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Pole vaulters display skills at track club event

Posted on Aug. 7th, 2010

Adam Drovetta
GardnerEDGE

The Gardner Track Club displayed their pole-vaulting abilities at the Johnson County Fair as a way to increase publicity for Gardner-Edgerton High School track and to give athletes of all ages an opportunity to showcase their skills.

The event started in the afternoon and went into evening Friday in a parking lot next to the fair grounds. Roughly $400 was raised from the four-hour event, said Kim Loring, who manages the club.

“It was awesome for a first time,” she said. “We actually talked about this last year after we’d gone to El Dorado [for an exhibition].”

Nineteen vaulters, mostly from Gardner and Edgerton, but also from Mill Valley, Louisburg, Baldwin, El Dorado, and even as far as Flagstaff, Ariz., participated in the event

Senior Jamie House of El Dorado had the strongest showing for the girls by vaulting 12’6” in a record-setting performance.

Sophomore Cassie Wait, who was the 2010 girl’s pole-vaulting Class 5A state champion, came one jump short of her personal record with a vault of 11’6.”

On the boy’s side, Gardner-Edgerton senior Casey Bowen had the highest jump at 16’0”. Casey took second in the 2010 state championships to fellow Trailblazer Kyle Wait, who vaulted 15’0” at the exhibition.

“[The event] was a really good idea,” Bowen said, “We really liked it. This just came together in the last few weeks and it turned out pretty good. Hopefully next year we could get some sponsors and get some more vaulters out here.”

Gardner-Edgerton pole-vaulting coach Thane Nonamaker was excited to see the results of the event.

“We had 19 vaulters and I would bet 14 or 15 got personal records,” he said, “Tommy Brady gets a personal record, Casey gets a personal record, those are awesome jumps.”

Loring, Bowen, and Nonamaker each said that they would like to see the exhibition become an annual event.

Here is a list of the participants and their highest vaults:

Kendra Wait- 4’0”

Morgan McIntire-4’6”

Karli Smith-5’0”

Kaden Loring 7’6”

Sarah Doyle 9’6”

Natalie Mitchell-10’0”

Jake McIntire-10’6”

Kyle Stubler-10’6”

Cassie Wait-11’6”

Emily Brigham-12’0”

Jamie House-12’6”

Jake Hamm-12’6”

Jacob Albright-12’6”

Ryan Weisenberger-12’6”

Tommy Brady-15’0”

Kyle Wait-15’0”

Isaac Mallory-15’6”

Casey Bowen 16’0”