how to have a perfect active pole drop!?!?

[straightup]

wow you guys have such incredible knowledge1 it never ceases to amaze me!

[PVDaddy]

After Carefully reading everyone's post, I'd like to add my two cents into this awesome discussion! I realize its not even worth that to some and I'm actually ok with that.. Altius, has raised the fundamental points of what is required to be good at anything, at any age! I have known for a long time that "Advanced Technique," in any sport, is not something special that only the "Elite" or more mature adults are able to perform. Advanced Technique is appropriate for ANYONE who has demonstrated a thorough understanding of its foundation, through their abilities to correctly perform the basic fundamental movements of that technique correctly without fail. The coaches and athletes who understand this are ALWAYS the ones who achieve the greatest improvements and accomplishments. Those that do not CONTINUE to learn and innovate will always be beaten by those who do. My 30 years experience as a coach, coaching kids from 5 years old through adulthood has PROVEN this truth of what advanced technique means and the advantages it provides. MOST coaches WAY underestimate what SOME of these young kids are CAPABLE of doing and doing CORRECTLY! If you do not believe that, I suggest you take a look at those 14 year old girls wearing gold medals around their necks as the best the world has to offer every 4 years, in a sport that is the most difficult in terms of advanced athletic technique-Gymnastics. Been wanting to get that point of what advanced technique is off my chest for a while now, my rant is over.

The development of correct technique for pole vaulting, with a flexible pole, took longer than it should of and was finally demonstrated around 1985. It amazes me that 28 years later, it still is not more fully understood and taught properly by what are suppose to be Elite coaches! We have been given the literature and the example and are without excuse. Not for your lack of trying Altius! But, why are you just now bringing up this VERY important point that the pole drop should be "a controlled drop" to us here on PVP? I to assumed it was just an active gravity pole drop. It sounded so brilliant! Thank-You for bringing this to our attention.

After hearing this for the first time here, I have done a careful analysis of Bubka's technique and would like to share my observations . I have found that what Altius has said about the last 6 steps being a controlled pole drop is entirely correct. Done correctly It is not just a matter of letting the pole drop freely through the fulcrum of the bottom hand and the drop being controlled by the top hand, because, the bottom hand plays such an active role and does so much else during the plant.

I would like to preface that what I am about to say is not appropriate for a beginner or even an intermediate vaulter, who has not proven through intense commitment, that they have perfected the fundamentals and really want to be a pole vaulter. This is after-all the Advanced Technique board.

1) The "controlled "pole drop planting motion begins 6 steps out.
2) The pole must be allowed to free fall through the pivot of the bottom hand throughout these steps.
3) Coming on to the 6th step (right foot) Bubka holds the pole at exactly 45 degrees. The bottom hand is held at about chest height.
4) Coming on to the 5th step (Left foot) the bottom hand is lowered about a fist width.
5) Coming on to the 4th step (right foot) the bottom hand is lowered another fist width
6) Coming on to the 3rd step (left foot) the bottom hand is lowered another fist width and has now reached it lowest point. Just above waist height. At this point the vaulter has broken from the hip, so the top hand is behind the hip, pole turned over,
readied for the plant.
7) Coming on to the second step (right foot) the bottom hand has been extended forward toward the pit to plant the pole. About
2/3 arm length out. The top hand has been raised to temples height.
8) Coming on to plant step the bottom hand is held just above the head with elbow bent facing out. The top hand is fully extended.

The bottom hand has been active and moving, changing its position throughout the entire 6 steps! It therefore is incorrect to say that it is just a matter of lowering the pole through the bottom hand fulcrum (Active gravity pole drop). Performed correctly, It must be a controlled lowering of the pole! I know that most say the bottom hand should stay at chest height throughout the planting motion, but, after carefully studying two of Bubka's best vaults, it is clear, that he continues to lower the pole by lowering his BOTTOM hand from the 6th step through the 3rd. The lowering of the pole is controlled and occurs because he lowers his bottom hand AND because the pole pivots (lowers) through it fulcrum. A controlled pole drop!

