Moving On

My leg feels pretty much back to normal today but I will still wait until Thursday to resume. Unlike the groin injury that kept me out of the National Senior Games (NSG), this one is on the left side and is far less problematic. The right leg explosively drives forward and up very hard at take off while the left legs sweeps through mostly straight.

I was so pleased with the ramp up from NSG to Sydney that I'm going to duplicate that same vault/run progression. Of course I will use all of my other new training components, but the vault plan will follow what I did before Sydney. I have every confidence that this will go smoothly because it is the left leg and not the right.

My poles should finally be at the airport in Houston today so I'll go get them and take them back to the track. Of course I'm far from needing poles of that size, I need to measure some grips and re-tape some of them after the trip.

As discussed I did not jump at the Halloween Vault and it looks like I will skip the Waterloo Lions Meet on 11/15 as well. That means the first target meet will be the Seasons Greeter Indoor outside of Dallas on 12/19. Then I will have the Texas Pole Vault Round Up and Corral on 1/9 followed the USA Track & Field Pole Vault Summit in Reno at the end of January. Two months after that is our National Masters Indoors in Boston.

I'm anxious for the indoor season for a number of reasons but the first is that I can get some Personal Records (PRs). In 2008 I "discovered" a technical advantage that really ramped up my ability to jump to jump on bigger poles. In 2009 I only jumped in one indoor meet because of a triceps strain and some bone chips floating around in my elbow. The bottom line is that my indoor PR is only 12', which is my current starting height. Obviously I would like to get a 13'+ mark.

My friend from Minnesota, Mike Soule, always says that when you can't train or vault that you should find something "vaulty" or vault related to do to remind you why you train. So that's what all of these recent posts are about - staying connected when I can't train or vault. Seems to work. Have a great day! Bubba

PS -Happy birthday to my brother Bill, who turns 54 today. He is in his 3rd trip to Afghanistan with our Special Forces. Bill was also a 5.30m (17' 4 1/2") pole vaulter.