Looking at the bar

[ADTF Academy]

As Alitus and Barto has commented obviously parts and technical defects later in the vault tend to occur because of a technical fault early in the vault. However, I do feel at times errors can occur because of things done at that instant. If you allow the vault to flow than it is continuos, but at any moment you can go against that flow and make things worst. Maybe even Altius won't agree with this but things are not always based on what occured before. Sometimes a vaulter tries to put that extra little mechanical motion in and thus mess things up. I have seen young vaulters get very close to covering the pole and then pull incorrectly and get away from the pole. This occured at that moment not earlier in the vault.

I do agree with Altius on his take of Brits taking off under constantly and Markov dropping of the leg would decrease the angular momentum they can generate to allow them to cover the pole in time. Is this coupled with the fact that they excessively pulled which caused them to get even further away from the pole. I know I will hear your suppose to pull. While other vaulters who can't cover the pole in time can stil stay in line with the pole on top. Is it the way they are pulling or focusing more on staying in line with the pole cord.

On the topic at hand, I am looking at it in the mindset of a 16 year old kid that watches those videos and hears the comments pull as hard as you can on top and watch the crossbar.

If you look only at those two statements and watch Brits and Markov's tops you will see those two things even if they are not the main reason they occur. It will appear they are staring at the crossbar and that they are pulling so hard they get away from the pole cord. On the other hand there is a lot of things they do very nicely that you could show a young vaulter as Altius said with Markovs approach.

This is the issue I have. Not with the comments but with the interpretation of a statment like that for a 16 year old kid. Yes was horrible a bad term to use, probably. I guess I lose some cool points there, but still there tops are not good with respect to so many other things they do. It is in fact a bad example of a technically sound top end. The reason because of things they do earlier in the vault (this I assume because I have never been able to talk to them).

The question still stands Barto do you think Tarsaov covered the pole (completed inversion) or not?

By the way I love hearing and want to hear what others think or I would not have posted. I am in no one personally attacking you. I am just very curious with what your saying because it challenges me. I just need to understand what you mean. I never once or thought the top was distinct from the rest of the vault give me some credit thats obvious. But then again what do you call the statment look at the bar during your entire swing to clearance. To me this cue just doesn't seem to conceptutally give a young vaulter an advantage. The reason I am curious is because each vaulter resposes to a cue differently and if I can figure out why you say it and to whom you say it I might use it. Do you teach this to all your vaulters or certain ones?


Now onto Markov and me climbing out of a hole. How many vaulters in our community all over the world do you know that can run over 9.7 m/s with a pole in their hand and be able to hang onto a pole at around 17 feet and safely get into the pit. Last time I checked not many. Should I as a coach tell a young athlete that just because he jumped the 3rd highest jump in history that he should mimic his jumping when overall Markov shows tecnical errors. You might I won't. I show images of Markov's approach and takeoff. To show them all of his vault and go thats a good jump is a lie. Overall if you look only at height and throw out the technical model you us then heck yeah it is a great jump. With a technical model (Petrov/Bubka) in mind this is not a completely technically sound model during the second phase of his jump.


Barto I am sorry if I affended you. Never my intention I was trying to figure out why and to whom a statement like that could be effective to use. My issue is not with an athlete clearing a bar but them over staring at the crossbar. Personally I go the opposite way and tell them it should disappear. Does anyone have a ladder I need to get out of this hole.

[rainbowgirl28]

I split this into its own thread...

[Tim McMichael]

I am going to chime in here with personal experience rather than objective theory – as usual. One of my goals was to clear each bar by about three inches. My reasoning was that a wider top end at the lower bars would give me more consistency. As the bar got higher I moved my standards closer and went more vertically up the pole. I will admit that this is not necessarily a good idea for anyone else to try. But for some reason, I have always found success on the contrary side of things. I certainly would not teach it except under very special circumstances to a unique kind of vaulter.

To do this, I had to be able to see the crossbar for just an instant at the end of my swing. I kept my chin tucked to my chest for the entire vault, and this allowed me to see it for that brief instant. After that I felt where it was with that weird spatial awareness that does not rely on vision. After about ten thousand jumps you can see the bar in your mind like it is lit up by a spotlight when your eyes can’t see it at all. Things also slow down from a subjective perspective. There are times when it feels like time stops over the bar, and I have all day to do whatever I need to to get around it. I used to be very, very good at holding it on with my hands. (I wish they hadn’t changed that rule).

ADTF Academy and I have already had an interesting controversy about whether or not pulling at the top of the jump can be done without separating from it and losing power. I posted a video under the “My Jumpâ€Â

[smokinvaulter1]

Tim every time you tell what you do when you jump it is like you read my mind. Everything I even think I jump just about like you. Of course I am only 5'10" 137 on 4.90 and 5m sticks also. My best jump standards were on 65 and opening bar they were on 80 and i moved them up 5cm per bar till 5.60.

