Looking at the bar

[JumpinSkiing]

Ok, so ive tried hard to see things from others perspectives, and i think i have come to agree with a lot of what you have said. Despite personal attacks and attempted intimidation in private messages by a 30 year old man, i will have to rethink my approach to giving advice on this site, as maybe all high schoolers should. Obviously, around the country, high schoolers will give advice to others at meets and practices, and any advice can be good advice in that setting, but this is a site where people should come to make sure they are getting to hear exactly what they should hear. Thats why i will try to avoid giving any advice on vaulting, no matter how simple the matter. I just hope everyone realizes that my advice-giving was not meant to assert myself as an advanced vaulter.... but simply to help others as i do at track meets. But this isnt a track meet, and i thank you for helping open my mind in this issue. See you in the threads!

I've had people tell me that looking at the bar after you swing is the worst thing you can do, both by my own coach, and by other athletes. And, my coach loves to yell "PULL!" Both are pretty much wrong.

[BethelPV]

"I've had people tell me that looking at the bar after you swing is the worst thing you can do, both by my own coach, and by other athletes. And, my coach loves to yell "PULL!" Both are pretty much wrong."

Looking at the bar after you swing is a bad thing to do, because if you focus on the bar, you are going to move towards the bar. Its the simple fact of aiming your body. If you set your sight on something, your body is going to react and move toward that something, in this case being the bar! So actually your coach yelling "pull" is wrong, but looking at the bar after you swing being bad, that is correct...

Zachmo

20 Years old
16'4" high school PR
5.10m College PR
I am a junior this year!

[Barto]

Looking at the bar after you swing is a bad thing to do, because if you focus on the bar, you are going to move towards the bar. Its the simple fact of aiming your body. If you set your sight on something, your body is going to react and move toward that something, in this case being the bar! So actually your coach yelling "pull" is wrong, but looking at the bar after you swing being bad, that is correct...

If you plan on ever jumping high, you will learn to look at the bar. It is impossible to clear a bar 3 feet above your top hand without seeing where it is.

Novice vaulters have a difficult time with this because they tend to stare at and focus on the bar - causing them to travel straight at it instead of up and over it.

The most effective way to fix this is to practice watching the bar AND your feet as you finish the jump. You may have a difficult time with this at first, but it is pretty crucial to develop this ability.

Barto

[BethelPV]

Hmm... Ill have to think about that a little bit Barto... need to sleep on it

Zachmo

[ADTF Academy]

The most effective way to fix this is to practice watching the bar AND your feet as you finish the jump. You may have a difficult time with this at first, but it is pretty crucial to develop this ability.

Barto

To me the most important comment was as you finish your vault. There is a major difference in timing between finishing the movement to inversion while you initiate the turn and finishing your turn completely as you prepare for the flyaway. At this time when you finishing your jump finding the bar could be a very good cue to use.


A lot of novice vaulters will have a chin up position as if they are looking back down the runway and trying to catch something in the mouth. This will cause them to flatten out. Finding the crossbar when your finishing your turn and start your flyaway could be a good cue so that it will allow you to remain in a hollowed out position as you move around the bar easier instead of simply flat lining into it.

I think the major difference is some athletes take find the crossbar as while your extending to inversion. I don't think this is what Barto means, but I could be wrong.

[BethelPV]

Barto...

After taking a nap and discussing this situation with a few other people, along with my coach, I understand where you are coming from about this, because you do need to be aware of where you are at in conjunction with the crossbar in your jump. My question for you is if you are jumping correctly, and get completely inverted, how can you see the crossbar? If you spiral around the pole, lower your shoulders, and drive your hips into your pole, you should not be able to see the crossbar, and if you can you aren't doing something correctly. After watching some of the videos on Stabhoch I have not seen any of the vaulters looking at the crossbar as the do their jump until they are belly down, rotating around it at the peak of their jump. However, if there is something I am missing I would love to hear about it, because as a vaulter and student of the sport, im always looking for new things to discuss!

Zachmo

[vault3rb0y]

I've done the same thing, and come to this conclusion, but just as Bethel i am open to new thoughts. I am one of those who was in a terrible habit of looking at the bar. I believe that great vaulters make their swing, and might take that one last glance at the bar before their feet come over their eyes and they complete the inversion. I was taught that as you pull, you dont worry about where the bar will exactly be, you just keep pulling and dont even think about turning, until you have moved that pole as far as you can! At that point, the turn will have come automatically. You can then bend your neck and see the bar, but try not to bend your back UNTIL you are peaking over the bar. So there will be a period when you will lose sight of the bar, but you should still be picturing where it is in your mind. At the same time, you should be more concerned with pulling as hard as you can while staying inverted, rather than keeping sight of the bar. You can look at the bar all you want, but if you arent staying inverted and pulling hard, but rather obsessing about where you are, you wont clear it anyway.

[Barto]

My question for you is if you are jumping correctly, and get completely inverted, how can you see the crossbar?

First of all, if you are jumping correctly you will never completely "invert".

