Author: Becca Peter

The 2024 Olympic Trials women’s pole vault finals begin today at 3:15pm Pacific.

I will be there with the live tweets: https://twitter.com/polevaultpower/status/1807443503154352325

Live results: https://results.usatf.org

Dedicated stream: Peacock 

Height progression: 4.28-4.43-4.53-4.63-4.68-4.73+5

I explained the Olympic Team qualifying scenarios in the qualifying round preview, but I think a visual explanation would be easier. I also walk through them again below.

USATF prioritizes the order athletes finish at the Olympic Trials for making the team. In this event it will almost certainly be the top three finishers who are on the Olympic team.

Qualifying via the rankings is NOT based on the “World Rankings” it is based on whether or not your are in the quota on the Road to Paris website. Today is the last day that athletes can achieve the standard and/or move up via the rankings. There is no chance of mark chasing.

ANYONE who places in the top three AND hits the Olympic standard of 4.73 is guaranteed to be on the team. Below are the scenarios if someone places top three without achieving that height.

Sandi, Katie and Bridget have the standard and are 100% guaranteed to be on the team if they place top three.

Hana, Gabi and Emily are currently ranked highly within the rankings quota, it is basically not possible at this point that anyone is going to bump them out of the quota. If they place in the top three without hitting the standard, they are going to be on the team.

Chloe and Brynn are currently in the rankings quota, but sitting near the bottom of it. If they place top three, they will most likely move up in the quota and have a secure position, and even if they somehow don’t move up, I don’t think it is super likely either one will be bumped out. It would be best if they hit the standard, and both are capable, but if they place top three without the standard, they are most likely on the team.

Kristen, Rachel and Riley are not in the rankings quota right now, but they are close to it. If they finish in the top three and don’t hit the standard, they *probably* will move into the rankings quota and make the team, but this depends a lot on exactly what height they jump, what place they get, and results from other places in the world.

Amanda and Marissa are too far down in the rankings to move into the quota, their only path to the team is placing top three and jumping 4.73.

As far as predictions for today…

I think the wind will probably be swirly and I would be surprised to see many PRs or big bars.

Sandi and Katie have both had setbacks this year and not been at 100%, but neither needs to be anywhere near 100% to make the team. Both jumped well in qualifying and should have no problem placing top three today.

Bridget had a really great indoor season. She is solidly the third best vaulter in this field, and she can beat Sandi and Katie if she has a good day and they are off. But she hasn’t been as consistent outdoors and struggled in the qualifying round. If she finds her confidence again and doesn’t let anything rattle her, she has an excellent chance at a top three finish.

Hana and Chloe both jumped well in qualifying and are coming off strong collegiate seasons, they are solid contenders to snag a top three spot.

Emily has a lot of experience at USATF championships and has been known to rise to the occasion in big meets.

Gabi has had a really consistent outdoor season. She PRd at indoor nationals to place third and could be due for another breakthrough here.

Brynn has had a very consistent season as well, she struggled in qualifying but if she relaxes in the final she has a solid chance at a top three finish.

MOST of the women in the field are in position to make the team if they place top three, even if they don’t hit the standard in the process.

Today should be a very interesting competition, Eugene is not an easy place to jump. If the wind is particularly swirly, we could see 4.63 or 4.68 for third.

The women’s pole vault qualifying round was fairly uneventful until the third bar.

The weather was sunny and warm, the winds were a bit on the swirly and inconsistent side, pretty typical for Eugene.

Kyla Davis, Tori Thomas and Megan Houston were unable to clear the opening height of 4.20m. Sydney Horn, Olivia Leuking, Kenzie Beukes, Mason Meinershagen and Jessica Mercier went out at the second height of 4.35m.

The bar went up to 4.50m with 16 women left in the competition, the target field size for finals was 12.

Katie Moon and Sandi Morris entered the competition at this height and cleared easily.

Marissa Kalsey also cleared on her first for a new lifetime best, the biggest surprise of the competition!

Kristen Leland, Gabi Leon, Hana Moll, Amanda Moll, Chloe Timberg, Riley Felts and Emily Grove also cleared the bar and guaranteed themselves a spot in the finals.

Ka’leila Abrille, Kristen Brown and Molly Haywood all missed three times and finished 14th, 15th and 16th.

Surprisingly, Rachel Baxter, Brynn King and Bridget Williams all failed to clear 4.50m, after clearing the previous bars on their first attempts. This left them in a three-way tie for 11th.

It seemed pretty straightforward that we would take 13 to finals and finish jumping, but the officials put the bars back up and began measuring them. It is unclear whether they intended to have the 10 remaining vaulters continue (which made zero sense) or have the three vaulters tied for 11th jump off until one was eliminated (which is petty as hell and bad for the athletes) but the coaches began yelling loudly at the officials, reminding them that we just took 13 to the finals for the men and that it was unfair to the women to make them keep jumping.

After further discussion, the officials finally relented and everyone was able to pack it up and call it a day.

The 2024 Olympic Trials women’s pole vault competition begins today at 5:48pm Pacific with the qualifying round! 

I will be there with the live tweets: https://twitter.com/polevaultpower/status/1806769829871022311

Live results: https://results.usatf.org

Dedicated stream: Peacock 

Height progression: 4.20/4.35/4.50/4.55/4.60

Top 12 qualify to finals.

Unlike the men, the women are unlikely to need to jump all five heights to reduce the field to 12, I have a feeling clearing 4.50 today will be enough to advance.

The favorites to advance to the finals are the women who are in contention to make the team, so let’s take a look at where that stands:

The Olympic standard for the pole vault is 4.73m and right now only Katie Moon, Sandi Morris and Bridget Williams have the standard. But we currently have five women who are in the rankings quota and could possibly qualify that way…

The field size for the Olympics is 32 and currently only 12 vaulters have the standard, leaving room for quite a few to qualify through the rankings. Rankings here refer to the rankings on the “Road to” website, not the overall world rankings.

Emily Grove and Hana Moll are ranked about 18th at the moment. Gabi Leon is ranked about 19th. It is basically impossible that these athletes would fall out of the rankings quota as this is the last weekend for any new marks to count.

Chloe Timberg is ranked about 27th and Brynn King is ranked about 30th, but a top 3 finish here is going to improve their ranking, if they manage to place top 3 and not hit the standard, they should make it in on the rankings.

To evaluate the next few vaulters and their rankings, let’s do a quick breakdown on the scoring. In a hypothetical scenario where someone who does not have the standard gets 3rd with 4.68, this would be worth 1170 points for the mark and 70 points for the place = 1240 points.

Kristen Leland is ranked about 34th at the moment, placing 3rd with 4.68 would move her up as high as 30th.

Riley Felts and Rachel Baxter are ranked about 36th, placing 3rd with 4.68 would also move them as high as 30th, but that is obviously a tenuous position as other athletes could move higher or achieve the standard and bump them down.

Everyone else is too far down to be likely to move into the rankings quota, they would need to jump 4.73m and place top 3 to make the team.

Today is just the qualifying round, the vaulters above are some of the favorites to advance to the finals but anyone in the field has a chance to make the team if they advance to finals + place top 3 + jump at least 4.73.

Check out our coverage of the Olympic Trials men’s pole vault final in Track & Field News!

https://trackandfieldnews.com/olympic-trials-mens-pole-vault-kendricks-first-crown-in-5-years/

The 2024 Olympic Trials men’s pole vault final is tonight at 5:40pm Pacific.

I will be in the stadium, melting in the sun, you can follow my live tweets here: https://x.com/polevaultpower/status/1804913283692146698

Live results: https://results.usatf.org

Dedicated pole vault stream: Peacock

Height progression: 547/562/572/582/587 then 5cm

The top 3 finishers will make the Olympic team as long as they have the qualifying standard (5.82m) or are ranked high enough. Eight of the finalists already have the standard and several more are ranked high enough, this is unlikely to be an issue.

If there is a tie for 3rd or 4th, an administrative jump-off will be held after the event to break the tie.

The big favorites coming in to this meet were Chris Nilsen, Sam Kendricks and KC Lightfoot.

Lightfoot failed to advance from the qualifying round. Kendricks looked great in qualifying but told the media afterward that he may decline his spot on the team if he qualifies. Nilsen had a great indoor season, but has only jumped 5.72m outdoors, well below his best form, and while he jumped solidly in qualifying, he did not look to be at 100%.

Kendricks and Nilsen are still strong favorites to make the team (and I am skeptical Kendricks will actually decline his spot), but nothing is guaranteed and it’s possible that we may see a rather unexpected Olympic team this year!

Austin Miller is a strong candidate to make the team, he jumped 5.90m twice indoors, has jumped 5.80+ twice outdoors and looked very strong in qualifying.

Zach Bradford struggled at indoor nationals this year, but he has jumped 5.82m twice this outdoor season and was a surprise addition to last year’s World Championship team.

Keaton Daniel jumped 5.80m indoors this year and is coming off a strong collegiate career, winning NCAAs indoors and outdoors. Daniel doesn’t have the standard but he is ranked high enough to qualify.