[JumpinSkiing]

Edit: Nevermind, Becca split it.

[ADTF Academy]

I will, however, also assert that seeing the crossbar and aiming for it can be a method of simply taking vertical energy and redirecting it horizontally. Not a good idea at a high bar, but it can mean a very safe and conservative clearance at a lower height.

Tim I can recognize this and understand what you were trying to do. I have in fact seen numerous 17+ foot vaulters use that for lower bars. On the other hand the initial question was when jumping at bars over 18 feet. I guess it comes to the notion of is this a high or low bar. I doubt you can have very much horizontal energy on top to clear a bar that is much higher than your grip.

[altius]

You need to watch a lot of jumps to decide whether or not an athlete has a technical problem - and even more to establish what that problem is. I have seen film of Markov in Paris when I believe he was jumping with the stands at 80 - inevitably it looks as though he is dropping off the pole early as he goes for the bar. On the other hand his 6.05 clearance in Edmonton was far better in every respect. I would certainly have no problem suggesting to any athlete that they try to model themselves on THAT jump - that is if they did not know who Bubka was - and that is not unusual these days!!

Of course athletes can make mistakes late in the vault even if everything prior has been ok - however I do not believe that this is the case with Markov - his problem begins much earlier.

Re looking at the bar -the truncated image of Bubka on the front cover of BTB shows him with the neck slightly flexed so that he can just see his toes - which is the cue we have used; while he may be able to see the bar through peripheral vision it does not look like it is a focus for him at that point in the inversion.

I would also point out that girls running under 7 m/sec and gripping at 3.70 can and have looked very much like even Bubka in some phases of the jump. See BTB p 43 and 50. You dont need to run at 9.7m/sec or grip at 17' to do so.

[baggettpv]

I agree with Altius about the one time shot for model making. The model we aspire to doesn't exist. People have gotten very close to it, and maybe have performed major functions similar to it. But....never perfectly. We can, hopefully always find a place for improvement.

Rick Baggett
WSTC LLC

[Tim McMichael]

I doubt you can have very much horizontal energy on top to clear a bar that is much higher than your grip.

I think you are absolutely right. There can be very little horizontal velocity at the top of a very high jump. This is one of the reasons I think pole movement is crucial. It is essential that the pole finish at a slight angle toward the crossbar. If it finishes exactly vertical the vaulter has to separate from it to get past the crossbar. What goes straight up must come straight down, so with an exactly vertical pole finish the vaulter’s center of gravity must fall out toward the bar to achieve the horizontal movement necessary to get past it. This can only be accomplished by using the arms to separate from the pole. Not good. With the pole angled toward the crossbar, however, the vaulter can stay tight to the pole and still achieve enough horizontal distance to make a clearance.

I also believe that you get a little more pushoff if you are resisting gravity at a slight angle instead of directly against it. I don’t know if there is any physics to prove this; it’s just something I feel at the top of the jump.

In my experience, the perfect angle toward the bar necessitates a standard placement between 60 and 65 cm. There is just enough room to clear the crossbar on the front, top, and back. With these criteria a successful attempt can be made with the body actually touching the crossbar for most of the clearance time.

I also think that when a clearance is this close, the only way to make it is to stay as close to the bar as possible for as long as possible. Anything that you try to get further away means that something else has to get closer. A lot of close bars are missed because an athlete yanks their chest away, and this pushes their hips into the bar. The best plan is to relax and turn your thumbs in and hope for the best.

To get back to the subject of this thread: With the standards at 60cm, I can still get a brief glimpse of the bar at the finish of my swing.

[Tim McMichael]

Smokinvauter:

It's nice to hear that someone else has the same experience. Back when I was making 18' consistently, I would also start at 80cm and finish at 62cm.

[bjvando]

Something I will always remember from big bubba sparks

"do hit a baseball what do you have to do- keep your eye on it,
to hit a golfball what to you have to do, keep your eye on it,
to hit a CROSSBAR what do you have to do __________. "

just something I remember from bubba....

[Tim McMichael]

To jump as high as you possibly can, you HAVE to hit the crossbar. A normal bar should stay up if it is only bent down a couple of inches. The question is how and where you hit it. I find that it helps to know exactly where it is at.

With enough experience, it only takes a brief glimpse to know where it is, but if I did not get that glimpse there is no way I could pull the trigger on any vault. There is too much information about velocity and penetration that I cannot have without it. I think there is a safety issue here. If an inexperienced athlete cannot see the bar at any point during their jump, how are they to know if they have enough penetration to make it safely into the pit? One of the cool things about 80cm being the maximum standard depth is that if you can get any part of your body over the bar at that distance, you will land behind the box.

I don’t tell my vaulters not to look at the bar, I tell them not to “keyâ€Â