00:00He hit the bar as he vaulted but while in midair he managed to steady it with his hand and
00:04it didn't
00:05fall. It might surprise you to know that this was actually a completely legal move. It was known as
00:10volzing after David Volz who started using the technique in 1980 when he realized there aren't
00:16technically any rules against touching the bar only that the bar must remain on the supporting
00:21pegs when you land. And it wasn't the first time that athletes had outsmarted the pole vaulting
00:26rulebook. See a long time ago in the 1880s some pole vaulters realized that there wasn't technically
00:31any rules against climbing up the pole whilst vaulting. You've probably seen a similar technique
00:36used in the completely bonkers sport of Dutch canal jumping. The world champion in the 1880s Tom Ray
00:42managed to add multiple feet to his records using the technique before it was banned in 1890. So when
00:49volzing came waltzing into vaulting a hundred years after pole climbing was banned the technique was
00:54quickly exploited by many competitors looking for a way to register higher vaults without actually
00:59really vaulting higher. In fact it became so bad that some athletes learned to purposely grab the bar
01:05on the way up and bend it underneath them as they crossed it. But of course this technique kind of
01:10ruined the point of the sport and in 1983 the rules were updated to prohibit athletes from steadying
01:16the bar with their hands during a jump.
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