FROM RUSSIA WITH ALTITUDE : Sergei Bubka Has Brought Such Style to the Vault That He Seems Poles Apart

Vitaly Petrov, who has become the most prominent pole vaulting coach in the Soviet Union, remembers well his first meeting with Vasily Bubka.

“When he came to the school and said he wanted to become a pole vaulter, I told him to stay out of track and field,” Petrov said of that morning in 1975 when Bubka applied to the sports institute in Voroshilovgrad, a city on the southeastern border of the Ukraine.

“He was 14, which is a rather late age to begin pole vaulting,” Petrov said through an interpreter during an interview last weekend in Chicago. “Besides, his physical abilities were such that it didn’t encourage me to take him seriously.

“You see, he did not seem to have any of the physical abilities for pole vaulting. I told him to try acting or singing or shooting. But then he said he was Sergei’s brother.

“I said, ‘Why didn’t you say so? Come in.’ ”

A year earlier, Sergei Bubka had been persuaded to enter the sports institute by a neighbor who made pole vaulting sound like a daring and challenging way to spend afternoons after school.

Petrov had no doubts about Sergei’s potential. Even though he was only 10, he already was stronger and more coordinated than many older boys, including his brother. Sergei was a natural.

“One could see at first glance that, physically, he was very good,” Petrov said. “He had good coordination and was good emotionally. What still had to be determined was whether he was serious as an athlete. Sergei was very serious.”

Sergei’s first recorded height in 1975 was 8 feet 10 inches, but he improved so dramatically that Petrov had difficulty staying ahead of his precocious student.

“Sergei has very often performed techniques even better than he was taught,” Petrov said. “He had a creative approach.

“It’s as if you teach phonetics or grammar. In grading the pupil, you feel he does better than expected. So when you start the next lesson, you give him a more challenging assignment than you would an ordinary student. But that also forces the teacher to be more creative.

“He had one pattern of run-up (approach). I didn’t like it. I told him to do it a different way. He began to practice the run-up that morning and came again in the evening to do more. In one day, it already was as if he had always used that pattern of run-up.”

Between the ages of 13 and 14, Sergei increased the height of his vaults from 11-9 3/4 to 14-5. For the next four years, he managed to stay ahead of his age, clearing 15-9 when he was 15, 16-8 3/4 when he was 16, 17-8 1/2 when he was 17 and 18-2 1/2 when he was 18.

But even though his results were impressive, he had made little impression outside the Soviet Union.

In his only international competition before 1983, he finished seventh in the 1981 European junior championships with a disappointing jump of 16-4 3/4.

He has seldom been disappointed since.

In the 1983 world championships at Helsinki, Bubka stunned a field that included four 19-foot vaulters by winning the gold medal with a personal record 18-8.

He has only gone up from there.

In 1984, he broke the world indoor record three times, once in The Times Indoor Games at the Forum, and the world outdoor record four times.

The only pole vaulter who has ever had a better year was Norway’s Charles Hoff, who broke the world indoor record 10 times in 1926, the final time at 13-8. Hoff also broke the world record four times outdoors.

American Bob Seagren is the only other vaulter who has broken the world record 14 times, eight indoors and six outdoors, in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. American Billy Olson has not broken a world record outdoors but has broken the world indoor mark 11 times, four times since Dec. 28. He holds the current indoor record of 19-5 1/2.

That is the record that Bubka has come to the United States this winter to challenge. After competing last weekend in New York and Rosemont, Ill., he will continue his tour Friday night in The Times/GTE Indoor Games at the Forum and Sunday afternoon in the Michelob Invitational at San Diego’s Sports Arena before returning to New York for the Mobil/TAC indoor championships Feb. 28.

Bubka and Olson are scheduled to vault in all three of the remaining meets. Also entered is Vasily, Bubka’s brother, who despite the physical limitations he displayed as a teen-ager jumped 19-2 last year, higher than any other Soviet vaulter other than Sergei. One other Soviet, Konstantin Volkov, has jumped as high.

The next time Sergei sets a world record, it will be his 11th since January of 1984. Unless Olson sets another record before Bubka, they will be tied. Olson is 27, Bubka 22.