[altius]

We agree to agree!!! But I am sure others will not!! However I suggest folk start taking serious notes of the pole carry of every vaulter they see - say vaulting 5m and up. I suggest that they will see the vast majority do not even set the pole up correctly at the start and that from about 15 metres out the left hand is on top of the pole -not underneath it and acting as a fulcrum as discussed earlier. Even worse they run for up to ten metres into the plant with the pole horizontal. So the notion of a controlled lowering of the pole (or a pole drop if that is what you prefer) is virtually irrelevant to these athletes. However the critical point is that this inefficient method means that they are inevitably limited in grip height and pole stiffness -before they even take off. Just an opinion -would be interesting to carry out a study on this specific issue.

Incidentally re Bubka -what you will often see even with that great athlete, is that he is not perfectly matching the model! In this case lowering the left hand - a no no in Petrov's eyes because the lower the left hand goes during the planting action, the greater the distance it has to be moved up for the take off.

[PVDaddy]

I said:

but, after carefully studying two of Bubka's best vaults, it is clear, that he continues to lower the pole by lowering his BOTTOM hand from the 6th step through the 3rd.

Altius said:

re Bubka -what you will often see even with that great athlete, is that he is not perfectly matching the model! In this case lowering the left hand - a no no in Petrov's eyes because the lower the left hand goes during the planting action, the greater the distance it has to be moved up for the take off

Altius, Bubka still has the last two steps to bring his his lower left hand up, and does, in plenty of time for take-off. Its above his head in perfect position?

[KirkB]

Q: How do you know when you have a perfect active pole drop?

A: When you time the drop of the pole so that it feels weightless!

You guys can debate all you want about on exactly what step you're doing exactly what motion with the top hand and the bottom hand - fulcrum this and fulcrum that. It's all a little academic for me.

If I found that I had to force the pole to drop faster on one vault, then on the next vault I nudged it forwards (with the thumb of my bottom hand) to let it drop a little earlier. And if I found that I had to hold the pole up slightly to drop a little SLOWER into the box on a vault, then I tried to not nudge it forwards quite as early on the next vault.

One thing was for certain - I did NOT want to be holding the pole up during the last part of the run. I knew that if I did that, I would run slower and my body posture going into the plant and takeoff would be sub-optimal. It's a fault that's very easy to spot with all of today's vaulters. If you see them leaning back during their run, then it's quite obvious that they're cantilevering the weight of their pole - and running slower because of this.

By trial and error, and by intuitively adjusting the optimal timing so that my pole would feel weightless, I got pretty good at dropping it at just the right time. I didn't have to think about it much at all. And I didn't have any cues back then on which step I should "begin" the drop, because there wasn't a specific step. It was a CONTINUAL drop.

We didn't have instant video playback in the early 1970s. We did have SOME Super 8 film that took a few days to be processed, and we did look at that - occasionally. We only did that for certain special meets - we never filmed any practice vaults that I can recall. Notice that I said "filmed", because that's exactly what it was - film on a roll of tape that you viewed on a projector. Sidebar: We couldn't slo-mo or freeze the film much, because the projector's lamp would melt the film if we did!

My point is that we didn't over-analyze our runs or our takeoffs or swings or our extensions by frame-by-frame post-vault analysis. Instead, we learned by how the vault FELT.

And quite frankly - for the run and weightless pole drop at least (not for the takeoff, C, and swing) - I never felt like I NEEDED to watch any film. I already KNEW what I was doing right and what I was doing wrong - because I FELT it!

On my EXTENSION, same thing - there was nothing that we needed to analyze, because the extension was pre-determined by the run, takeoff, C, and swing. And if my extension was off a bit on a vault, I didn't need any vid to tell me that. I already knew that it was due to something that I did wrong in the bottom half of my vault!

Kirk Bryde

[altius]

Altius, Bubka still has the last two steps to bring his his lower left hand up, and does, in plenty of time for take-off. Its above his head in perfect position?

I suspect that if you asked Petrov - or even - Bubka - they would say that he was recovering after making a mistake! Remember Petrov's unspoken motto - "Perfection is expected -only perfection will be tolerated!"

[altius]

Sorry =repetition.

[altius]

"By trial and error, and by intuitively adjusting the optimal timing so that my pole would feel weightless, I got pretty good at dropping it at just the right time."

