What state is the best?

[xtremevaulter]

I want to know what state they think puts out the best pole vaulters. That means at any level High School, College, Elite, even masters. My vote is for Washington State...mainly cause i come from washington and i know quite a few good vaulters from my general area

[OAKPV2004]

Texas....In all of pole vaulting history. Texas.

Billy Olson
Jacob Davis
Brad Pursley
Dale Jenkins
Eric Eshbach

....there is a short list of 18' and 19' jumpers from this enormous chunk of land. Im sure I missed a few names also.

[vaultguru6]

Typically the answer to that question of what state puts out the best pole vaulters would be texas, but don't forget to take into consideration their oh so adored tail winds. Texas is notorius for tail winds...20+ mph winds ALWAYS consistently blowing in the same direction are common if not the norm. And in those conditions who can't jump 18-19 feet? However, take the Texans out of the good ol Lone Star State away from their tail winds and they've got nothing on anyone else. I personally take off about 6-8 inces any mark coming out of texas.

[vaultin chris]

not to mention they have alot more warm daysthan us here in the north

[OAKPV2004]

Untrue. I PRed last summer out of this state, in tennesee. We have variable winds too, Many times bad cross winds. Not to mention Rain at the worst times, and humidity...

[vaultin chris]

oh that sounds real bad...
how about this...my first outdoor meet last year at Ohio Univ. was about 38 degrees and out of the 8 meets i had only 4 were 70 degrees or better and two of them were 40 or below.

[zack]

If you're talking High School it was talked about earlier here http://www.polevaultpower.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=79&start=0

[vaultin chris]

i wish i was talkin about high school...that was my first college outdoor meet -- 38 degrees.

[Carolina21]

Texas all the way. Am I biased? of course, all texans are, but the numbers and heights don't lie. HS national record 18-2(eshbach), NCAA championships meet National record 19-2(Jacob Davis) Just one HS in Texas has had 5 (maybe more I can only think of 5 at the moment) 17 foot+ vaulters. Most states can't even claim that many total. And this was from a small 3a high school in a small town, not one of Texas' huge cities.

[ashcraftpv]

1. Texas
2. California
3. Indiana

Honorable Mention:
Oklahoma
Washington
Oregon

Texas is a lock at #1 no doubt about that. Hostorically Cali has always had stud HS kids, but has fallen off as of late. Indiana is #3 because that's where i went to HS and they always produce quality kids every year. There is consistently a kid or two over 16' every single year. Not too many 17' footers (3 all-time), but the list of 16'+ kids is astounding(i'm in there some where )

[wacky274]

I know most people don't expect much from Arizona, but if you look at the level of our athletes in all rangers, not just HS, you can see that we definetely have a good vault state (though not the best). As i have mentioned in other posts, we have people who train here such as Nick Hysong, Mel Mueller (in the past), april steiner, brandon bennet, mike mortenson, kevin opalka, amy linnen, etc. Though we've only had one over 17' in HS, we have a long list of 16 plus vaulters, and are typically really consistant at getting at least one or so over every year. But i am biased coming from Arizona of course, but dont count us out just yet. This year you may see some surprising things happening here in the vault. 2 girls jumping 13's at least by the end of the season, and two guys prob around 16'6". I know we need to prove our self as a "vault state" but we'll see what happens.

[jomrus]

Ohio is coming right along. Just recently, two kids out of Princeton High School alone have risen to 17+ in their first two years of college. Go coach Crump.