Track & field: Triple jump a 'weird' event that takes a special breed

After watching the triple jump for years as a Sterling assistant track coach – as well as the guy who runs the event in pretty much every meet the Golden Warriors attend – Tom DePasquale has come to a conclusion about one of the most technically difficult events in track and field.

“It just seems weird, just so out of the ordinary,” DePasquale said, smiling and shaking his head. “It’s kind of an event that doesn’t make sense. Running fast makes sense, throwing something far makes sense, jumping far makes sense; the triple jump, jumping three times, with the first two on the same foot and then switching feet for the last jump … it had never made sense to me.

“Yet, that’s what makes it fascinating, I think. When I was introduced to it later in life, it just amazed me.”

DePasquale, a long jumper in his youth, has gained a great appreciation
for athletes who even try the triple jump.

There’s no real secret to the triple jump. An athlete takes off at a sprint down the runway, then leaps off either their right or left foot. After sailing through the air, they land on that same foot, and push off into the air again. The next landing comes on the opposite foot of the first two, and it’s another immediate takeoff, finishing with a landing in the sand to measure the total distance from that first jump.

What can look like a hop, skip and jump into the sand is actually a very concise set of technical aspects that have to go together smoothly, or there’s a danger of falling.

“The jump breaks down into three phases: a single-leg hop, going into a bound, then a long jump at the end,” Erie-Prophetstown jumps coach Liz Green said. “Once you find out which leg they’ll be able to use those first two jumps, you want to make sure to get a really long second phase – and that’s the weakness of most athletes, and where they falter in the event.”

Green has coached a pair of standout triple jumpers. Paige Rus won the Class 1A state title in the event as a senior in 2013, and freshman teammate Rachel Cobert placed sixth. Cobert also took sixth at state in the event last year, improving by a foot as a sophomore, from 35 feet, 1 1/2 inches to 36-2.

Rus’ 2013 leap of 36 feet, 9 1/2 inches is the Panther record, and Cobert is hoping to break that mark with a 37-foot leap by the time she graduates next spring.

So what does Green look for when trying to find triple jumpers?

“Obviously it starts with having a natural jumping ability,” said Green, who has found triple jumpers in P.E. class, on the basketball court, and even during a health class when doing the standing long jump. “Then, you look for a kid with a really good long stride. When you gave both of those things, you’ll have a really good triple jumper.”

Cobert has all of those things, and she has added experience to boot. Her father, Bob, was a triple jumper for Erie back in his high school days, and her brother, Rob, competed in the event as well.

“It’s kind of a family affair for me, so I started really young,” Cobert said. “I was learning it in elementary school, when my dad was working with my brother when he got to middle school. By the time I got to middle school, I was pretty familiar with it.

“It’s an event not a lot of people do, or are even interested in doing. It’s very unique, very technical, and I think it’s interesting because it’s very challenging.”

That’s what drew former Sterling standout Joe Schneiderbauer to the event, as well. Schneiderbauer was a two-time state qualifier in the triple jump, and he holds the Warriors’ second-best jump in program history of 45-3, 8 3/4 inches behind all-time leader Greg Colberg.

Schneiderbauer, who played football and ran track at North Central College, tried to triple jump in college, but used his all-around athleticism to become a decathlete instead. This year, he has returned to Sterling to help coach the Warrior jumpers as he finishes up chiropractic school, and he hopes to find a job in the area so as to continue coaching the event he loves.

“It just takes a different skill-set, more than just pure strength,” said Schneiderbauer, who got the nickname “Jumping Joe” in middle school. “You have to be able to turn downward momentum from landing in the first two jumps into upward momentum into the second and third jumps. It’s a chance for kids that may not be the most explosive ones in the long jump to use their coordination and extend one jump into three different ones.

“I think it’s fun, but it’s also a real challenge, and because of that, you get those athletes that really want to compete in it. A lot of kids come out and try it, thinking it will be fun, and when they figure out just how hard it is, they choose to go somewhere else on the track. The athletes that triple jump, they really want to be here and work at it and get good at it.”

Once you get the form down, there’s really no quick fixes to improve your results. In the end, it comes down to learning the phases so well that your body can take over, so your brain can quiet down from the “thousand things running through your head,” as Cobert puts it.

“It’s doing the drills to strengthen your hips and knees and ankles and legs,” she said, “just improving on the little areas of the different parts of the jump. In the end, when you perfect those things, it all adds up.”

Cobert admits that she’s still learning how to triple jump, and loves watching her fellow competitors at the state meet to pick up pointers on how to do it well, especially in the areas of the cycle that she struggles with.

Schneiderbauer agrees. Even having been around it at the Class AA state meet as a junior and senior, and then with teammates at North Central, he still studies the craft in order to help his young pupils get better.

“It just doesn’t come to you overnight; it’s not even something you master in 1 or 2 years,” Schneiderbauer said. “It takes tremendous athletic ability and a lot of hard work, and I’m still in awe whenever I see someone do it correctly. It’s very rare to see someone put all three phases together at such a high level, and be able to extend out each jump as far as possible to get the maximum distance.”

And that’s what keeps DePasquale coming back as well. He has studied the event for decades, even researching to find out that the event originally became popular in the late 18th century in Scotland – “What the heck were the Scottish people doing, throwing logs and doing weird jumps?” he asks with a laugh – before becoming a staple of the modern track meet.

But as few and far between as it is, even for a guy who’s seen thousands of jumpers throughout the years, there are still those rare occasions when DePasquale is left shaking his head in wonder when he sees an athlete who excels in the event.

“When it’s done well, it’s really very balletic, just poetry in motion,” he said. “When you get the right athlete who’s very flexible and very strong, having great balance and that little bit of fearlessness because the event is just so out there, it’s just so beautiful ... and I think that’s what keeps athletes and fans coming back.”