Vaulting in the Big Leagues

One more week of class and then a week of finals (of which i have the last possible final date and will be back on the 19th at 8pm) i am getting rather restless and ready to move onto my new classes (chemical engineering 2, biological anthropology, comparative literature of international short stories, physics 2, and multivariable calc, yes all very fun and exciting sounding)

as far as practice goes i have been struggling a bit. Between excessive engineering presentations every day last week and being sick and whatnot i felt like i have not been accomplishing a lot. also i felt as though whenever i was there the vault coach wasn’t and when i wasn’t he was. i was getting rather frustrated and unmotivated. that was until today. practice started poorly, although i was finally there at the same time as my coach, i was getting off the ground about 0% of the time. as practice wore on i got a little aggravated, i was told to keep my focus and that it would come to me eventually. i moved down a pole, got in the air, then the next jump i went over the bungee. my coach could see that i was still not fully confident so after everyone had stopped vaulting he challenged me to an impromptu meet, against him. and out of nowhere i was doing much better than I have been on a bigger pole than i had been on for the majority of the year. i ended up losing but i had a lot of fun and it got me to remember how enjoyable vaulting is and how great competition can be when you have fun with it. so to all of you that may be losing focus and or faith in the vault, stick in there, it always finds a way back to you.

good luck with finals other collegians, and happy winter to all!

<3 erinn

First semester of sophmore year has gone by so fast. i am kinda the opposite of chrissy because track wise i am a sophmore but academically i am basically a freshman. i delared my major at the end of last year so this is my first semester taking all the classes i need to take. its fun being in classes with all freshman and trying to help them out.

as far as track goes it is going pretty well. this year we got a new assistant coach, i think that some of you may know him, Coach Hoogasian. after a week of miscommunications and settling in i think that we are off to a good start. Coach Hoogasian is really good at getting athletes in the right mind set to do their best, when somone is frustrated and its making them vault worse he can usually talk some sense into them which is a huge help. he is also really injury sensitive which is good because the majority of our team was injured by the end of last season.

speaking of which, last week i didnt vault at all because i hurt my lower left back. its a pretty old injury actually. i got it in indoor season last year from vaulting a few feet under and noone realizing it for a practice or two. over the summer i tryed to not vault alot and strenghen/stretch my back. unfortunately my first day of vault practice here my back hurt worse than it did before, or i wasnt used to it. so i went to the trainer and i am doing all kinds of fun physical therapy. i didnt vault last week and this week i am going every other day. tuesday was the first day i vaulted pain free and i had an awesome time. it really helped me refocus. before that i was getting pretty frustrated. its no fun having your body not work when you are mentally prepared to do something.so learn from my mistake and get your injurys properly looked at in a reasonable time frame.

well i am off to take a physics test, i hope everyone is doing well!

yesterday was so nice and warm out. it made me think of summer at patriot pv. i CAN’T wait for summer vaulting. i am looking forward to seeing you all this summer and eating lots of ice cream. oh yah, and vaulting. to sum up: warm, sun, vaulting, ice cream=

thats all for now!

ok well this season has gone by fast. i feel like it just started but it looks like tomorrow will be my last meet of indoor. i will miss it because it is nice and warm indoors and there is no wind. I will be at BU for the valentines day invitational, if any of you go then i look forward to seeing you.

well there has not been alot going on as far as vaulting goes. pretty much the same old stuff. the one thing that i have changed (no killing me when i say this) is that i have widened my grip a fist from my tiny grip. now it is a forearm and a fist. i will never go back to the whole arm thing that i used to do dont worry. the thing was that my coach, mark, noticed that i was having trouble staying square and i was kinda turning funny so he thought if i widened my grip a smidge that it would help. it was the first time he had ever told anyone to widen their grip. it was really awkward at first but it really has helped my control. i have very small forearms so my grip was reallllly small before. i guess i just never noticed. i will just have to remember to jump up and not lock my bottom arm like i used to. i hope that it helps me at this meet. i realllllly want to pr!

well i have to go now because me and a few of my friends have to go to the basketball game to be recognized at half time for getting good grades. i think its to prove that athletes are dumb. i just think its embarassing but there is free food so you know i cant say no.

have a good weekend all!

