Pole Vaulting Just One Of Thrill-Seeker Max Manson's Adventures

By Doug Binder, DyeStat Editor

Whether he is climbing up, or free-falling down, Max Manson has grown to love playing with gravity.

He scales sheer granite walls, such as the famed Diamond at Longs Peak. He does backflips off 50-foot cliffs into cold, deep water.

When he was younger, he was into rocketry. Naturally, he put a rocket on the back of a sled and shot himself down a snow-covered chute.

Manson is also an accomplished pole vaulter, like his father Pat, a three-time Pan Am Games champion.

The senior at Monarch High in Louisville, Colo. recently won the New Balance Nationals Indoor title with a clearance at 17-5.50 (5.32m). This weekend, he will travel to compete at the 79th NIKE Chandler Rotary Invitational meet in Arizona, hoping for nice weather and a little bit of tail-wind.

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Whatever he’s doing, Manson seeks a surge of adrenaline and a sense of accomplishment.

“I can’t get enough,” Manson said. “And pole vaulting goes along with it, too. You’re catapulting yourself into the air. I’ve always been an adrenaline junkie, I guess.”

Manson and his younger sister, Mia have also been blessed by genetics. (A junior, she is a sprinter, jumper and a 13-foot pole vaulter).

Pat Manson, their dad, was one of the first preps to clear 18 feet in the pole vault. He reached that height in the summer after his senior year at Aurora Central CO in 1986.

That launched Manson into college success at Kansas and began an incredible 22-year year streak of making an 18-foot bar that lasted all the way until 2007. Manson competed in five U.S. Olympic Trials, narrowly missing a spot on the team in 1996 and 2000.

Amy Manson, their mom, was a three-time participant in the Trials as a distance runner. She competed in the 5,000 meters and the marathon.

Perhaps it is no wonder, then, that Max Manson has developed a passion for seeking challenges and testing limits.

By the age of 12, he had climbed all 54 of Colorado’s 14-foot peaks (“the 14ers”) with his dad.

“That was a good classroom for him to learn the planning process,” Pat Manson said. “For any adventure, especially these big weekend trips, you have to research. Learn routes, find updates on the weather, check posts to find out whether there are trees down on the trail, or other hazards. (Then) load the car and go.”

Mountaineering, rock climbing and assorted other back-country adventures became a way of life for Max before pole vaulting did.

He got an early start, at age 8, to try out the vault and get a feel for it. And he made progress through summer track camps.

But it wasn’t until the eighth grade, and especially his freshman year of high school, that Max really got serious about vaulting.

“We’ve been patient along the way and let Max drive the pace of where we go (with it),” Pat Manson said. “I want to let him enjoy the sport, and it’s been a fun ride.”

Max lives for fun rides and he often documents his adventures for his YouTube channel.

For a recent climb, at night, of the Bastille Wall in El Dorado Canyon, Max carefully planned every camera angle and position, as well as his own route up the rock face.

He brings the same careful, calculated thought to pole vaulting.

He has recently moved onto 16-foot poles and is working his way up to a higher grip. With the guidance of his father, he has already developed a world-class push-off over his hands.

“Physically and technically it’s an exciting time,” Pat Manson said. “He hasn’t done a lot of training. I’m kind of excited for Max to do a little bit more high-level training and see where it takes him.”

Last spring, Max achieved one of his biggest goals, surpassing his dad’s Colorado state meet record with 17-3.50 (5.27m).

This spring, the aim is to join his father in the 18-foot club.

“He’s beating everything I did so far (at the same age),” Pat said.

Max will head to Stanford in the fall. Of course, he hopes to take a detour through Yosemite Park along the way and do some climbing.

Over the last several years, he has developed a sports season pattern that works for him. Summer and fall is for climbing and adventures. (In August of 2017, he led family and friends to the top of Grand Teton in Wyoming to witness the solar eclipse).

Winter and spring are for pole vaulting.

“That’s been important in keeping me super-psyched about both of them,” Max said. “I think if I did one thing year-round I might get burned out.”

The two sports seem to work well together. Countless hours in a climbing gym have done wonders to help develop core strength and strong arms and hands.

“I’ve always found they are good cross-training for each other,” Max said. “When I switch to vaulting, my technique is way better, because of added core strength and upper body strength. And when I’m going into the climbing season, speed climbing or dynamic climbing, I can feel the advantage from pole vaulting.”

So what will it be? Does Max want to follow in the perilous footsteps of free-soloing climber Alex Honnold, or virtuoso vaulter Mondo Duplantis?

“I think it’s a tough choice,” Max said. “I think … I’d have to go probably go with Honnold. Climbing takes him all around the world. From one week to the next he might go from Madagascar to Europe to Australia.”

Both pursuits – outdoor adventuring and pole-vaulting – are part of Max’s make up.

And he doesn’t want to choose. In both, there is a certain adrenaline rush mixed with a calculated risk. Both are goal-oriented.

“I would say ‘both’ is the right answer,” Pat said. “I don’t think they have to be mutually exclusive. He can do both.”