Esperanza’s Enigmatic Lycett Vaults to a Different Drummer

There is an earring in Trevor Lycett’s left lobe. His light brown hair tumbles, long and wavy, from beneath a baseball cap. His biceps bulge.

He is athletic, emotional, flaky, fearless, frantic and unpredictable.

He is a pole vaulter.

And in most eyes, that makes Lycett a real wacko.

When Al Britt, his coach at Esperanza High School, first watched Lycett competing in a junior high track meet, he noticed that Lycett seemed to be marching to music only he could hear.

The back flips and cartwheels Lycett performed as a warm-up, more than the earring and the long hair, told Britt everything he needed to know.

“There’s my next pole vaulter,” Britt said at the time.

In four seasons at Esperanza, Lycett certainly has made his mark. A senior, he has:

--Coached himself for long periods.

--Sought the advice of former world-class vaulter Anthony Curran.

--Been knocked senseless after crash-landing headfirst four days before the 1988 Southern Section championships.

--Recovered to vault 14 feet 6 inches, the top leap in the nation by a freshman that year.

--Bolted for a mid-season Mexican vacation.

--Cleared 16 feet in workouts, but never in competition.

--No-heighted at last year’s section preliminaries.

--Finished third twice at section finals.

“Vaulting can be predictable when you’re a consistent person,” Lycett said. “I’m an inconsistent person.”

Despite that, Lycett figures to be one of the favorites in today’s Southern Section 3-A pole vault final. He is a key figure in Esperanza’s quest for a third consecutive team championship, though Britt isn’t counting heavily on Lycett. His performance is simply too difficult to predict.

“Yeah, I’m different from everybody else,” Lycett said. “That’s the way I am. You have to accept me the way I am.”

He pole vaults, considers himself an artist and one day would like to work as a professional welder--”all things far apart,” he said.

“I do metal sculptures. I’ve never figured out a way to weld and pole vault at the same time.”

There are pictures in the Lycett home of Trevor as a young child, poised to leap over a bar perhaps three feet off the ground.

“I guess I just like jumping over high things,” Lycett said. “My parents thought I had a death wish.”

No, the thrill comes when Lycett takes flight. Done correctly, a successful 14-foot vault goes by with a glimpse of the bar and a free fall onto the pit, and nothing more.

But a failed attempt can lead to injury. Lycett’s “crashes,” as he calls hard falls, are the result of improper technique.

“I think crashing can be fun,” he said. “Each one is different. You have to laugh at it. It’s not like I’m a bad vaulter. Something just went wrong.”

He doesn’t admit to being a particularly well-trained athlete. He said he doesn’t like to run or lift weights. In workouts, he mostly “kicks back” on the pits, talking with teammates.

“I try not to get into stressful situations,” he said. “I try to fix small problems. When I’m in competition, I shake. I’m nervous, I’m really nervous.”

Britt often has a difficult time creating the right mood for Lycett to vault well in practice.

“I think for a vaulter it’s always difficult to duplicate the feeling of a big meet situation,” Britt said. “Some days he takes a couple of vaults and he can’t do anything, so we put away the mats and go home.”

Said Lycett: “You have good days and bad days.”

The trick is to match the good days with the big competitions. Today, Lycett has one more chance to establish some consistency in an inconsistent career.