University Track Nationals

March 14th

So in this, my last year of university, nationals were held in Windsor, Ontario. Because most of the meets throughout the years have been either in Toronto or Windsor it didn’t feel like nationals until I’d look at the corner full of Calgarian athletes or Dalhousie students. The feeling for me this time around was especially different. Since I hadn’t competed in pole-vault since before Christmas, and hadn’t started jogging till the week after provincials, I was more worried about not embarrassing myself then living up to any expectations. The day of I started warming up an hour and 45 minutes early in order to find my long approach mark and get comfortable but ended up just jumping twice from the short approach since my foot was bothering me. After spending some time with “the message” and hearing the rules from the official the meet began. My teammate Vuk pulled out of the meet in warm up because of an injury but I still had coach James, Guelph athletes, my mom and Sarah there supporting. The first height was 4m35 and I made it over on my first attempt. I swung back too fast on my next jump and hit the crossbar off at 4m50 but made it on my second attempt. That was my last successful height and tied me for 7th place, one up from my ranking and good for 1.5 points. Guelph had another great year overall as the men got bronze, just 1.5 points ahead of Manitoba and the women missed first place by a single point.
I am extremely grateful that I was able to compete this weekend and enjoy the thrill of pole vaulting and the pleasure of travelling with the team one more time before I graduate. Vuk, although unable to jump this time, will recover soon and may compete at the Pan American games this summer.

this is the 4m35 jump: