Too heavy to be a successful vaulter?

[Colbyc63]

I'm 15 going into my sophomore year, I've been lifting for about 5 years and it's gotten very strong, but also bulky. I'm currently 5'8" and 153lbs, with less than 10% body fat. I also play football (American), powerlifting, and cross country (mainly just for conditioning, not real fast) my maxes are 215 for bench, 340 for squat, and 350 for deadlift. I'm not exceptionally fast, 5.20 for my 40 time. My question is that will my weight and speed going to limit my potential?

Btw. I've been vaulting since the 8th grade and missed my freshman year with a broke hand

[KirkB]

5-8 and 153 pounds is not too stocky to vault successfully. But I guess it all depends on your definition of success.

To me, success would be to train for pole vaulting with the intent of vaulting as high as you can, for your speed, body weight, and body type.

Work on your sprinting technique, and focus more on gymnastics swinging and strength drills on highbar and rings, and less on power-lifting (you already have that).

Most vaulters have more of a gymnastics background than a power-lifting background, but there's also many vaulters that don't have either, so you already have an advantage over them.

With less than 10% body fat, along with your power-lifting PRs, you likely have an excellent strength-to-weight ratio (compared to other vaulters), which is also quite important for vaulting success!

But don't worry about the competition, just do the best you can to clear as high as you can, and enjoy the training and the competitions!

Kirk

[Colbyc63]

5-8 and 153 pounds is not too stocky to vault successfully. But I guess it all depends on your definition of success.

To me, success would be to train for pole vaulting with the intent of vaulting as high as you can, for your speed, body weight, and body type.

Work on your sprinting technique, and focus more on gymnastics swinging and strength drills on highbar and rings, and less on power-lifting (you already have that).

Most vaulters have more of a gymnastics background than a power-lifting background, but there's also many vaulters that don't have either, so you already have an advantage over them.

With less than 10% body fat, along with your power-lifting PRs, you likely have an excellent strength-to-weight ratio (compared to other vaulters), which is also quite important for vaulting success!

But don't worry about the competition, just do the best you can to clear as high as you can, and enjoy the training and the competitions!

Kirk

Thanks for the advice, although I can't really stop heavy weighlifting (being a multi sport athlete). I do have a pair of rings to use in my front yard and I do lots of swing work on them. I also already do lots of sprint and agility work for football

[Colbyc63]

And it's not to popular for guys to be gymnasts around here anyways (east Texas) so there's notto many people at all here with a gymnast background lol

[KirkB]

Thanks for the advice, although I can't really stop heavy weighlifting (being a multi sport athlete).

At your age, you should not drop your other sports for the sake of pole vaulting.

Pole vaulters need to be strong, but they need to stay slim and trim, rather than bulking up. At some point in the next couple years, you may want to consider reducing the number of sports you're active in, but don't do that yet. All your cross-training is good for PV, with the exception of bulking up too much. And maybe PV isn't your #1 sport (yet), so just do it to challenge yourself and to have fun (regardless of the competition).

I do have a pair of rings to use in my front yard and I do lots of swing work on them.

Great! But also consider highbar work. You may have noticed that highbar specialists have less bulk in their biceps and lats than rings specialists. Successful vaulters should follow the training regimen of highbar specialists rather than ring specialists. But rings are better than no gymnastics training at all, and your time must be limited with all your other sports to train for. And if you're restricted to just rings, you can still do the swinging excercises on them (as you say), but avoid too much repetition of the brute strength tricks.

I also already do lots of sprint and agility work for football.

Great!

And it's not too popular for guys to be gymnasts around here anyways (east Texas) so there's not too many people at all here with a gymnast background lol

Nevertheless, my advice still stands. "Successful" pole vaulters don't follow the crowd, they do what's needed to be successful. You will have an advantage over all those other Longhorns by doing more gymnastics training.

This includes parkour training, which you might also find to be fun.

Good luck!

Kirk