When Paulo Benavides and his father/coach Paul hopped into their car for the three-and-a-half hour drive north from El Paso to Albuquerque for an all-comers meet last Saturday (February 7), Paulo had a definite and obvious aim for his evening in the pole vault: Devin King’s year-old High School Indoor Record of 17-10¼.
That specific goal didn’t even make it up to Albuquerque.
“I found out on my way up there, one of my dad’s friends texted him, gave us the heads up, that Deakin Volz had gone 5.45 (17-10½),” said Benavides, a senior at Franklin High (El Paso, Texas). “I knew I had to go 5.46 for the record.”
That was just one moment in what turned into arguably the most remarkable day in the history of American high school boys vaulting. As it turns out, Volz’s national indoor record lasted just a few hours, as Benavides was perfect all the way through 17-11, his fifth bar. He then took three solid attempts at 18-3 as he looked to break King’s absolute record of 18-½ set during the 2014 outdoor season.
“I had some pretty good attempts, I got on top of it,” said Benavides, who has signed to attend Kansas. “It’s just a matter of time, it shouldn’t be long. My whole goal was to get the indoor record. I wanted to start there but my dad convinced me I’d be better off to work up to it.
“It was pretty exciting, I got pretty fired up. That was the big goal this indoor season, I didn’t think it would happen this early, I thought maybe I’d get it at New Balance.”
Instead, in what could become the year of the high school pole vaulter, Benavides moved to the front of a remarkable class. He’s heading to the Milrose Games this weekend, where he’ll compete against his friends Tommy Dial and Armand Duplantis. There are already four vaulters over 17-0 this indoor season, including three Texans: Benavides, China Springs’ Brandon Bray, and Tomball Memorial’s Jacob Wooten.
Texas doesn’t have an indoor state championship meet, but is debuting an outdoor meet of champions this year so he and Wooten can compete for a title against Bray, who is in a smaller classification.
“Texas is loaded,” said Benavides, the product of a former world-class vaulter in his father and an NCAA all-American distance runner for UTEP, Rita Delnoye. “This is definitely the strongest year ever for the vault, the national record getting broken twice in one day.”
Benavides has understandably large goals for the rest of indoor and the long outdoor season ahead. He’s consistently vaulted a foot over his age (he’s 17 now) but goals at this point are higher than 18 feet.
“His training has been going very well,” Paul Benavides said. “I believe he can potentially jump around 18-4 to 18-8 this outdoor season with the right conditions.”
“I haven’t felt like I’ve had one where I put it all together,” Paulo said. “I think 18-6 is a pretty realistic mark. I’m getting there, I’m getting there. I’ve been training really well, it’s just a matter of putting it all together.
“I’m going to jump really high, really soon.”
Source: http://www.trackandfieldnews.com/