However, there are a number of points in the event’s history where progression wasn’t guaranteed. The Pole Vault is no exception, in both the men’s and women’s data a general increase in vault height can be seen throughout the data. We’ve seen some stalling in female events due to an era of performance enhancing drugs but generally average performances have increased over time. Over the course of the events we’ve investigated we’ve come to expect almost perpetual progression. ![]() Unfortunately she was unable to compete in Rio because of the ban on Russian athletes. The same has been said of his female equivalent Yelena Isinbayeva - the current world record holder. His success was attributed to his great strength and gymnastic ability. Sergey Bubka is the stand-out competitor from Pole Vaulting history, breaking the world record 17 times over the course of his career. Despite his domination of the sport, he won only a single Olympic gold. In this short time, the women’s event has been dominated by three nations - Germany, the U.S.A and Russia. We weren’t able to collect reliable data before 1991 so our data-set only progresses from this date. In the women’s data one thing is immediately very clear. The International Association of Athletics Federations only recognised the event in 1994 - astonishingly recent. The U.S.S.R, Poland and Germany begin to take a large share of top performances and in the modern era the U.S.A has less than 20% of the share of top performances. In the early part of the 20th century their domination was supreme - around 80% of the top athletes were from the U.S.A.įrom the middle of the 20th century other nations begin to compete with the U.S.A’s dominance. Of all the data we have, over 50% of records are for an American athlete. It is clear from the men’s datasheet that the USA have, historically, absolutely dominated the event. Visit our datasheets by clicking on the images below. Visit our datasheets!įor a description of the sections of the datasheet and how to interpret them please see our original article on the 100 metre sprint. Let’s have a look at the history of the pole vault data to see how things have changed. Over time the construction of the vaulting pole has changed significantly and it’s a big factor in the performance in the event. Poles are built with different stiffness and weight limits so an athlete can tune them to their style and size. Constructed from layered fibre glass, it is designed to bend and store energy very efficiently. The modern vaulting pole is a very complex piece of equipment. Pole vaulting has ended up as a fiendishly technical event. This historical version of pole vaulting has also evolved into a competitive sport. Historically, pole vaulting was used to cover horizontal distances (across canals, ditches or spans of water) rather than gaining vertical height. The competitor that is able to clear the greatest height is the winner. Competitors use a pole (between 3 to 5 metres long) to clear a bar set at a specified height. that which we see in the Olympics) is a competition based on vertical height.
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