Trevor Woods knew the pole vault competition would be tough when he entered last week’s Pacific-10 Conference Championship meet.
The senior had cleared a season best 17 feet, 1 1/2 inches two weeks prior to his trip to Tucson, Ariz., but ranked only seventh in the conference. With the likes of UCLA’s Yoo Kim, Pat Luke and teammate Tommy Skipper vying against him, Woods would have to bring his “A” game to even crack the top seven.
The Coos Bay native stepped up that game, finishing fifth (16-11 1/2) behind three fellow All-Americans.
“I got higher than I was pegged to get points-wise,” Woods said. “I thought I could get second or third, but I’ve got to walk away happy with fifth.”
While Woods was happy he could contribute points to the team, he was disappointed Oregon couldn’t hold off UCLA for the Pac-10 title. The Ducks had a 67-49 lead on the Bruins after the first day, but fell 143-130 after Saturday’s action.
“Naturally, I’m a little disappointed that we didn’t pull it out,” Woods said. “But we didn’t throw it away. We had points here and there, but UCLA had a great meet.”
With the NCAA West Regional Qualifier less than two weeks away, Woods said he needs to clear at least 17-8 to have a shot at going to nationals. While Woods fell well short of that mark Friday, he has cleared it before, with a personal best of 18-0 1/2 in 2002.

Double Duty
While it is common for athletes to compete in several events during the course of track meet, Skipper went a step further.
The freshman competed in the pole vault and javelin simultaneously during Friday’s action.
After clearing his opening vault (17-3 1/2), he ran 40 meters across the infield to throw the javelin. His second throw traveled 215-2, which put him in second at the time. Satisfied that his throw would hold up points-wise, he returned his focus to the pole vault, where he won with a clearance of 18-3 1/4.
His mark in the javelin was good for fifth at competition’s end.

“I didn’t know what to expect in the javelin,” Skipper said, “and I tried to get a solid huck in there early so I wouldn’t have to take all my attempts in the jav’ and focus solely on the pole vault. In both events, I wasn’t trying to over-scrutinize anything. I’m a ‘fly by the seat of my pants’ kind of guy so I was more focused on just competing than heights, distances, etc. If you can’t focus on the competition part, you can lose track of what’s really important.”
Skipper entered the meet with the Pac-10’s top clearance of 18-8 3/4 from the indoor season. Despite this, UCLA’s Kim was ranked higher nationally during the outdoor campaign. Other than a little trouble early in the competition, Skipper turned what was supposed to be a showdown of two great pole vaulters into a one-sided show.
“Tommy got into a rhythm like no other,” Woods said. “All that work he put in during the spring was paying off. He was a horse. Nothing was going to keep him from that title and he just ran away with it.”

Moving up the list
Senior javelin thrower Adam Jenkins moved into third on the all-time Oregon list with his performance Friday. After struggling with his long approach early, the Gladstone native moved to a short approach and fired the spear 227-4, one inch better than former Duck Nick Bakke’s mark of 227-3, which he set in 2002.
Despite the mark, Jenkins is more concerned about ironing out the problems he suffered with his long approach.
“With that throw of 227-4,” Jenkins said, “with a long approach I probably could have hit 235 or 240.”