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A question in the car on the way to the grand haven beach vault came up. The question was should beach or street vaults count as legitimate marks? We talked about set-ups that favor tailwinds, down hill slopes, and deep boxes. Should records be allowed at pole vault only meets? We know Reno is a big meet every year and seems to be set-up legit, but some beach and street vaults are obviously not. Does anyone know if colleges accept summer beach or street vault marks as official? Should school records be broke at beach or street vaults? Seven of us talked at length and had different opinions. What do you think??

IMHO beach vaults should only count for personal records or something like a "open record" and then only if the beach vault is completely within all the rules that should apply. Efforts should never count as a school / college / university record - I think they should only be set when you are representing your institution.

Dan

If you sanction your event through USATF then you have a responsibility to comply with all of the rules and specifications. As long as those are met, I think any and all records should count. Those meets might be some of the few that are actually run off correctly since pole vaulters are organizing the events.

There are several meets that we compete in during the season that have very sub-par facilities. I'm sure several athletes have the same scenario in their states. I don't think kids should be penalized just because they don't live in an area where they can compete on college tracks. These street/beach vaults give them opportunities they don't get during the regular season.

That's just my opinion.

AVC Coach wrote:If you sanction your event through USATF then you have a responsibility to comply with all of the rules and specifications. As long as those are met, I think any and all records should count. Those meets might be some of the few that are actually run off correctly since pole vaulters are organizing the events.

Agreed.

If you want to have a fun beach/street vault with a downhill runway, that's fine, just make sure to note it in the results. That A'RORN Days one in Nebraska was downhill (newspaper article mentioned it) and the Fisher Street Vault was downhill. So those marks should be counted separately, but most of the beach and street vaults I have been to have been legit.

[quote="AVC Coach"]If you sanction your event through USATF then you have a responsibility to comply with all of the rules and specifications. As long as those are met, I think any and all records should count. quote]

i agree but ive been to many that are sanctioned but obviously not legit

You'll know if it's legit. I say if the set up is cheezy just don't count it. As for the wind, heck yeah, count every advantage it gives you! Most of all, have fun! That's all that really matters!

Yeah, wind is different. Maybe though, you could say you vaulted say, 16', but that it was at whatever street vault. As long as there's some kind of clarification.

This is an interesting question. Personally, I agree with most of you that it should count if all of the specs are followed (ie. no downhill runways, etc.).

However, I wonder if Athletics Canada would have accepted Ryan Vu's 17' jump (had he made it) from the Tacoma beach vault. AC tends to be quite fussy over things like that. I didn't mention anything about it at the time, because I didn't want to detract from Ryan's outstanding performance. Still, it would be a good idea to check into it beforehand to avoid disappointment later.

Powervaulter wrote:This is an interesting question. Personally, I agree with most of you that it should count if all of the specs are followed (ie. no downhill runways, etc.).

However, I wonder if Athletics Canada would have accepted Ryan Vu's 17' jump (had he made it) from the Tacoma beach vault. AC tends to be quite fussy over things like that. I didn't mention anything about it at the time, because I didn't want to detract from Ryan's outstanding performance. Still, it would be a good idea to check into it beforehand to avoid disappointment later.

At Tacoma we had two of the best USATF officials in the country who diligently measured the bar and could have signed off on any paperwork.

I don't know if Athletics Canada has requirements such as a minimum number of events at a meet for it to count, or no board runways outdoors. Those are things that might have caused it to be rejected.

I have put the question to Athletics Canada, and will post the response when I get it.

rainbowgirl28 wrote:At Tacoma we had two of the best USATF officials in the country who diligently measured the bar and could have signed off on any paperwork.

As great as that is, it isn't sufficient to be acceptable for a USATF masters, or WMA record.

- master

master wrote:

rainbowgirl28 wrote:At Tacoma we had two of the best USATF officials in the country who diligently measured the bar and could have signed off on any paperwork.

As great as that is, it isn't sufficient to be acceptable for a USATF masters, or WMA record.

- master

What requirements were we lacking? The three officials?