Tom Jennings, who manages the Pacific Coast Club, which includes American vaulters Olson, Earl Bell and Brad Pursley, is impressed as much by Bubka’s style as by his results.

“Not many people have his charisma, especially not many of the Soviets,” Jennings said. “He has charisma, but it comes from his power rather than from his showmanship. He radiates strength. You see him coming down the runway, gritting his teeth and putting every ounce of his energy into going for it. The other athletes are very impressed by Bubka. I think there was a time when you could say they were in awe of him.”

Never was that more evident than last July, when Bubka became the first man to clear six meters with a jump of 19-8 in Paris. It was voted Track & Field News’ performance of the year for 1985.

French vaulter Thierry Vigneron compared the jump to Bob Beamon’s long jump of 29-2 1/2 in the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, a record that still stands.

But Bubka has predicted he will jump 20-0 before the end of this year and said he expects to jump between 20-4 and 20-8 before the end of his career.

Olson was low in more ways than one that day in Paris.

“I got beat by a foot and four inches,” Olson told Dave Rosner of Newsday. “That’s pretty sad. Brad Pursley and I were both sitting there looking at each other and saying, ‘Well, it’s time to go play golf.’

“Crud, man, both of us got humiliated. I didn’t think at that time I was ever going to be able to come back and duplicate that kind of mark, and I told Sergei that. That was a pretty hopeless feeling because I never felt like that before.”

But while Bubka was embarrassing his competitors, he also was blazing a trail to greater heights. For that, he unblushingly takes a bow.

“The world record has changed several times recently due to the progress I’ve made for the last two years,” he said through an interpreter Tuesday during a Los Angeles press conference.

“I’ve shown to the other athletes that it’s possible to jump higher and higher. I’ve broken the psychological barrier for all of the other athletes, and now they are not afraid to jump six meters.”

If that sounds egotistical, so be it. There also is much truth in what he says.

“Sergei revolutionized pole vaulting,” Olson said. “It was a matter of adapting with him or getting out.”

Bubka not only was the first vaulter to switch to a 17-foot pole, he also held it higher than anyone else.

Olson noticed that for the first time in the 1984 Times Indoor Games, when he equalled his career best with a jump of 19-0 and lost to Bubka, who jumped 19-1 1/2. It was the first time anyone had cleared 19 feet and lost.

“He came over and asked me if I was jumping on a five-meter pole, which is 16-5,” Olson said. “I said, ‘Yeah,’ and he just started laughing. ‘Ha, ha, ha.’ He just thought that was the funniest thing ever. ‘You mean you’re jumping that high on a five-meter pole? Ha, ha, ha.’ ”

Since then, most of the other vaulters have begun using slightly longer poles. Olson’s, for instance, are 16-6. More significantly, they are holding the poles higher. Olson has raised his grip from 15-9 to 16-5. But he still cannot match Bubka, who holds his pole at 16-9 1/2.

The advantage, American vaulter Mike Tully told Track & Field News last year, is that “the higher you hold on the pole, the less it takes to move forward to get vertical where you can land in the pit.”

Bubka has continued to experiment. In order to raise his grip even higher, he occasionally uses 17-2 poles and has talked about switching to 17-3 poles, which are made to accommodate men who weigh 220 pounds. Bubka, a 6-footer, weighs 176 pounds.

Although it might be assumed that it would take extraordinary strength for Bubka to negotiate a pole of that length, his technique and speed are more beneficial. He has better than average strength for a man his size, but it is his 10.2-second speed in the 100 meters that separates him from the other vaulters.

That does not mean he is unbeatable. Since Olson began holding the pole at 16-5 in January’s Sunkist Invitational at the Sports Arena, he has broken the world indoor mark three times, renewing his confidence. For the first time in six meetings, Olson beat Bubka last Friday night at the Millrose Games.

“He no-heighted,” Olson said. “But dang, I beat him.” Olson cleared 19-0.

Bubka was not impressed.

