Melbourne Track Classic: Hooker 5.65

[PV Official]

Pole VaultOfficial Results - Men - Pole Vault Pos Athlete Nat Mark Pts
1 Steven Hooker AUS 5.65
2 Matthew Boyd AUS 5.15
2 Blake Lucas AUS 5.15
4 James Filshie AUS 5.00
5 Richard Möcks GER 4.80

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http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/steve ... 5837114994

Steve Hooker below-par at Melbourne meet
Scott Gullan From: Herald Sun March 04, 2010 7:45PM

Steve Hooker failed to reach his target jump of more than 6m last night at Olympic Park. Picture: Michael Dodge Source: Herald Sun

A PERPLEXED Steve Hooker left Olympic Park last night scratching his head after an uncharacteristic below-par performance.

While the Olympic and world champion pole vault champion comfortably won the event with a clearance of 5.65m, he was frustrated at not taking advantage of the perfect conditions on his home track.

Hooker, who had been confident of taking the bar above the magical 6m, failed at three attempts at 5.85m after easily clearing his opening height.

"I don't know what happened," he said.

"It felt good the first clearance and then I went up to 5.85m and a bigger pole and it just didn't work. I don't know what to say."

After dealing with terrible conditions in the past at the Melbourne Track Classic, Hooker - who cleared 5.91m in Sydney on Saturday night - was excited when he arrived last night to find a perfect light northerly breeze drifting through Olympic Park.

"Up until I was out of the competition I thought it was going to be a big night so it is just a bit of a shock," he said.

"I opened high at 5.65m because I wanted to minimise my jumps so I would be fresh when I was jumping a bit higher.

"Sometimes that can back-fire and tonight it certainly did."

A late-night soul-searching session with coach Alex Parnov was on the agenda given the pair leave on the weekend for Doha, Qatar, to begin preparations for next week's world indoor championships.

"I will have to spend some time with Alex and get the video and work out exactly what was going on because I felt like I should have been clearing those bars," he said.

"The thing is I felt like I was running in and taking off much much better than I was in Sydney so when that happens and you don't get the result it is sort of hard to understand what has exactly happened.

"We have to look at the positives out of this one. The run up speed was good, my plant was better, I was taking off better and doing all of those things that I wanted to do in this competition but unfortunately the result just didn't come."

Hooker is desperate to win the world indoor title as it is the only gold medal he hasn't got in his extensive trophy cabinet.

Another big-name casualty was long jump star Mitchell Watt who was forced out of the competition because of a groin injury.

The world championships bronze medallist jumped 7.89m and 7.86m with his first two jumps before electing to withdraw.

The injury puts his world indoor championships campaign in doubt and in his absence Queensland's Chris Noffke took victory with a leap of 7.96m.

In the men's javelin local favourite Jarrod Bannister continued his comeback with a third placing (81.32m) behind Finland's Tero Pitkamaki (83.32m) and New Zealand's Stuart Farquhar (83.26m).

Kimberley Mickle produced an A-standard qualifying throw for the Commonwealth Games of 58.22m to win the women's javelin.

[rainbowgirl28]

Interview with Hooker: http://www.flotrack.org/videos/speaker/ ... ven-hooker

[AllaboutPV1]

I don't know for sure, correct me if i'm wrong. I think steve hooker just got a little ahead of himself at this meet in melbourne. goin into the meet he was confident that he was gonna jump 6 meters, he will jump 6 meters and higher, he just needs to stay focused at the task at hand. none the less he is looking excellent this year!!!!!