Pole vaulter trying to raise money for Deaflympics

[rainbowgirl28]

http://www.mcall.com/sports/all-deaf-ol ... sports-hed

Trying to vault a new challenge
Pole-vaulter Seth Keck needs $4,500 to compete in the 2004 Deaflympics in Australia.

By Mandy Housenick
Of The Morning Call

Nobody can say the Kecks haven't tried.

They've sent out more than 100 letters to Lehigh Valley businesses and non-profit organizations, such as the United Way and Special Olympics of the Lehigh Valley. They've even e-mailed Oprah Winfrey.

No one has responded.

And if the Kecks don't raise $4,500 in the next three weeks, their son, Seth Keck, who's been deaf since he was 22 months old, won't be able to participate in the 2004 Deaflympics in Melbourne, Australia. He qualified this past spring as a pole-vaulter.

''It would mean a lot to me,'' the 20-year-old Seth wrote via e-mail. ''It would be a dream come true. It would be a great experience. I hope to raise enough money to go. If we can't, I would be very upset and disappointed.''

So would his parents, Barbara and David Keck. They've been encouraging Seth, a 2002 Salisbury graduate, to participate in sports since he was a kid. And he has.

He's won two gold medals in the Keystone State Games' decathlon. As a senior at Salisbury, Seth took second in the pole vault in the Colonial League and District 11 meets. Last year he was a starting forward on Northampton Community College's soccer team.

Now that he's at Gallaudet University in Washington, he's a pole-vaulter on the track and field team.

But without the help of some kind-hearted, generous Lehigh Valley businesses and residents, Seth, who has cleared 14 feet, will have to turn his back on his team from Jan. 5-16, 2005.

''I don't have $4,000 to give him,'' said Barbara Keck, who is an educational interpreter for the deaf at Parkway Manor Elementary School. ''That's not in my bank account. We would love to see him do this. He keeps e-mailing me and asking if we've gotten any money. I told him I'm doing what I can.''

Seth, who is majoring in fine arts and considering going into animation, manages to keep improving, despite not having a pole vaulting coach at Gallaudet. He counts on his father to give him instruction at meets. Plus he gets together with other pole-vaulters at an indoor training facility in the District of Columbia for extra workouts.

The Kecks were living in California when Seth was an active toddler with a 350-word vocabulary. Then he was diagnosed with spinal meningitis at 22 months; he was just two months shy of getting the meningococcal vaccine. The common 10-day hospital stay for someone with spinal meningitis turned into three weeks for Seth.

Making things even tougher on Barbara Keck â€â€

[rainbowgirl28]

LOL at this typo that accompanies his picture...

Seth Keck, 20, who is dead, is a Salisbury grad and a track and field athlete at Gallaudet University.
(SPECIAL TO TMC)

October 6, 2004

Maybe that explains why he is having trouble!

[RoySloppy]

I practiced with him at Vertical Assault a few times over the winter. really inspiring kid

[Lord of the Poles]

What??? deaflympics?? Why in the world is that there? just because we're deaf doesn't stop us from being as good as anyone else in the vault.......

I'm hard of hearing, 40% in one ear and 60% in the other...

being deaf...what does that have to do with athletics?

[mdavis2685]

well i guess it would be difficult to do some running events if you cant hear the gun go off to start the race

[Scott Go Pre]

I was at a few meets where there was a deaf and blind school. In the running events, the deaf kids would look up at the gun to see the smoke, and then take of running, or someone would tap them when the gun shot. They were pretty fast for deaf kids!

[mdavis2685]

really? thats interesting, how would the blind kids do the running events? or did they do something else? also i was at a few meets at the NY armory where a kid was blind in one eye and had poor sight in the other eye. i give him "props" for being able to pole vault like that

[Scott Go Pre]

The blind kids, I think, only run sprints that are 100 meters (straightaways). They could also do shot, discus, hammer.

[qtpie57]

theres a story in chicken soup for the teenage soul about a blind guy who won the junior olympics a while back and set a new JO record.. true story, he went like 17 feet or something...


also, every year at stanford invitational they have a 200m for blind people, they have a rope aroudn their hand and they have somebody not in the race guide them around the turn and then they just run

[rainbowgirl28]

theres a story in chicken soup for the teenage soul about a blind guy who won the junior olympics a while back and set a new JO record.. true story, he went like 17 feet or something..

It's not a true story at all

http://polevaultpower.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3474

[Lord of the Poles]

I was at a few meets where there was a deaf and blind school. In the running events, the deaf kids would look up at the gun to see the smoke, and then take of running, or someone would tap them when the gun shot. They were pretty fast for deaf kids!

Yea, at my cross country meets where it was going to rain (probably most of them), I had my hearing aids off and HAD to watch the gun. Happened at a few outdoor track meets too...

[Robert schmitt]

What??? deaflympics?? Why in the world is that there? just because we're deaf doesn't stop us from being as good as anyone else in the vault.......

I'm hard of hearing, 40% in one ear and 60% in the other...

being deaf...what does that have to do with athletics?

It may not affect a deaf persons physical potential. It may effect the quality of their instruction. I had a deaf girl try out for the pole vault and there was defiantly something lost in translation between the interpreter and me.