In each of his three stops in the United States this winter, Bubka, has told reporters that he does not respect Olson’s athletic ability and has denigrated Olson’s world records by remarking that all of them were set in U.S. indoor meets.

“I don’t think his potential is very good,” Bubka said in Rosemont Sunday. “He is not strong enough to go six meters. I don’t think he will jump very high in the future.”

As for the other American vaulters, Bubka said: “I like Mike Tully. He can perform at world championships. Earl Bell has the same qualities. Joe Dial is a very fine fellow. I like him. But they all have to improve one step further. I don’t feel any of them can challenge me if I feel all right and the conditions are correct.”

Olson said that Bubka’s outspokenness represents a personality change, one that is not necessarily for the better.

“Since 1984, Sergei has said he doesn’t like Pierre Quinon one bit,” Olson said. “Maybe it’s because Pierre is the (1984) Olympic champion. Pierre has something that Sergei doesn’t have. Now, he’s belittling me. Maybe it’s because he considers me a threat.

“The guy has had nothing but success. He’s never experienced failure. You’ve got to face failure and have yourself humbled before you can become a well-rounded person.”

This definitely is not the same Bubka who first visited the United States in the winter of 1984. Then, he was barely 20, spoke little English and seemed shy, following in the shadow of Volkov, an older, more worldly Soviet pole vaulter.

“He had to be nervous about being here in 1984,” Jennings said. “You know everything Soviets are told about Americans. But he knows now that Americans aren’t anti-Soviet or anti-Sergei Bubka.

“He also knows the people here know who he is. When he was here the first time, he was somebody new. Now, he’s full of self-confidence.”

He is the most dominant of the five Soviet athletes on tour, both in terms of athletic ability and personality. He speaks English well enough that his coach, Petrov, has used him as an interpreter on occasion.

But in interviews, Bubka insists on speaking through the group’s official interpreter, Lyudmilla Potanich, an English teacher from Moscow.

Bubka, though, has all of the answers.

Upon arriving at New York’s LaGuardia Airport last week, he said: “I don’t like New York. There are so many contrasts. You see outstanding luxury and, at the same time, people living in poverty. The skyscrapers make you feel like a prisoner. In the Soviet Union, our cities are much cleaner. I’m not used to seeing so much garbage in the streets and so little green.”

That, however, did not prevent Bubka from shopping in New York. He asked the wife of an American track and field official whether Bloomingdale’s has better blue jeans than Macy’s.

Bubka has been equally candid on other subjects, particularly those concerning the conditions at U.S. indoor meets. He doesn’t like plywood runways, preferring the Tartan surfaces of Europe, or the small pits, which he considers dangerous, or crowds that aren’t absolutely quiet when he is preparing to jump. He is accustomed to being the center of attention.

Asked in Rosemont if he considers pole vaulters eccentric, which is their reputation, he said: “When I was in New York, I looked at the American pole vaulters and saw the conditions under which they compete, and I thought, ‘They must be crazy.’ ”

But even though Bubka’s comments to the media make him appear arrogant, that is a side of him that is not evident in his personal relationships. He includes among his friends several American pole vaulters who describe him as friendly and even playful.

From his unruly blond hair, his plain, boyish face and his lively green eyes, which always appear to be searching for another curiosity, down to his nail-bitten fingers, he looks more like a character from a Mark Twain novel than a menace from behind the Iron Curtain. Huck Bubka. It makes one wonder whether he enjoys creating controversy as a form of mischief.

“I think he’s a nice, genuine guy,” said Lane Maestretti, a technical representative for AMF Pacer, a leading manufacturer of poles.

“I was there when he was in Joe Dial’s room last week in New York, and everyone was joking around a little. He congratulated Joe on the season he’s having, and I had the feeling he was really happy for him. Joe is only about 5-9, so Sergei kept patting him on the head and calling him, ‘little man.’ ”

Bubka is a notorious driver. Last summer in Europe, four pole vaulters, Americans Tully, Kory Tarpenning and Larry Jessee and Poland’s Tadeusz Slusarski, gave Bubka a driving lesson.

