Jordan Savidge wins NAIA indoor national pole vault title

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Savidge wins NAIA indoor national pole vault title
MARCH 20, 2009
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By Keith Trout



After taking a year off of pole vault competition last year, Smith Valley native Jordan Savidge switched schools and made an impressive return to track and field competition, winning the NAIA (National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics) Indoor Track & Field Championships pole vault title earlier this month.

He helped Azusa Pacific University (Azusa, CA) to its third straight men's track and field indoor NAIA title and in fact his victory clinched the team title for APU, which won decisively with 78.5 points, a 23.5 point margin over the next team, after only winning by ¾ point last year. The APU women's team just missed a sweep as it finished second at the national meet by 1 point behind Wayland Baptist, its second straight narrow miss.

Savidge, a junior at APU (in his first semester there), cleared 16-8 ¾ for the winning height, despite having at least 1 miss at five different heights. However, he came into the meet with the best pole vault height during the indoor season among NAIA vaulters at that same height, which he cleared on Feb. 21.

The NAIA national meet was conducted in the "Mini Dome" at East Tennessee State university in Johnson City, TN.

Savidge is now starting the outdoor track and field season where he hopes to qualify for the NAIA outdoor national meet in May in St. Louis, where his family, which includes his parents Dale and Maureen of Smith Valley, and sister and brother Natalie and Kevin, now of Reno, hope to attend.

Savidge, a multiple-state champion at Smith Valley High (2005 graduate) - he holds the NIAA 1A state meet pole vault record at 16-0, set in 2005 (he also competed well in sprints and long jump) - continued his vaulting success in college. He won the 2007 California Junior College outdoor pole vault title with a best of 17-0 while competing for Mt. San Antonio College in southern California.

This season Savidge, after the year off from competing, started a little slowly but still cleared the national meet qualifying height of 15-7 at his first meet on Feb. 14. Then a week later he cleared 16-8 ¾, not missing on his first five tries and having good runs at 17-0. That gave him the best height by three inches going into the NIAA national meet on March 5-7.

Savidge was only the third APU Cougar to win an indoor pole vault national title and the first such APU national PV champion since 1995.

He also ran the 60 meter dash, with a best time of 7.17 seconds on Feb. 21, which was the fourth best time on the team.

This was the fifth NAIA indoor national title for APU men's coach Mike Reid (he also has won two outdoor titles and this was the sixth national title in eight years for APU; APU has won 23 overall national track titles) and he was named the NAIA men's indoor track and field coach of the year, his seventh such crown.

[ArcadiaPV]

Maybe the best 9 fingered pole vaulter ever