There are certain levels of achievement that serve at various times as targets for athletes. These levels sometimes attain a Holy Grail status of sorts, considered nearly impossible, but still desirable and motivating.
Of course, perhaps the most well-known example of this sort of record would be the quest for the four-minute-mile. For many years, it was considered impossible for a human being to cover a mile in less than four minutes.
Experts in human physiology and veteran coaches and observers of running steadfastly proclaimed that a sub-four-minute-mile would never happen, yet when Bristish-er Robert Bannister ran 3:59.4 in 1954, after years of the mark being chased unsuccessfully by distance runners, it took less than two months before Bannister’s mark was bettered.
The current world record of 3:43.13 in 1999 is over 16 seconds faster than Bannister’s time and a few women have gotten tantalizingly close to the four-minute mile, the record currently being a 4:12.56 established in 1996.
A look at the list of the fastest 10 recorded times for both men and women in the mile, however, contains no Australians, which might indicate a preference for fight over flight, so we will switch to another event where seemingly unassailable records have fallen, and at least one Australian has had an impact: pole vaulting.
We will be looking a bit at Steve Hooker, who hails from Melbourne and won the gold medal at the Beijing Olympics in 2008.
At one time, the mark to which all pole vaulters aspired, but could not quite crack, for year after year, was 18 feet, or in most of the world, 5.4864 metres. The world record had been established in 1969 at 5.44 metres (17’ 10-1/4”). In 1973, an American by the name of Steve Smith broke the barrier indoors, and that seemed to erase the physical/psychological barrier that had thwarted all previous attempts.
This breakthrough, and the move towards complete metrification of track and field events, created a new target: six metres.
Steve Hooker is one of five men who have cleared above six metres indoors, his personal best of 6.06 m putting him in third place, .09 m (3-1/2 inches) behind the immortal Sergey Bubka, who was to pole vaulting what Makybe Diva or Black Caviar was to horse racing, Tony Lockett to footy, or Rod Laver to tennis. By going over six metres, Hooker was one of the key participants in chasing a new Holy Grail target for pole vaulters, 6.096 m (20 feet), a mark that has only been achieved three times, twice by Sergey Bubka in 1993 and 1994, and once by Frenchman Renaud Lavillenie in early 2014.
To the casual observer, it might seem as though achieving some certain height record in pole vaulting would be simple. If you want to go higher, simply use a longer pole.
This is a valid observation in a manner of speaking. It is true that the poles used have gotten longer over the years, which has been possible due to two factors. Technology has developed longer, lighter, more flexible poles.
At the beginning of competitive pole vaulting, poles were made of solid ash, which gave way to bamboo, which was replaced by tubular aluminum, which in turn was replaced by fiberglass and carbon fibre composites in use today.
That has resulted in lighter, longer poles, but the other of the two factors that have produced higher vaults, the more important of the two, is the athletes themselves.
It takes great speed, strength and coordination to plant the poles and bend them, as well as to control the energy generated by the pole attempting to return to its original shape. Anyone who doubts this need only look at the physique of Steve Hooker, along with the fact that he was capable of running sub-eleven second times in the 100 m sprint, to put to rest any claims that height in pole vaulting is simply a function of pole length.
Back to Steve Hooker, he came from an athletic background. His mother Erica was a 1972 Olympian and a 1978 silver medalist in the Commonwealth Games. His father William ran the 800 m and 4 x 400 m relay at the 1974 Commonwealth Games, along with winning four national crowns.
Born 16 July 1982, Steve Hooker did not compete internationally at the upper levels until 2006. He had participated in the World Junior Championships held in Chile in 2000, coming away with a fourth place finish for his efforts.
He emerged as a force in 2006 at the Commonwealth Games in his hometown, although he had earlier relocated to Perth. That same year he won the World Cup in Athens, providing glimpses of his ability, but 2007 had nothing beyond a third place finish in the World Athletics Final in Stuttgart.
2008 began inauspiciously, with another third placing in the World Indoor Championships in Spain. His bronze medal was one of two medals for Australia, the other being gold by Tamsyn Lewis in the women’s 800 m. Hooker’s season best of 5.80 m came in behind American Brad Walker’s 5.85 m personal best and Russia’s Yevgeniy Lukyarenko’s 5.90 m, which led the world up to that point in the season.
Just a few short months later, however, Lukyanenko could not match his 5.9 m from the World Indoors and even dropped to no better than 5.85, whilst hooker was able to take the gold medal by exceeding his World Indoor performance with a height of 5.96 m.
He would remain at the top in 2009, with a gold medal in the IAAF World Championships and another in the 2010 IAAF World Indoor Championships. With golds in the Olympics, World Indoor and Outdoor Championships, Hooker had essentially bagged the triple crown of pole vaulting.
He would add two more first place finishes in 2010, The Continental Cup in Croatia and the Commonwealth Games in New Delhi. His win in Beijing in 2008, along with the World Indoor and Continental Cup in 2010, all represent records for those events.
Hooker struggled beyond 2010 and eventually decided it was finally time to move on in April of 2014. In an interview, he spoke of hanging on in the hopes of finishing on a high note, but as many athletes at many levels can attest, there is often a disconnect betwixt was the mind is capable of envisioning and what the body is capable of producing.
He was living in Melbourne once again and got married to middle distance runner Yekaterina Kostestskaya, whom he met at the Olympics in Beijing in 2008 and married in 2012. They have a son, Maxim, who was born 2013. The latest reports have the family living in Phoenix, Arizona.