Matt Ludwig has been a bit below his best this year, but he looked really good in the qualifying round and he has a record of jumping well in unfavorable conditions. Although the weather will be nice tonight, the wind at Hayward Field is not always predictable. Ludwig doesn’t have the standard but he is ranked high enough to qualify.

Every single athlete in this field has the potential to jump at least 5.82m and make the team, someone I have not mentioned could easily do it as well!

I hope you will tune in to the coverage on NBC/Peacock and follow along with my tweets.

Pole vault qualifying rounds are always a bit painful to watch because the vaulters stop jumping once the targeted field size has been reached. This one was particularly painful because American record holder KC Lightfoot was unable to clear 5.60m and will not be advancing to the final and an unnecessary round of jumping at 5.70m made for a very long competition.

The conditions were pleasant, upper 80s and the wind appeared to be mostly a tailwind.

There were 26 men in the competition and the goal was to reduce the field to 12.

At the opening height of 5.40m, Trevor Stephenson was the only vaulter who failed to clear the bar.

The next height was 5.50m, we lost Logan Hammer, Conner McClure, Jacob Englar, Bradley Jelmert, James Rhoads and Scott Houston at this height, reducing the field to 19.

At 5.60m, KC Lightfoot surprised everyone by struggling. Lightfoot jumped 6.00m this indoor season and has jumped 5.80m or better in three of his four outdoor meets.

On Lightfoot’s first attempt at 5.60m he aborted his approach, then bailed when he tried again.

On his second attempt it looked like he might have gone down a pole because he had way too much pole speed and never had a chance at clearing the bar.

On his third attempt he came down on the bar, it bounced around on the pegs for a second before falling to the pit and ending his 2024 Olympic dreams.

Christyan Sampy and Clayton Simms were also unable to clear this height, while Scott Toney missed once and then passed.

The bar was raised to 5.65m with 16 vaulters remaining.

Scott Toney missed his remaining attempts and Cole Walsh missed his three attempts while 13 vaulters cleared the height. But Tyler Burns added a wrinkle to the competition when he missed twice and then passed.

The rules for when to end a qualifying round have more to do with the desires of meet management than anything dictated by the rule book. For example, the NCAA holds administrative jump-offs to break ties for the final advancing spot, while USATF and World Athletics have typically accepted all athletes if the field is one or two over the targeted size.

Burns passing made things complicated.

Burns was in 15th place and not going to advance to the final unless he cleared the next bar. The next three vaulters were in a three way tie for 11th, so even if Burns clears, he does not displace any of them.

In my opinion, it would have been within the rules for the officials or meet management to decide that the 13 vaulters who cleared 5.65m would all advance to the final, and only Burns would need to jump at 5.70m.

Even if you raised the bar to 5.70 and everyone jumped, if Burns cleared but none of the vaulters tied at the bottom did, you would still end up taking 14 to the final.

Unfortunately, the officials decided everyone needed to jump at 5.70m.

Sam Kendricks and Matt Ludwig both had no misses and were 100% guaranteed to be in the final even if everyone else cleared 5.70m, so they passed.

Everyone else jumped. At this point it was around 7:30pm, the vaulters had been on the infield for over four hours, and a lot of them were gassed.

Austin Miller was the only vaulter able to clear 5.70m on his first attempt. Chris Nilsen, Jacob Wooten, Keaton Daniel and Zach Bradford all cleared on their second attempts.

Burns had his one attempt and ran through.

Once the three vaulters tied for 11th missed all three attempts, and remaining two vaulters were 100% guaranteed to be in the final and they passed their final attempt and at about 7:45pm the nearly two hour long qualifying round was finally over.

Lightfoot was the only vaulter with the Olympic standard who was unable to advance.

In the mixed zone after the meet, Sam Kendricks mentioned that he may decline his spot on the Olympic team if he qualifies, he expressed that he is still very unhappy with how he was treated in Tokyo (after he tested positive for Covid).

Keaton Daniel video interview with Dyestat/Runnerspace

Austin Miller video interview with Dyestat/Runnerspace

Sam Kendricks video interview with Dyestat/Runnerspace

The 2024 Olympic Trials pole vault competitions begin at 5:50 tonight with the men’s qualifying round!

I will be there with the live tweets: https://x.com/polevaultpower/status/1804159426678473022

Live results: https://results.usatf.org

Dedicated stream: Peacock

Height progression: 5.40/5.50/5.60/5.65/570

Top 12 qualify to finals