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‘On the Road to 2005’ - Averbukh jumps 5.85 in Kuortane
Sunday 27 June 2004

Kuortane, Finland - Serious attempts at six metres in the men’s Pole Vault are not very often seen but European champion Alexander Averbuhk of Israeli managed decent vaults at the Finnish Federation’s annual Elite Games Series of meets which made it’s second stop of the summer today.

The 29 year-old Averbukh attempts were all solid efforts over the bar at 6.00, but he was not quite ready for it. His personal best and national record stands at 5.93 (set in 2003). So in the end Averbukh had to settle for a winning 5.85m vault,  while Vadim Strogalev of Russia next best with 5.70.

“Six metres was rather close, but some small things in my technique did not work. I made a 100 % jump at 5.85 and felt very confident. I have some small pain here and there, but no injuries,â€Â

I can't wait till the olympics. I really didn't think it was going to be such a great competition.

yay! good for him he deserves it!

Now that guy is pretty darn fast!

He's also an ex-decathlete (8100 or so PR I believe). See there is hope for all you decs to turn into real athletes one day!

i saw him at the israeli championships last summer he was really fast but he was injured so he NHed but he was really nice and he had good technique

"See there is hope for all you decs to turn into real athletes one day!" I think maybe this is backwards - or is it because I am left handed Vault after 7 events - and end with a 1500m cool down

I don't want to sound grim but with all my respect to decathletes Averbukh may be considered to be one of them just partly.
Yes he scored over 8000 but he's been brought up as a pole vaulter. Actually he is the last representative of so called Siberian PV School in Irkutsk (Yuriy Volkov - silver medallist at Moscow-80 Olympics, Alexander Krupskiy - Ex European Champion, Dennis Petushinsky - over 590 vaulter from the beginning of 90-s and many more other vaulters over 570).
As a junior Averbukh jumped 540 or even 550 and was the member of the Russian team at the World Juniors in Lisbon-94. Then in the middle of 90s he just didn't have a chance to make the Russian senior team as a pole vaulter (Tarasov, Trandenkov, Bochkariov, Gataullin, Chistiakov were all jumping over 580; even Tarasov failed to qualify for Atlanta). That's the reason (and thanks to his farther - a great multievents coach) that he became a dec for a while and ranked 1-2 in Russia.
What's more important is that the dec experience has undoubtedly improved his skills (around 10,60 100 m and over 7.60 long jump) and helped him to gain the bronze medal at Seville-99 WC shortly after he recovered from a serious injury.
By the way: Tim Bright jumped 570 at Seoul-88 Olympics competing in decathlon. Was he a dec or pole vaulter???