Mondo MF Duplantis...WR

You rarely see a coach take the fastest kid on the team and put them in a field event (maybe long jump). Mondo is a special case of a kid that always wanted to be a pole vaulter, and he hit the genetic lottery by just happening to grow up and be one of the fastest pole vaulters ever. Let's not forget he ran 10.5 as a high school senior in the 100.

His father Greg was also probably one of the top 5 fastest pole vaulters of all time as well. His big problem was that he was about 5-5. But Mondo lucked out and is the tallest of all his brothers at around 5-11.

Then there is the part where pole vault is second nature to him because he has been doing it since he was about 5. So at 20 there are very few technical things he has to work on. At this point he can just focus on strength, speed, and getting on bigger poles.

Most sprinters reach their PRs around 26. Imagine if he is a 10.2 speed guy in 6 years? 6.40?

Wow I didn't realize that Mondo was now 5'11". I still remember the little guy with the big pole :) Thanks for the insight...that 10.5 was kind of a mind-boggle, what an all-around stud athlete, would be a great decathlete.

I guess I’m not cool enough to go around talking about meters. Must be a Millennial thing. Sitting around in a coffee shop talking about how we Americans should convert our feet/inches thinking to something foreign. A huge majority of Americans have no idea what 6.17 meters. Dang, aren’t you so superior to us.

does USA need to take a hard look at their olympic selection process?

Alabama BSS wrote:

I guess I’m not cool enough to go around talking about meters. Must be a Millennial thing. Sitting around in a coffee shop talking about how we Americans should convert our feet/inches thinking to something foreign. A huge majority of Americans have no idea what 6.17 meters. Dang, aren’t you so superior to us.

Naw man, not a millennial thing, it's a every country but the USA, Myanmar and Liberia thing.

Breaking world records since age 6:

https://twitter.com/Statman_Jon/status/1226321711810990080

brrrrr wrote:

unreal and he's only 19? 20? we should acknowledge that the PV is a young event but this kid is special

27 years later 2cm higher than Bubka. Although Bubka could have gone 6.20 if he wanted.

Bubka raised the record by 13cm over his career.

Who knows, maybe duplantis can get as high as 6.30 some day.

He must be vegetarian.

Eat more Tofu. wrote:

He must be vegetarian.

There are no vegetarians in acadiana.

Is is 124 years considered young? wrote:

Alabama BSS wrote:

I guess I’m not cool enough to go around talking about meters. Must be a Millennial thing. Sitting around in a coffee shop talking about how we Americans should convert our feet/inches thinking to something foreign. A huge majority of Americans have no idea what 6.17 meters. Dang, aren’t you so superior to us.

Naw man, not a millennial thing, it's a every country but the USA, Myanmar and Liberia thing.

Even the US military has left the civilian US behind on this. Don't expect them to defend the mile, they don't use it.

I’d say he’s probably one of the best athletes in track and field currently. I can see him killing a decathlon

The thing that stands out to me about his form has always been the explosiveness of his tuck. If you watch the slow-mo videos, you can see just after the take-off, he gets his knees so far up into a tuck and explodes out of it so well. He gets the craziest hip height out of all that vertical motion.

All in all, this is great record by a European athlete, keeping the world record in Europe, and making the European area record 6.17m while Kendricks keep the North American/Central American area record at 6.06m.

Europe has had the world record since 1980. 40 years now!

vaultpurple wrote:

Let's not forget he ran 10.5 as a high school senior in the 100.

10.57 +2.1. The fastest non-wind illegal result I can find for him is 10.69, which has no wind information (meaning it’s 10.69*). He’s a 10.7-10.8 guy at his very best.

vaultpurple wrote:

Most sprinters reach their PRs around 26. Imagine if he is a 10.2 speed guy in 6 years? 6.40?

Mondo isn’t a sprinter, nor is he training as one. He probably won’t improve at all. 10.7 is still impressive speed for a vaulter; there’s no reason to exaggerate and overhype his athleticism.

His speed down the runway with a pole in his hands is faster now than it was in high school, and that is all that actually matters.

No, he's just hot as LIVING HELL.