Dragila no longer queen bee as rivals swarm

STACY DRAGILA was a woman apart at the Sydney Olympics in 2000, when she stormed to victory in the inaugural pole vault competition.

This evening, the American returns to her hometown of Sacramento with a new coach, new base, a different technique and, at last, a host of rivals for her Olympic crown.

Dragila goes into the women's pole vault heats at the US Olympic trials tonight, at the California State University arena where she competed as a high school heptathlete having broken the world record on June 8 for the umpteenth time when she raised the bar to 4.83 metres at the Ostrava meet in the Czech Republic and then sailed over it.

She had been doing that on a regular basis pretty much since the 1999 world championships in Seville, Spain, when she cleared 4.60m but five years and 23 centimetres later, the landscape is changing.

Dragila, 33, is no longer the unrivalled queen bee of the pole vault; she has company. The 19 days it took for her to lose her WR to 22-year-old Russian Yelena Isinbayeva testifies to that. The further seven days that passed before another, younger Russian, Svetlana Feofanova, raised the mark to 4.88 underlines how much of a fight the Californian has on her hands to retain her title in Athens next month.

It was the same at the world championships last August in Paris. Having moved from Idaho to the permanently sunny climes of Phoenix, Arizona, to join new coach Greg Hull the previous March, she took a recently reconstructed technique, still a work in progress, into competition and came away with a fourth place, a foot behind new world champion Isinbayeva.

Feofanova's clearance on July 4 of 4.88m equates to 16 feet, 0 inches, making her the first woman to break the magic barrier that has long been targeted by Dragila and Co.

"I believe that 4.90 (16ft ¾ inch) will be quickly broken by either me or Isinbayeva or Dragila," Feofanova said last week, "we have the potential to do this."

Dragila certainly has the potential to do it this weekend, either tonight or, barring disasters, in Sunday's final, on the same runway she took the world mark to 4.63 at the 2000 trials. She says she is ready for action.

While Dragila begins her bid at the pole vault runway, the track at the Alex G Spanos complex will play host to the 200m heats for men and women as well as the women's 10000m and men's 5000m finals.

With three Irishmen having attained the A standard for Athens - Mark Carroll, Alistair Cragg and Cathal Lombard the latter race will be an opportunity to size up some of the non-African competition they will face next month. With Meb Keflezighi opting out having already qualified in the marathon and 10,000m, the only American to have so far reached the Olympic A standard of 13:21.50 is Jonathon Riley, whom University of Arkansas runner Cragg succeeded as 5000m NCAA champion.

Two other finalists have the B standard of 13:25.40: Louis Luchini and Jorge Torres.