Masters athletes set records galore at Pole Vault Summit
Posted January 10th, 2008 at 5:24 PM by Martha Jones
Section: News & Results, Track & Field
Masters athletes shredded the record books over the weekend as a half-dozen competitors set a total of eight world indoor records at the 18th annual National Pole Vault Summit in Reno, Nevada.
Some 60 Masters men and women as old as 72 were among 2,400 athletes racing down a dozen elevated runways arrayed like spokes of a bicycle at Reno’s Livestock Events Center.
In the elite men’s division Friday, American record holder Jeff Hartwig led the way — becoming the first over-40 jumper to clear 18 feet in legitimate competition. Jumping 5.50 meters/18 feet .50 inch, Hartwig broke a record only an hour old. In a separate competition, longtime rival Pat Manson of Colorado (who also turned 40 in late 2007), upped the listed world indoor record twice, finally to 5.36m/17-7.
On other pits Friday, four other Masters jumpers were setting their own age-group records — all world indoor bests (pending ratification by World Masters Athletics):
National champion Paul Babits of Indiana, a 47-year-old who runs a pole vault camp in Fort Wayne, raised his own M45 world indoor record to 5.01m/16-5.25.
2001 world masters champion Jeff Kingstad of Wisconsin, a former scuba-diving teacher in the Cayman Islands, cleared 4.11m/13-6) at age 55 to better the previous standard of 4.10m/13-5.25 set five years ago. Kingstad’s clearance came on a rare fourth attempt allowed as a tiebreaker since he was in a jump-off for first place.
Retired engineer John Altendorf, a 61-year-old from Corvallis, Ore., upped his own M60 world indoor record to 4.00m/13-1.50, and remains the oldest man to clear 13 feet.
And finally, Donna Schultz of Portland, Ore., made sure the men didn’t have all the fun — erasing one of Phil Raschker’s countless world records. Schultz, who turned 50 last September, cleared 3.07m/10-0.75) to top Phil’s listed W50 world indoor record of 3.06m/10.50 set at nationals in 2000.
For more information on the 2008 Pole Vault Summit in Reno, visit: ttp://www.polevaultsummit.com/
Via: USA Track & Field
Written By: Tom Surber
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Tags: Jeff Hartwig, masters athlete, nevada, paul babits, pole vault, pole vault summit, reno, track and field
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The Final Sprint
Thanks for posting the USATF release, but Tom Surber didn’t write it. He tweaked a version I alerted him to: My track blog on Masters Athlete Web site:
http://www.masters-athlete.com/public/478.cfm
January 10th, 2008 at 11:18 pm