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[POLE VAULT, POT LUCK AND CAMP FIRE]

  SAVE SEPTEMBER 22ND
   ON YOUR CALENDAR
             FOR
  G-FORCE VAULT CLUBS
        1ST ANNUAL
POLE VAULT, POT LUCK AND CAMP FIRE

Come join the fun and food at our first annual club get together. All USATF members are welcomed to jump. We’ll be under the lights with the festivities beginning at;
                                   6:30PM Saturday  September 22nd.
                                         The address for the meet is
                                     6275, 263rd Street, Wyoming, MN.

Please contact Mike Soule at vaultingeezer@yahoo.com and let me know if you can attend. I
Will send you back a signup sheet to let me know that you are coming and what we can expect you to bring.
 ENTRY FEE IS $10 AND A DISH OR SOMETHING FOR THE POT LUCK
              G-Force club members in good standing (dues current) are free
                 Whether to watch or participate, this is a family event!
                                                                                   

Yep! It's legal. The rule states no more than two layers of tape may be applied to a pole for gripping purposes. Way back in the old days some vaulters would actually put (for the lack of a better word or description) a knob of tape on the pole to keep their hand from slipping down the pole. It would sort of be like a knot in a climbing rope if you can picture that. That scenario is what the rule is designed to prevent. The double side tape deal is no different than what some vaulters create when we spray "Tuf Skin" or "Firm Grip" or soak the tape with lighter fluid to draw the adhesive of the athletic tape through the fibers to the outside of the tape. Some vaulters like a sticky surface to hold onto some like a dry surface. It's all legal as long as there is no more than two layers of tape in the grip section of the pole. Later..........Mike

Actually UCS poles are the easiest to get a sticker for. What you do is take a photo of the engraving and email the picture to UCS. They will mail you out a pink weight label for you to place on the pole 6 inches down from the top. Bingo! You're in. Turn around time is remarkably fast. Here's the link for more from UCS.
http://www.ucsspirit.com/vaulting-poles/news-details.cfm/news/New-NFHS-Rules-Requirement
There's a discussion on pole vault power that Bruce Caldwell from Essx posted that said he can provide weight labels for Altius poles made after 2003. The link to the thread is;
http://www.polevaultpower.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=19165
Hope this helps. It's quite the struggle right now. An official at a meet I was at yesterday approved a pole he shouldn't have and didn't approve one that he could have using the same reasoning he used for the one he approved. Print it out and bring the rule with you. It's definitely a hot button for the NHFS officials this year. Later..........Mike

Dan!
Don't tell me you guys wrecked that one already! Geez! I had it made not 3 years ago. If I get a chance I'll stop by and take a look at it. I still have some of the material left from the roll and if it just needs new pieces sewn in maybe we can get it fixed.

Fun Day! Wished I could have looked better. Thanks to Steve and Chris for the coaching.

I sent you guys an email for the links to get your marks included on the Masters Track and Field rankings.

Hi Gang
I posted this on PVP earlier this week but I thought I'd post here as well. I felt it kind of important. Bethesda holds a coaches concussion seminar every second Tuesday of the month if any of you are interested in going to it.
I attended a coach

Here is the interview with Jenn. I got it off of the PVP website.
AN INTERVIEW WITH JENN STUCZYNSKI

http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=3548240

Jenn Stuczynski wants to set the record straight.

The American silver medalist in the pole vault is not a trash talker, as the Russians seem to believe. She's not a bullied victim of an abusive coach, as a legion of Internet fans seem to believe. She's more than happy with her performance.

But Stuczynski is upset that the joy of her medal, won just four years after she first started training for the event, has been swallowed by controversy.

In an emotional interview Friday, the 26-year-old from Fredonia, N.Y., told how words and images taken out of context in the coverage of her duel with gold medalist Yelena Isinbayeva of Russia made the days after Monday's event miserable.

"I was so depressed," Stuczynski said. "It was awful. It's so hard," she continued, fighting back tears without much success. "You work so hard, and people take it away."

The first controversy erupted over a quote Stuczynski gave during a press conference after she won the U.S. Olympic trials in Eugene in July. Asked how she thought the team would do in the Games, Stuczynski said, "I hope we do some damage, and, you know, kick some Russian butt."

It was a rah-rah quote that was mostly forgotten after she said it. "It was me and my teammates, in an emotional moment," Stuczynski said, noting that Russia has five of the top vaulters in the world, and finished 1-3-4 in Beijing. "It was a pep rally, one of those things that was, 'Come on let's go. We're not going to go over there, roll over and die. We want to fight.' "

Stuczynski never meant it as a putdown. "It wasn't intended to be malicious," she said. "It would be pretty stupid of me to come out and say before my first Olympics that, you know what, I'm gonna beat the world record holder."