<3erinn

hello all i have not written in a long time but here it is. so this weekend i was at reno. it rocked, it was awesome to see all those vaulters in one place. you all must come next year so that we can rival vertical assault (they had like 100 ppl). so i FINALLY turned over and got a new pr! i was pretty pumped. it was a good end to a wonderful weekend. i hope to see you all there at some point. so now i am back at school for wintersession where all i do is eat run and sleep. i am about to head off to my second practice of the day. i am getting to concentrate on vaulting alot more now so i am pretty happy about it. i hope that all of your seasons are going well!

stay healthy and happy!

remember to have fun. vaulting is supposed to be fun! negativity will weight you down and u need to go high!!

<3 erinn

Hello again.

i haven’t written in awhile but i have been very busy. this past week was a recovery week because all of a sudden there were alot of injuries on the team so we did alot of long runs to recover and lots of core and stuff like that. Monday was our only real workout which was stadiums (my favorite). we did time trials on wednesday. everyone had to run the 300m or the 600m. i opted for the 300m because in real life track i run about 20m. the 300m wasnt as bad as i thought it would be and i kind of regret not doing the 330 hurdles in high school. vaulting has been good here. i am on a pole that is too heavy for me but i am getting along with it now. i have done mostly drills but i made a few full approaches and it went ok. i ordered some poles and they came in on friday so i will be able to use them on tuesday (i vault tuesday and thursday after practice and do pole runs on wednesdays) i will finally be able to do full vaults!

i have learned a few good things recently. we do this drill that is just rowing that has really helped me to understand the timing of the row and how to do it. there is a good chance that we did it at patriot but i just never did it. it is very simple, you just plant and when the pole is vertical you row to your side which will send you flying to the back of the mat. you can tell if you time it right because you will speed up. this was helpful to me because i have a hard time turning over because i dont keep my hands moving but now i get it.

well thats all for now!

<3 erinn (the cooler mentor than forrest)

well this week started out with a pretty rough workout. (or at-least i thought so) we had to do stadiums (aka run up and down all of the stairs in the football stadium for 5 minutes) times 4. our rest was sprinting up the bleachers 3 times. since it was a short week i only lifted 2 days which was nice. wednesday we did core stuff. lots of things with medicine balls and hurdles. thursday we did event work so i got to vault. my poles have been ordered and are on their way i even get a baby 100 lb 11’6” to play with!! friday was 300m times 6. i was initially not very thrilled with this workout but by the end i wasn’t as tired as i had been weeks before so i think all this working out is actually helping.

i have two tests early this week so i have been trying to get some studying in for them. i managed to get in enough study time and still have time to dance in the rain. (yah im that cool) i think my test that i had on tuesday went pretty well but i havent gotten the grade back yet.

 as for the logistics of “being on my own” it’s not that bad. i did help sean do his laundry for the first time this week which was pretty funny because we have been here two months.

well that’s about it. i hope everyone is doing well!

? erinn

PS i saw the HUGEST crawfish on the track on friday. it was a very strange thing to see on a track

Hey im erinn. and i dont use correct capitalization or punctuation or spelling as you will soon be able to tell. i went to nashoba regional highschool and now i go to Umass amherst. i am currently undeclared. and i do TRACK! ok well now that thats overwith i will give you a brief overview of my college experience thus far. as far as academics go i am doing pretty well at this point. i have a TON of reading to do because i am in more classes than they (who they are i dont know) suggest. but it is all manageable if i stay on top of it and dont get behind. my first exam is tomorrow in my nutrition class (i am taking a break from studying to write this!!) so i hope that that goes well. so far track is awesome. i dont really know how i would have gotten used to school without it. it instantly groups you with people that you will inevitably become friends with and provides you with a sort of community. and we get really cool stuff. (ex. new shoes, clothes, a nutritionist, trainer, academic councilors, free tutors, weight coach, the list gets longer by the day) on the other hand there are a few unexpected drawbacks (shortened winter vacation) the workouts pretty much go as follows: monday: some type of interesting run workout like hills or resistance running. tuesday: core workout, hurdle drills, jump rope, sprints in the grass with no shoes. wednesday: some type of sprint workout with a 20 min cooldown run. thursday: plyometrics. friday: repeat 350m or 400m sometimes in relay form. also i go to the gym monday wednesday friday. monday is legs (squats, step ups and more fun stuff) wednesday is arms, and friday is a mix. things that i have learned about track: you will never be as sore as you are the first week, eat more than an hour before you run, running barefoot is fun, get sleep!!! i have only vaulted 2 times since i have been here but they were both enjoyable experiences. mostly just progressing from 1-3 steps. this week we are officially in pre season and can start vaulting more! ok well i am pretty sure i should keep studying so bye! i will be more indepth later!!