Upon Further Review

After studying the video of my attempts at 13' (3.96m) yesterday, the 14' 7" (4.45m) poles were clearly too small as I expected. What I didn't expect was that on one jump I was "out" on my take off 6+" (15 cm) and the last one was 8+" (20 cm) yet still blew the pole away. The one where my step was "on", I bailed mid extension because I thought I was going off of the back of the pit. When your biggest poles are too small in your first meet, that's usually a decent sign. That training stuff must work I guess.

I haven't heard back from Kris yet but I think we're going to drop the 14' 7" (4.45m) poles out until after the Texas Senior Games on 10/24, now less than two weeks away. Instead I'll use my two biggest 14' 1" (4.30m) poles for that meet and then afterwards I will probably ONLY jump on the 14' 7" poles. Our plan originally was to have my first two smallest 14' 7"s match up to my to biggest 14' 1" poles so that I wouldn't have to switch lengths in a meet. I think that is probably going to work awesome.

Speaking of Kris, he jumped really well yesterday but in an odd landing accident with the crossbar he got whacked on the bridge of the nose while laying in the pit after a miss. The bar was falling and he had his hands up to catch it, then his pole hit the bar and knocked it out of line and BAM. The situation was made a little worse because because the bar hit his sunglasses. That said, 15 minutes later, after cleaning up the blood and icing his nose, he took a really nice attempt. STUD!!

Another cool story from yesterday was my friend Larry Bonnett. He had seen me at the San Marcos River Vault this summer and told me that this blog was inspiring him to get off of his butt and get training again. Yesterday was his first day back out and it was a big one as I think he tied his best he has jumped since he entered his age group. Very neat to see him have that success.

Today was back in the gym for me which felt outstanding. Well actually it feels like crap but the inner feeling to get going again and be on a schedule is just fantastic. I'm not sure I will jump again before Texas Senior Games but if I do it will be on my small 14' 1" poles on Sunday. We will play it by ear but I don't feel compelled to do it. I think it's more important that I feel good and powerful. Unfortunately when you haven't been doing full training and return to it you feel a little more flat than usual so I may just wait for the meet to jump. We will see but you will be the 2nd to know.

Thanks so much for being here. Of course we know that I have been training hard for the past several months even though I haven't jumped in a meet. BUT recently I've had a few people say, "I heard you took the outdoor season off. How long do you think it will take you to feel like you're in shape to jump high again?" HUH? Just because I didn't compete doesn't mean I wasn't training hard. Yesterday I was on the biggest poles that I have jumped on since 1999 and they were too small yet I was only at 12 steps. I think there is a lot more in the tank but I need to learn this new quicker timing on the longer poles without losing hand pressure. Looking forward to the challenge. Thanks again! Bubba