1. Bubka 's height of COM is 1.21m above the runway at take-off.
2. Trandenkov's height of COM is 1.28m above the runway at take-off.
The taller of the two vaulters had the higher centre of mass and hence greater gravitational potential energy at take-off.
Similar calculation leads to the result that at COM peak height with respect to the bar height Trandenkov for his 5.80m bar clearance had a bar to peak height differential of 0.065m (6.5cm or just a "tad" over 2.5 inches).
Bubka's had a bar height to COM peak height of 0.19m ( a 7.5 inch COM - Bar height differential on this jump!). In another competition the peak COM height was 6.50m for Bubka!
In this competition with Trandenkov, Bubka had less Total Energy on their respective jumps. Yes, Bubuka will have had a greater grip length on the pole but a 20cms difference in their bar heights would, I guess be sufficient to cancel the grip differential effect!
As to their relative efficiency, go figure chaps and good luck.
When and if you do, look carefully at the "Pole contribution Optimization effects diagram 3) I posted. That's just a request. It may give pause for though as to whether a better efficiency index might be watts / kg power per unit vaulter body mass thereby allowing work rate to be considered. It also should give you some vital clues as to the type of training types and power training Lavillenie has been using.
However I really don't believe we shall get much further in all this so I, for one reader, am not interested to know what spin you want to put on your efforts in regard to the above.
The your physics are better than mine stuff is taking us all away from the kernel of the efficiencies arguments. I am moving on.
Oh, and surprise, surprise Decamouse shows some pictures (Brilliant effort Decamouse) and PVdaddy agrees Lavillenie has been improving!
Willriefer, instead of trying to use the "ships passing in the night argument" and a total misrepresentation of the above to make this false conclusion in regard to the real data obtained from two vaulters you identified for comparison
willrieffer wrote: This would seem to lead to a very odd conclusion. That building muscle mass over CoM, simply raising the CoM in this way, would give the vaulter an advantage? Really? Is that really what I'm thinking? OR again maybe everything is way way more complex than that...
can you, or other readers, confirm or deny that the evidence I put up for examination supports my assertion that since 2009 Lavillenie has improved upon his drop leg technique in the first support phase of the pole vault by May 2014?
Decamouse 's evidence has convinced me I am not delusional. So readers shatter my illusions!
If my illusion is just that, I will happily concede that Willreifer's conceptual analysis of the take-off and techniques of swing control in the first phase of pole vault as exemplified by Dossevi is worthy of serious reconsideration.
To me Dossovi's technique is a distant echo to the French approach to pole vaulting of the 1970's through to about 1996! Nothing new or radical.
Since that epoch there has been a steady sea change in their approach with their elite vaulters as the grip lengths on the pole have had to become longer and the inexorable rise in technique development demand to be able to use stiffer poles.
Renaud Lavillenie is the epitome of this steady evolution and yet there is still room for him to improve his technical efficiency even though he is a fabulous pole vaulter and worthy World Indoor Record Holder at 6.16m. Let us rejoice and celebrate his achievement but also refrain from searching for "radical" or "mysterious hitherto unknown or unknowable use of the laws of physics" to account for his achievement.
The answers are all there in the evidence from the past and the practical expression of that knowledge revealed by the superb vaulting of some elite women and male pole vaulters around today.
"I hear, I look, I see, I do and then I understand that I must Listen, Hear, See Anew and Redo and discover my belief in my understanding was ill founded and so the action cycle must repeat itself until the performance reflects enlightenment" may be a mantra worthy of all pole vaulters and coaches. In the end what is initially mysterious and complex reveals itself to be simple but only through the effort of personal action can this be found.
I rest my case with respect to Lavillenie and the efficiency issue. Without the data the exercise is going to continue to be chasing "Will O'the Wisps!" (Pun intended but without any malice!)