In my first book on the teaching of games in 2001 I defined intuition as "The distilled essence of past experience ". The essence of intuition is therefore experience. So while it was ok for you to learn from experience what worked for you - coaches like myself faced with the challenge of introducing young and inexperienced athletes to the Petrov Model, needed to develop an absolutely precise model of planting the pole, This naturally meant that we had to find a an easily understood and easily practiced method of bringing the pole from a relatively high carry position into position for the plant. Since these youngsters have little experience -and therefore cannot rely on intuition, we teach them to control the lowering of the pole with a precise series - of equally precisely timed movements - of the left arm to get the pole into position to be moved up into the take off position precisely when Petrov says it should be moved into that position - i.e. before the take off foot touches the ground. So the lowering of the pole is a means to an end moving it from an initial high carry position into the precise position for take off. Unless this is done the notion of a free take off is redundant.

Pedantic perhaps. But as the great man says -the vault in born in the last few steps. We do not want still births so we make sure everything is done to prevent them - and so prevent run throughs or poor take offs. Now you may argue Kirk that this is an advanced forum. But remember my philosophy - that any thing Bubka could do, and I am assuming that this is advanced enough for you - youngsters can begin to learn to do. So yes we do take a lot of care with how the left hand is used as a fulcrum and we try to ensure that athletes UNDERSTAND precisely why they are doing what they are doing.

Then when our athletes do take off they have resolved MANY -but of course not all - of the problems this event poses. Equally important it fits with my philosophy - stolen from St. Francis - that you must control everything you can control. And there is certainly no reason why a youngsters cannot be perfect from the first step to the take off - IF they are committed to the training needed to achieve that. After take off it is a slightly different matter - because every take off, no matter how precisely we try to make, it is a happening - a one off - and brings problems that can only partly resolved through drills but will usually need lots of practice to build the intuitive feel needed to really resolve tiny problems as they arise.

This is the philosophy I will bring to the clinics I am preparing to lead in the USA in June/July. Coaches are welcome to come along and see whether these ideas make sense in practice with real athletes!

[CoachEric]

I will concede that the weight of the pole transitions to the bottom hand. However, I hate to explain it this way to an athlete, because it invites misinterpretation of the pole drop. If the athlete tries to actively use the bottom arm to drop the pole, the vaulter is only increasing the distance to plant, and forcing deceleration.

but, after carefully studying two of Bubka's best vaults, it is clear, that he continues to lower the pole by lowering his BOTTOM hand from the 6th step through the 3rd.

What you are seeing here is the transition of the pole's weight to the bottom arm. Bubka provides minimal resistance, thus does not affect his sprint mechanics, even though the weight of the pole pushes the bottom arm lower. I would agree with Altius that Petrov would say that Bubka's hands come down a little too much. I believe he says so in his Reno 2005 speech, but I'm not sure. Note that even though the bottom arm comes down from chest height, Bubka:
1.) keeps the bottom elbow down
2.) keeps the left forearm tight to the torso
3.) allows the pole tip to accelerate into the plant
4.) pulls the top arm up to shorten distance to plant
5.) plants with the tip going through eye level

BTW these are all great cues for athletes to help them understand how not to drop the bottom hand too low, and keep the arms in tight into a straight line plant.

Now, on lowering the pole vs. dropping the pole:
Normally I would say we're splitting hairs. Maybe we are, but maybe we have a fundamental difference in understanding the mechanics of sprinting with a pole and pole rotation at takeoff. The purpose of the one-arm drill, which sort of sparked this debate, is for the athlete to understand the timing of a dropping pole. If you want to call it lowering, OK. Like I said, I can concede that a slight weight does transition to the bottom hand as it becomes the fulcrum for a planting pole, but it should be miniscule! Perhaps the plant would be more efficient and higher if the vaulter felt no weight on the bottom hand at all. I digress.

The important thing is that as the pole tip passes through eye level, it must not stop. The pole tip dropping freely right into the plant frees up the feet to be really active into the takeoff. Elites aside for a minute - For a developing athlete, executing this drop into the plant will improve the takeoff 10 times out of 10. With the weight of the pole removed from the equation, the vaulter can strike with the feet directly below the hips, eliminating braking force and allowing the hips to be lined up for takeoff. The vaulter will be faster, taller, and prepared to jump. The pole angle will also be higher, because the rotational inertia of the pole will move the top of the pole upward along with the hands, instead of the two working against each other.

I'm inclined to agree with Kirk's approach here. This isn't something an athlete tends to learn "by the numbers." It comes intuitively after many repetitions of (guided) trial and error.

