Raising the Bar

Bridget Pearson of Hoover High has a superb sense of balance.

Pearson, a junior, not only is the defending state champion in the girls’ pole vault, but also has a 3.9 grade-point average, is a member of her school’s student government and is an accomplished musician who plays the piano and the Celtic harp.

“She’s active in a lot of things,” Hoover track and field Coach Greg Switzer said. “She wants to do well in the pole vault and she works hard at it, but if she couldn’t vault, she’d have plenty of things to fall back on.”

Pearson, who will compete in the 56th annual Pasadena Games on Saturday at Occidental College, was a gymnast from age 3 until she outgrew the sport at 12.

She took up the pole vault in 1995 after becoming enamored of the event while attending the Sunkist Invitational track meet at the Sports Arena and the Mt. San Antonio College Relays in 1994.

“It just looked like so much fun,” said the 5-foot-10 Pearson. “I told my dad that I wanted to learn how to do that. He said, ‘That’s usually a man’s event, but I’ll see what I can do.’ ”

Pearson’s switch to the pole vault came at an opportune time.

The pole vault had been part of the men’s Olympic track program since the modern Games began in 1896, but women didn’t start competing in the event until the early 1990s.

Until then, it was theorized that women and girls lacked the upper-body strength necessary to compete in the pole vault.

That theory has been proved wrong.

The women’s world record has risen from 14 feet 1 1/2 inches in 1995 to 14-7 1/4 in ’96 to 14-11 in ’97 to 15-0 3/4 feet last Saturday.

The national high school record is 13-1 3/4 and the level of talent at the high school level has risen dramatically in recent years.

One high school girl in the United States cleared 11 feet in 1994, but five did it in ‘95, followed by 21 in ’96 and 36 last year.

“When I was starting out, if you could clear a height, you were a decent vaulter.” Pearson said. “But now if you clear 6 feet or 6-6, it’s a nice starting height, but you need to go a lot higher to get noticed.”

Pearson, 16, first attracted attention with her vaulting when she cleared 10-10 in 1995 as an eighth-grader at Toll Junior High in Glendale.

That height would have tied her for sixth on the national high school performer list that year, and she has continued to improve under the tutelage of UCLA assistant Anthony Curran.

She cleared 11-8 as a freshman at Hoover and placed second in the 1996 state championships before clearing 12 feet and winning the state title last year.

The aforementioned marks make Pearson the national freshman and sophomore record-holder, and her goal this season is 13 feet.

“I want to get faster, leaner and stronger,” she said. “I want to get more vertical in my jumping. . . . Right now, my coach says I have a tendency to do the flagpole thing. I shoot out away from the pole as I rise up instead of rocking back and going straight up as I go toward the bar.”

Pearson would love to win the state title again this year, but she’s not going to evaluate her season solely on whether she repeats as champion.

“There are so many amazing vaulters out there that it’s hard for me to say that I’ll be disappointed if I don’t win state,” she said. “I won it last year, but that’s because I was the best vaulter on that day. That’s really what it comes down to. Who’s the best vaulter on that particular day. If you have an off-day, you’re not going to win state, but that doesn’t mean you had a bad season.”

Pearson also plays volleyball and water polo for Hoover, but track is the sport she dreams about competing in internationally--and not necessarily for the U.S.

She could also compete for Ireland because her father, Christopher--a 60-foot shotputter for Ireland in the 1960s--was born there and she has dual citizenship.

“It’s something that I’ve thought about,” Pearson said. “It would definitely be easier to make an Irish team than a U.S. one.”

Until then, Christopher Pearson envisions his oldest daughter leading a balanced life on and off the track.

“She’s a curious mixture of being an easy-going relaxed person and a laser,” he said. “I call her a laser because she’s able to focus on fine details. She has enormous focus. That’s why she excels in things like calculus.”

And the pole vault.