But the Russian media seized on the quote as a personal insult to Isinbayeva, one of the most popular female athletes in the world who has dominated the event. Much of the rest of the press ran with the story line after Isinbayeva won convincingly, setting a new world record with a jump of 16 feet, 6 3/4 inches.

"I guess in translation it's gotten messed up, and it becomes personal and I'm attacking her and I'm a trash talker," Stuczynski said. "And that's the part that's hurts because that's not it at all."

Isinbayeva helped the narrative at her post-victory press conference. She said Stuczynski's remark motivated her, adding, "She must respect me and know her position. Now she knows it."

Stuczynski couldn't answer her in the press conference, because she had to go through doping control.

That media tempest was a mere squall before what was to come. On the NBC telecast, on tape delay some 12 hours later, the network miked Stuczynski's coach, Rick Suhr, who discovered her on a basketball court four years ago and convinced her to try the pole vault. In the time since, training her and several other athletes in a makeshift facility in Churchville, N.Y., he's coached her to an American record and silver medals in world championships and now the Olympics.

After Stuczynski missed her final attempt at 4.90 meters, the camera followed her to Suhr's spot in the stands. NBC captured the following remarks from a surly sounding Suhr, who was talking to her while text-messaging:

"(It's) the same old same old. You're losing take-off at the big heights. What are you gonna do. You gotta learn to keep take-off. You got9you got caught at that meat grinder. I did not

There was quite a discussion on this very subject on the polvaultpower website. There were also a couple of links to the interviews that Jenn did after the meet. What I read was she didn't have a problem with Rick's conduct. In fact she even said in one of the interviews that when she asks her coach about anything she expects him to give it to her straight. He did exactly that. Now, would I take his approach in the same situation? Heck no. As most of us coaches know you save that stuff for the evening after or the day after. But for crimenie sakes, if your vaulter "wants it straight" and you're in front of a worldwide audience, at least have a big "sh*t eatin'" grin on your face when you're saying it. I watched all 6 hours of both the ladies and mens qualifications and finals and I'm sure those Russian
coaches weren't expounding "warm fuzzies" to their athletes either.Did Suhr act like a jerk? I don't really know but he sure came off as one. Later.............Mike Soule

I'd like more information too. Please call or e-mail me at;

Mike Soule
H. 651-462-0835
C' 651-308-6453

e-mail,  vaultingeezer@yahoo.com

Hi guys and gals. I sent Jamie the following e-mail with questions regarding a street vault. After I sent it I realized I could have posted it here. So anyway, here it is.

How'r ya doin'? I got to thinking last night that a street vault up here in Wyoming might be kinda cool. We have a city celebration every year called Stagecoach Days (it's actually this weekend so I'm looking at next year) and I would like to hold it on the Saturday of the celebration. I'm thinking the biggest crowds would be uptown late afternoon and evening, and the fact that I've got some good lighting, we could hold it during those times. Anyway, I was wonderin' what all needs to be done to put one together. Another question would be do you think anyone would come at this time of year. If you could take a couple of minutes and send back and overview of what's needed, how do you handle insurances, stuff like that I would really appreciate it. I'll look forward to hearing from you.  Later.............Mike

Now the fun begins! Little ones definitely define the meaning of life. Enjoy each moment with "Hank" and the other Lil' Whites that will follow. Nice job you two. By the way........what's his PR? What poles do you have him on? How many step approach do you have him running from? Have you established his mid mark yet?
Later...Mike

For the life of me I can't remember his name but he's the coach over at St. Thomas. He ran the vault at the indoors last year (2006) and went to the pub with all of us afterward. Anyway, he manned the standards with another guy and then he had one of his vaulters (I think) run the clip board. It went as smooth as glass. When all the girls besides two were out, he had the boys warm up in between their jumps. Then with one of the girls trying for a record (I think she was from Chaska) they had the early boy vaulters going in between her jumps. It was very efficient. Very well run.

Chris, the vault went flawlessly on Saturday. The guys did a great job getting through all of the jumpers.

Cool! I'll look forward to seeing them. I like watchin' the good jumpers jump. I did see that John Lund is signed up. It'll be my first time off the ground since October so I'm not expecting much out of me that's for sure. I'm guessin' that it's going to be pretty ugly.

I was looking at the entries and didn't see anyone from
Flight Deck signed up........Is anyone going to be there?