Mr Hooker, You Can Be The Best

The Sunday Age

Sunday August 24, 2008

Jessica Halloran

BACKED by the best coach in the world, Olympic champion Steve Hooker believes he can break Sergey Bubka's world record of 6.14 metres. Alex Parnov, too, is confident Hooker's technique will see him eclipse that mark set by Bubka in Italy in 1994.

"That's something I'd like to do in the future, and that I'm aiming for," Hooker said. "Sergey's still the legend and I'm just a newbie. I'm going to try and do what I can to be as good as he was."

Bubka won six straight world titles, gold at the 1988 Seoul Olympics, and broke the world record 35 times - indoor and outdoor.

Under Parnov's guidance Hooker has become an Olympic gold medallist, set a new Olympic record of 5.96m, and is only the 15th man in history to clear the pole-vaulting holy grail of six metres.

"The chance is there [to break the world record]," Parnov said, before the Games. "But I feel that, sooner or later, it's going to happen in Steve's career."

The coach, who emigrated to Australia after the 1996 Olympics, and has guided the careers of world champion Dimitri Markov, former world record-holder Emma George, and Olympic silver medallist Tatiana Grigorieva, started overhauling Hooker's technique at the start of 2007.

Hooker describes Parnov as the "best pole-vault coach in the world". The major changes were made to Hooker's run-up and his grip, and because of the adjustments he had a patchy season last year, but recently he has found the key ingredient - "consistency".

"I've been trying to get it so my technique is stable, so I can get it for the next four years," Hooker said.

"The way I used to jump was just aggression and sort of rawness, it would be really sore on my body the next day; after competitions now I feel like I could jump again. Things are way more in control, way more technical, I think that's a much smarter way of going about it."

The other major change has been dealing with pressure. He wasn't flustered when he stared at exiting these Olympics five times.

"I don't think about consequences of missing or clearing," Hooker said. "I didn't think about the interviews I'd have to do if I missed and came fifth at the Olympics. It's something that in the past I had worried about.

"I was just in the moment. I was enjoying it, I was loving being in a dog-fight with [main rival] Evgeny [Lukyanenko].

"I think that was the difference. I loved having third-attempt clearances. I loved it all being on the line."

To qualify in the preliminary round, Hooker cleared 5.65 metres on his final attempt.

In the final he made 5.80, 5.85 and the golden 5.90 all on his third and final attempts. Yet he could see a positive in this.

"I was knocking all the nervous energy out," Hooker said. "I started to jump technically well and that's what got me through in the end."

Before his successful gold medal attempt at 5.90, Hooker paused to enjoy the experience.

"I took a moment before jumping at 5.90 and I just sat back and realised I was doing something that every kid dreams of," Hooker said.

"I had my destiny in my own hands. Evgeny was out of the competition, if I clear that bar I'm an Olympic gold medallist and I did think I was the kind of person that could stand up and take that sort of opportunity on. To have done it is a dream come true."

MEN'S POLE VAULT

GOLD

Steve Hooker AUS5.96m

SILVER

Evgeny Lukyanenko RUS5.85

BRONZE

Denys Yurchenko UKR 5.70