pole selection... Right now we have every pole up to a 4.90 195 (All UCS). I think that will be plenty big for him this year, but he has three more years left. I want to order a new series of poles but I want to order enough so we do not have to ever order any more (without going overkill and ordering every pole UCS makes).

I really do not know how the poles transfer from the 4.90 poles to the 5.00 poles. Normally with the smaller poles, since we have the 16' 195, I would say the next pole is a 190 that is 6 inches longer (so ideally a 16'6 190).

But UCS goes to 5.00 poles so would it be the same to get:

5.00 190
5.00 195
5.00 200
5.00 205
5.00 210

Also, I have noticed as he starts to use the longer poles, they seem to be softer and he needs stiffer poles, so I did not know if I should go all the way up to the 210 with the 5.00 poles or go

5.00 190
5.00 195
5.20 185
5.20 190
5.20 195

It just kind of throws me off how the weights change on the larger poles, and that UCS stops going up by 15cm and switches to 10cm.


Any advice on this would be great. What would some of you as college coaches choose?

Thanks!

[wurster490]

Hi, I have experience on these poles so I will tell you that if you go with flexes and not lbs it will be better. I have a line of 16foot poles that goes right into my 16'5 poles. So if I were you, I would start with what you have and then work your way down (in flexes). So for example I have a 16ft 17.6 flex, 17.0 flex, 16.5 flex, then a 16'5 16.0, 15.5, 15.0, 14.5...etc. It will make smoother transitions from pole to pole. So there will be 2 poles that are 190lb's, but one will be a soft 190 and one a stiff. If you go from a soft 185 to a stiff 190 it could be tough. I would say going 0.5-0.6 would be good.

Hope that helps.

Jason

[VaultPurple]

Hi, I have experience on these poles so I will tell you that if you go with flexes and not lbs it will be better. I have a line of 16foot poles that goes right into my 16'5 poles. So if I were you, I would start with what you have and then work your way down (in flexes). So for example I have a 16ft 17.6 flex, 17.0 flex, 16.5 flex, then a 16'5 16.0, 15.5, 15.0, 14.5...etc. It will make smoother transitions from pole to pole. So there will be 2 poles that are 190lb's, but one will be a soft 190 and one a stiff. If you go from a soft 185 to a stiff 190 it could be tough. I would say going 0.5-0.6 would be good.

Hope that helps.

Jason

Thanks for advice. I am not too sure how many I will be able to order, If it is unlimited I would love to do that. But if not, would it still be best to just look at the flex of the 195 (15.8) and go down by 1cm each time? So I would go 16' 15.8 to 16'5 14.8, 13.8, 12.8?

It just seems strange to me to keep going down flex since that would be like going from 16' 195 to 16'5 200? I am just used to dropping down a little in weight when going up in length.

Also, how do you order by flex? Will the factory do that for you?

[kev44000]

Call Lane or Steve at UCS, they will set you up. They are the experts on pole sizes. But yes at 5 meter and up go by flex numbers only. Jack's are 16.0 15.5 15.0 14.7 14.3 13.9 13.5 13.1 12.8 12.5 12.2 then to 5.10 meter poles. He jumped 5.60 on the 12.8

You cannot gap a flex that much with a 5 meter pole 15.5 to a 14.5 etc.

[AVC Coach]

You really need to start ordering your poles by flex numbers only. Especially if you're buying poles that big and expensive.

[Bubba PV]

You stole my thunder AVC. I can't think of the last time I ordered anything but a flex number - 20 years ago maybe?

[ashcraftpv]

A big +1 on buying by flex number. I'd keep your gaps no bigger than 0.5/0.6 if you can.

[wurster490]

VaultPurple wrote:
It just seems strange to me to keep going down flex since that would be like going from 16' 195 to 16'5 200? I am just used to dropping down a little in weight when going up in length.

The reason the flex number decreases is because it is a measurement of how much the pole sags when it is hung from each end with a weight in the middle. The stiffer the pole the less it hangs. 16' poles and 16'5 poles are measured the same when they are flexed, so their flex numbers are consistent.

[rainbowgirl28]

I wouldn't order anything longer than 5.00m poles. Few college vaulters need anything longer than that, and if you get one that does, you're best off ordering poles specifically for him.

[VaultPurple]

I think we are just going to order a 5.00m 16.0 15.5 15.0 14.5 14.0

I am almost certain this vaulter will eventually need 5.10 poles but this will probably hold us over for the next two years. And we have a younger guy that will eventually be on that length of pole when he works out some technique problems.

[AVC Coach]

I am almost certain this vaulter will eventually need 5.10 poles but this will probably hold us over for the next two years. And we have a younger guy that will eventually be on that length of pole when he works out some technique problems.

Those are big poles. How high is this guy jumping right now?

[VaultPurple]

I am almost certain this vaulter will eventually need 5.10 poles but this will probably hold us over for the next two years. And we have a younger guy that will eventually be on that length of pole when he works out some technique problems.

Those are big poles. How high is this guy jumping right now?

I know it sounds like a stretch and I almost do not believe it myself, even looks less believable with his PR.

He has currently jumped 16' for the first time three weeks ago. Before this year he had a lot of problems with his run, plant, and swing. In high school he could jump 15'6 with a 16' grip but I did not want him to have that high of grip to start with because all he did was sit over the bar. When he cleared 16' he ran 7 lefts with a about a 15'1 grip on a 15'7 180 and the standards were on 80 with him blowing through the pole. At our last meet it was his first time at 8 lefts and he came into the meet at 15' with the 16' 180 (gripping 15'6) and blew through but still cleared the bar because standards were almost all the way back. Then at 15'7 he moved to the 16' 185 with the same 15'6 grip but we couldn't find the right standard placement and since it was his first time on the pole he didn't have much confidence with his swing but still managed to sit over 15'7 three times with about a foot of clearance.

All of this progression is while training at a crappy high school track with a very slow runway, running into a head wind every day. He never uses bigger than a 15' 180 in practice but at meets on nice tracks he blows through everything until he is on stiffer 16' poles. The rest of the week he just works on his swing and plant from shorter runs so we do not have to deal with all the run throughs from the head wind.

The reason I think he will continue to move up such big poles and start jumping really high next year is because our new track is almost complete and it will have a double sided pit on a new fast runway that runs with the main wind. So he will actually be able to practice on the same poles he competes on.