[KirkB]

Now you may argue Kirk that this is an advanced forum. But remember my philosophy - that any thing Bubka could do ... youngsters can begin to learn to do.

Actually, I think that the "intuitiveness" of just learning to "balance" the pole so that it drops "perfectly" into the box at the right time is something that even beginners can - and should - be able to do. I think as coaches we sometimes lose our athletes in the details. If they understand the end goal (not leaning back during the runup, and having good posture on takeoff), then they can figure out (with experience) all the details to make that happen. Breaking it down step-by-step sometimes confuses them so they don't view the technique as holistically as they should.

For a developing athlete, executing this drop into the plant will improve the takeoff 10 times out of 10. With the weight of the pole removed from the equation, the vaulter can strike with the feet directly below the hips, eliminating braking force and allowing the hips to be lined up for takeoff. The vaulter will be faster, taller, and prepared to jump. The pole angle will also be higher, because the rotational inertia of the pole will move the top of the pole upward along with the hands, instead of the two working against each other.

This is my main point. Thanks for helping me make this point, Eric!

I'm inclined to agree with Kirk's approach here. This isn't something an athlete tends to learn "by the numbers." It comes intuitively after many repetitions of (guided) trial and error.

Kirk Bryde

[altius]

"This isn't something an athlete tends to learn "by the numbers." It comes intuitively after many repetitions of (guided) trial and error."

Well I suggest you go back and review your understanding of skill learning, because you are both wrong. Alternatively you can go and study how fighter pilots - or anyone involved in mastering high level skills - are TRAINED. Intuitive (Non conscious) behaviour is indeed characteristic of high level performance in virtually every highly demanding activity BUT it is best built on a firm platform of conscious -learned- behaviour. So while once upon a time pilots learned to fly 'by the seat of their pants' they do not do so now - they learn 'by numbers' simply because many tended to get killed before they reached the stage where flying was intuitive. Ditto pole vaulters who are not TAUGHT the correct movement patterns at the beginning of their training.

But don't bother about my opinion - it is just that of a professional in the field - who happens to have been applying theory to practice for nearly sixty years across activities as varied as soccer, basketball, table tennis, volleyball, swimming, downhill skiing, sailing etc and pretty well all the events of track and field. A mere teacher, coach, teacher educator and coach educator in fact.

I don't expect to change your minds Kirk and Eric but I do hope that folk who haven't thought about this idea too much will take heed of what I am saying. They will find that they will teach pole vaulting efficiently, effectively and safely using the approach I am recommending. Going down the seat of the pants route will leave many youngsters stranded with no real idea of what they are trying to do - the inevitable result will be continual run throughs and loss of confidence. Of course if they persist in trying to take off because of continual pressure from coaches and teammates then many will get injured and some will get killed. In fact I wrote BTB1 after going to Reno and seeing just this behaviour and generally poor levels of execution of this critical phase of technique. This was in the same year that three young vaulters had been killed in the space of a month.

Opinion is great - the heart and soul of PVP - but opinion based on fact and long experience teaching hundreds of youngsters would seem to be more valid.

[KirkB]

Altius, I think you're making a mountain out of a mole hill, and scaremongering to boot. Sometimes you get on your high horse and won't get off.

I'm all for PV safety, so I don't need to be reminded of any of that on THIS thread.

And I will be the first to AGREE that the plant, takeoff, and swing are critically important to be taught " by the book" (BTB2 for example).

But in this thread, I'm ONLY talking about the "perfect active pole drop", or what I call the "weightless pole drop". THAT'S ALL!

And my point is - at the risk of repeating myself - that vaulters can become confused with "the numbers". Instead, they will get a more HOLISTIC idea of what a good run and pole drop should FEEL like by simply (iteratively and incrementally) trying it and modifying it so that they're not leaning back during their run, and so that they have good posture on takeoff.

OF COURSE the coach should provide guidance, but if that guidance is so detailed that the vaulter gets confused (like if an inexperienced coach - someone with barely any coaching or vaulting experience - tries to tell a vaulter step by step exactly where his hands should be), then your intent as a coach to "have the vaulter experience the drop of the pole effectively" will be lost.

That's what I've been trying to say, in as polite a manner as I know how. That's all.

Kirk Bryde

Edit: fixed a typo - "... so that they have good POSTURE on takeoff".