Secondly, I don't know what videos you are watching, but most of your great technicians (Tarasov, Markov, Brits for examples) all look straight at the bar after they swing up and cover the pole. Most of these guys' coaches even que them, "Squeeze your gluts while you watch your feet go over the bar." This is how you finish vaults well.
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[ADTF Academy]

Secondly, I don't know what videos you are watching, but most of your great technicians (Tarasov, Markov, Brits for examples) all look straight at the bar after they swing up and cover the pole. Most of these guys' coaches even que them, "Squeeze your gluts while you watch your feet go over the bar." This is how you finish vaults well.
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First off if Brits and Markov are your idea of a good example to show young vaulters of a top then you teach a much different vault then I. In my mind and idealogy there tops are horrible. They get so far away from the pole cord. I would never show these vaulters top to any young vaulter to attempt to follow. In there case your right though. They are obviously doing something if it is as you put looking at the crossbar than so be it. Personally I think they are over pulling and got away from the pole.

You brought up Tarasov. At least the vidoe I have seen looks nothing like the other two on top. I will agree there is a point in time do to the nature of the event if you looked hard enough you could see the crossbar during your swing through your feet. I will agree. However, to have a vaulter focus on this I guess I am not at that conclusion yet. Personally I feel there are more vital things to think about if you can even think when your moving that quickly.

watching Tarasov's 5.80 vault at the 2000 olympics you can't tell me he looks like Brits and Markov on top. Tarasov get what I picture as inverted on this vault. to me inverted is not straight up and down in the traditional sense, but in the sense that your completely in line with the pole cord as you rotate around it and allow the pole to finish its rotation into the pits. This he does on this jump to perfection in my opinion. to say he is constantly looking at the crossbar and gets away from the pole and does not reach inversion leaves me to feel that as a whole we are no where near using similar langauage when coaching the vault.

I would love to see what you mean by a vaulter being inverted. Do you feel it means backwards past vertical. Would you say Isenbayeva gets inverted or no?

[altius]

Here we go again! I had vowed not to get involved in debates on technique for the same reasons that some of the earlier respondents to this topic have indicated. I also feel that there is little point in joining any discussion when my nearly fifty years of experience in the vault - detailed in the coaches forum a week or so ago - counts for nothing when a teenage expert can choose to dump on my ideas.

However I must respond to the comment about Markov if only to suggest that the problems he often - not always - has in the third phase of the vault, are due to his tendency to drop the right leg after take off. Even a momentary lowering of this leg has two adverse effects; both mean that he does not always 'cover the pole' soon enough and so he misses the chance to move into the vertical position on the pole usually demonstrated by Bubka - and shown in truncated version on the front cover of BTB. What you are seeing at the top is the effect of problems earlier on - which is usually the case in most field events. There is little point worrying about where the eyes should focus when a vaulter can never get into a position where this really matters.

I have discussed this problem with him again in the past couple of weeks - I first raised it with him over two years ago - and he assures me that he is going to deal with it. We will see - in my view IF he can sort it out and continue to run and take off as he did in his 6.05 jump in Edmonton he can jump 6.10 plus - but we will see.

I would suggest that Brits' problems stem from a take off which is usualy well under - this combined with a fairly passive second phase means that he is forced to shorten the axis of rotation by tucking - so he positions himself under the pole and in a poor position to do anything but come off the pole early and shoot at the bar - similar to about 90% of vaulters around the world!

Agree with Master - until some kind of agreement is reached over what key terms really mean there is always going to be confusion and misunderstanding.

[Barto]

Altius is correct in describing how the differences between Markov's and Britts' takeoffs result in their comming off the pole at slightly different angles and timing; however, that doesn't change the fact that what they are trying to accomplish after covering the pole is very similar. Tarasov usually achieved a better position off the top because his takeoff and swing was a little "cleaner" than the other two, but again this does not change that what he was trying to do after covering the pole was also similar to the other two.

ADTF Academy wrote: "First off if Brits and Markov are your idea of a good example to show young vaulters of a top then you teach a much different vault then I. In my mind and idealogy there tops are horrible."

Well, here it goes and I appologize ahead of time for my rudeness. I am afraid the readers of this post are about to witness 15+ years of frustration with trying to explain the vault to people who simply don't want to hear it.

Yes, I am fairly certain that I must teach a very very different vault than you. If you believe the top of the jump is in any way at all distinct from the rest of the jump THEN YOU ARE WRONG. THE TOP OF THE VAULT IS RESULTANT FROM WHAT TOOK PLACE BEFORE IT. PERIOD. END OF DISCUSSION. To attempt to describe to young vaulters what the top of the jump should look like without the context of the entire jump is poor coaching and shows a very limited understanding of the biomechanics of vaulting. If you hold the opinion that Markov (the 2nd highest vaulter in history) is a poor technician, so be it. But please understand that if you are going to describe something as technically "horrible" with regard to any of the top 10 male vaulters in history, you are digging a very deep hole to climb out of.

Barto

[altius]

Understand the frustration Barto - been there done that! However I dont think ADTF academy was saying Dima was not technically good in general -(or at least I hope not because in my view he is has the best run and take off of all modern vaulters) - but that he feels the top end is "horrible". I would prefer to say that it is certainly not as good in relative terms as his run and take off - for the reasons I gave. However we agree completely on the need to understand WHY such problems occur rather than always trying to deal with the symptoms - which are fairly easy for anyone to see.

Unfortunately until folk accept the notion of a superior 'technical model' - in fact the Petrov/Bubka technical model - misunderstanding will continue to fester.