Free takeoff. Inversion. Time on pole. Welcome to the source.
Coaching Olympic athletes since the 1992 Barcelona Games
"Once you understand the m640 model, you will never watch a pole vault the same way again."
Here is a model of the pole vault I have developed and refined since the early 1990s. It has produced results at the highest levels of the sport — men and women, indoors and out, across four decades. You can evaluate it yourself.
It was to produce vaulters who understand the event so completely that better becomes inevitable. Start with New Thinking — or go directly to any concept.
How the pole vault was misunderstood for decades, what Petrov understood that others missed, and why the catapult model — still coached today — leaves athletes without a firm understanding of why today's leaders are winning. The m640 model brings that understanding and offers a clear path forward.
The most important concept in pole vault coaching. The 1.10-second window. Why every fraction of a second not contributing energy to the system is gone forever.
No timing. No phases. One continuous movement — like the rigid pole era. Why simplicity creates a positive feedback loop that complexity cannot.
The continuous chain applied to every element of the vault — pole carry, run, plant, takeoff, inversion, pullthrough. The complete technical framework.
Where the m640 model comes from — three decades of development, the athletes it has produced, and the terminology it gave the sport.
The tiers differ by depth of transformation and proximity — not content quantity. Each stage is complete in itself.
The complete m640 model delivered to the mind. Every concept, every term, from the source. You will never watch a vault the same way again.
Learn more →The model meets your specific vault. Monthly diagnosis of exactly where your chain breaks and why — analyzed through the m640 lens.
Learn more →Full internalization. Direct ongoing dialogue with the model's creator. The model and your vault become one. Application required.
Apply →She is a very good sprinter and long jumper. In high school she ran 12.1 in the 100 and long jumped 5.90m. In college she pole vaulted, but the head coach counted on her in the 100 and put her on the 4×100 squad. By her senior year she had broken 12 seconds, running 11.68, and placed eighth at conference in the long jump with 6.10m. She was runner-up at the national championship with 4.75m. That was three years ago.
Now she is standing here at the Olympic final and the bar is at 5.20m. She is in second place behind the Norwegian, two of them left to decide who wears the gold. A clearance on the first attempt would give her a decisive advantage and put the pressure back on her rival.
It is 10:30 pm. The wind is a calm tail. The stadium is buzzing.
I can do it, she whispers.
At the mark of her 18-step run up, pole held in front of her, tip on the ground, she imagines the final wrist flick and herself flying over the bar like a feather. The thought invokes a little flicker of imitation.
The pole comes up and feels weightless. Last thought: just like a feather.
She starts, metronome, in a familiar posture and rhythm. She stopped counting steps two years ago — it interfered with her feeling of the jump. Building speed, the pole begins its free drop from further away than seems reasonable. She is used to that feeling from training. Her left arm extends toward the box, opening a wide space between her and the pole.
She jumps into what feels like a backflip over the runway, accelerating the rotation with her left arm, up and over the bar, and it feels faster than the pole can unbend.
Wrist flick. She is flying over the bar, weightless.
Clearance.
The stadium erupts.
Free takeoff, inversion and time on pole are in use worldwide. Inside the model they mean something more specific than they have come to mean outside it. The definitions are open to anyone.