“We almost had five or six accidents,” Tarpenning said. “When it was over, he asked if we were scared. We shook our heads. ‘Then why were you holding your hands over your eyes?’ he asked.”

As another example of his sense of humor, he told reporters in New York last week that he was there not to compete against Olson but to pay another visit to the Empire State Building and to see one other sight.

“I heard you have a team, a circus team,” he said. “It does all kinds of tricks imitating a basketball team.”

The Harlem Globetrotters?

“Frankly speaking,” he deadpanned, “that was the only reason for coming here.”

Two nights later, in the Millrose Games at Madison Square Garden, a capacity crowd of more than 18,000 made its support of Olson obvious, chanting, “Bil-ly! Bil-ly! Bil-ly!”

Bubka went from vaulter to vaulter, snickering and offering his own chant.

“Bil-ly Super-man! Bil-ly Super-man! Bil-ly Super-man!”

Later that evening, though, Bubka was in no mood for jokes. Because the officials gave an extra jump to Dial and Olson, ruling interference from photographers, Bubka, almost as if he had studied Hubie Brown’s technique in dealing with officials, charged that the Americans had received special favors and threatened to quit, even starting to pack his poles.

He relented after he also was offered another jump, but he later said that the officials were guilty of “subterfuge.”

He blamed the fiasco on “the American way of life--to make the biggest amount of money in everything.”

That does not sound like a Soviet citizen who has been westernized, as was the rumor when he returned to his home in the Ukraine during the middle of the European season last summer. It proved to be nothing more than a rumor when he reappeared for the Grand Prix finals in Rome.

“He complained in Europe that he had no time to train,” Petrov said. “He went home to train in order to correct his mistakes before the most important competitions.”

Bubka was born in Voroshilovgrad, an industrial city of 382,000. His father is a retired military man. His mother is a nurse. Sergei and Vasily are their only children.

When Petrov was transferred to a larger institute in Donetsk, a Ukrainian city of 879,000 near the Black Sea, Vasily and Sergei, who was 15 at the time, went with him. They still live there. Both are married. Sergei and his wife have a 4-month-old son, Vitaly, who was named for Bubka’s coach.

Sergei and Vasily are close, even wearing matching argyle sweaters when they travel, but they also have an intense rivalry. Sergei said that his parents do not openly take sides, but he believes they sympathize more with Vasily.

“I think parents love all their children equally, but they probably give more support to Vasily because of my success,” Sergei said.

Petrov said that Vasily, 25, is in a difficult position.

“Vasily is the older brother, so he feels he should be better,” Petrov said. “Up to 1981, his results always were higher. Now, Sergei has reached heights that no one else has reached. But Vasily has spared no effort to achieve his results. He has had to work harder than Sergei.

“I, as a coach, have a dream. I want to see a total of 12 meters by the two brothers.” In feet and inches, that is 39-4 1/2. They are six inches short of that, although Sergei boasts that he has done his share.

One day last week, with Vasily in earshot, Sergei said: “It is difficult for me to compete when Vasily is competing. I have to compete and watch Vasily’s mistakes.”

Sergei glanced at Vasily to make sure his older brother had heard him.

Vasily smiled and made a comment in Russian. Sergei laughed but would not translate for an American reporter. It is better to give than to receive.

THE POLE VAULT

WORLD OUTDOOR RECORD

HEIGHT NAME CNTY DATE 19-8 1/4 Sergei Bubka USSR July 13, 1985

WORLD INDOOR RECORD PROGRESSION THIS SEASON

HEIGHT NAME CNTY DATE 19-5 1/2 Billy Olson U.S. Feb. 8, 1986 19-5 Sergei Bubka USSR Feb. 8, 1986 19-4 3/4 Joe Dial U.S. Feb. 1, 1986 19-3 3/4 Billy Olson U.S. Jan. 25, 1986 19-3 1/2 Billy Olson U.S. Jan. 17, 1986 19-3 Sergei Bubka USSR Jan. 15, 1986 19-2 3/4 Billy Olson U.S. Dec. 28, 1985

NOTE: The world indoor record before the start of the current season was 19-2, set by Thierry Vigneron of France on March, 4, 1984.