Completed Event: Track & Field at NCAA Outdoor Championships on June 11, 2025 , , M: T-35th/72 (8.5) || W: T-34th/68 (8)
/
Final
Track & Field
at NCAA Outdoor Championships
Duke Women's Pole Vault Remains Elite Under Wilbourn
10/29/2020 12:15:00 PM | Track & Field
DURHAM, N.C. – Over the past decade of Duke track & field, numerous event groups have been on the local, regional and national stage.
Among the most notable include the heptathlon, which Curtis Beach captured the national title in at the 2012 and 2014 NCAA Indoor Championships. Then there were various women's relay quartets, which consistently posted All-American results. Several distance runners etched their names in the record books, highlighted by Juliet Bottorff, who emerged as an NCAA champion in the outdoor 10,000-meters in 2011.
Yet with all of the recent success enjoyed by the Blue Devils across different platforms, few events, if any, have boasted the numbers that surround Duke women's pole vaulters.
Since the 2009-10 season, four pole vaulters at Duke have earned a total of 12 All-America honors in their careers. In that period, three Blue Devils have won gold at the ACC Championships six total times, while seven have achieved All-ACC standing 25 total times. In Duke history, each of the program's five highest indoor vaults, and four out of the five best outdoor marks, have been recorded in the past 10 seasons.
It is a trajectory that began modestly but escalated in the blink of an eye, springing Duke into being a preeminent program for high-caliber female vaulters around the country. And as the Blue Devils reload for another indoor season, the remarkable progress of the pole vault as well as the culture its competitors maintain can all be traced back to Shawn Wilbourn.
Wilbourn joined the Blue Devils staff following the Olympic Trials in July of 2008. A decathlete during his collegiate career at Long Beach State University, he spent his first year in Durham as an assistant coach, working with student-athletes in combined events, pole vault, horizontal jumps and hurdles. At that time, Duke had produced just two All-ACC vaulters and no NCAA Championship participants in the event since 2001. Wilbourn would have to build from the ground up, but discovered he had an unlikely foundational piece already on the roster.
"When I first got to Duke, we had a girl in the program that was a walk-on – her name was Amy Fryt," Wilbourn said. "Really, she kind of kick started the program because she went from jumping 11'6 or 12 feet in high school to almost 14 feet. She made indoor NCAA's for us, was a second-team All-American, but to go from the height that she was jumping in high school to almost 14 feet in college – and at that time, 10 years ago, if you jump 14 feet, that's a big deal. Because of her, I was able to kind of get the recruiting started."
Fryt's improvement would prove to be synonymous with a growing event under Wilbourn. She captured ACC outdoor titles in 2009 and 2010, earned indoor all-conference status as a sophomore and junior and culminated her career in the form of second-team All-America honors at both the 2011 NCAA indoor and 2012 outdoor meets.
By the time Fryt had graduated from Duke, Wilbourn was in the midst of selling Durham as a destination for pole vaulters. Like any program on the rise, his recruiting process would be driven by the potential he saw, and not always the numbers that were already attached to a prospect.
One name that he came across was Megan Clark, a high school vaulter who, as part of a military family, moved around the east coast for the majority of her youth. Clark's father and Brigadier General, Robert, traveled from West Point to Duke for an ethics conference in 2010 and had Megan tag along, hoping to track down Wilbourn, even while the possibility of competing for an ACC program appeared distant.
"I went to Duke as a sophomore in high school, when I'd only jumped 10 feet, and I loved the campus," Clark said. "I walked around and I met with coach Wilbourn for the first time. He basically told me that if I jumped 13 feet, he would be the first person to call me. In my head, I was like, 'I would really like to go here, but I just don't know what it's going to take.'"
With the standard set out for her, Clark needed little time, clearing the 13-foot mark during her junior season. True to his word, the first call she received afterwards came from Wilbourn. With Duke near the top of her list, Clark attended a pole vault camp on campus the summer before her senior year, and after an official recruiting visit, she knew it was where she wanted to be.
Even then, however, perhaps neither of them could foresee the Fort Benning, Ga., product becoming the most prolific vaulter in Duke history over the next four years.
"Next in line was Megan Clark," Wilbourn said. "Megan had come to my camp, so I got a chance to see her firsthand. She wasn't heavily recruited. She jumped 13 feet one time in high school, but I saw her in our camp and just saw how special she could be. We recruited her, and then she really blossomed obviously. She jumped 15'3, broke our school record, was runner-up twice at NCAA's, multiple time All-American and fifth place at the Olympic trials."
Clark finished her career at Duke in 2016 with a laundry list of accolades. She was named the 2015 ACC Women's Field Performer of the Year, and her school records in both the indoor and outdoor vault stand to this day. She doubled-up as an ACC champion her junior year, taking gold at the indoor and outdoor meets, and she competed at the USA Track & Field Outdoor Championships in 2014 and 2015.
For Wilbourn, Clark's repeated appearances at national events helped enable him to recruit top-end talents such as Madison Heath and Laura Marty, who both went on to have illustrious careers of their own in Durham. In fact, for Heath – a three-time All-American and six-time All-ACC honoree – a decisive moment in her choice to attend Duke came when she saw an interaction between Wilbourn and his then-top vaulter.
"I think what really pushed Duke over the edge was coach Wilbourn, for me personally," Heath said. I sat in on a practice with him and Megan, and I liked the way he communicated with her. He would give encouraging type of feedback, but he would also look at her video with her and say 'This technique is what you really need to be working on,' and 'This is what you should focus on in the next jump' – just really technical, specific things that I thought were really helpful."
That rapport between Wilbourn and the student-athletes he coaches has proven to stand out among recruits making their decision. When Heath had a chance to meet Wilbourn on a visit, it struck a chord with her how much he pledged to individualize her development.
"I had a lot of potential, but I was a brand new vaulter," Heath said. "I had not been vaulting for a long time. I was pretty messy, I guess you could say, technique-wise. I actually really connected with coach Wilbourn because on every visit I went on, I asked every coach, 'What do you think I should work on? What would be your strategy for me jumping higher?' Coach Wilbourn, unlike some others, just really analyzed my video. He really looked at my technique and he had a plan for what I needed to work on technique-wise.
"He really saw what I could be, not just what I was."
That sentiment is echoed among just about every Duke pole vaulter who has undergone Wilbourn's tutelage, from Fryt to current sophomore Brynn King. King always had Duke near the front of the line in her college decision, as both of her parents were student-athletes for the Blue Devils. Even while she began pole vaulting as a junior in high school, she cleared over 13 feet, earning herself looks from Division-I schools while she focused heavily on academics. Upon meeting with Wilbourn and discussing the outlook of her college career, it didn't take long for King to confirm the choice she had been leaning towards.
"I think what kind of sold me was on my recruiting was we sat down and had a meeting, and he asked me what my goals were," King said. "I told him and he gave me a very detailed plan and was like 'I can help you achieve these,' which is something that a lot of the other coaches that I was talking to didn't say. He pointed to past vaulters and showed that he's had results."
While Wilbourn's ability to provide a comprehensive layout for each prospect has paid off in recruiting efforts, it is his unwavering dedication that alumnae and current vaulters refer to most when talking about him. According to Clark, there is a distinct emotional investment that Wilbourn makes during a student-athlete's years at Duke that separates him from other coaches.
"He's really committed to his athletes," she said. "I remember we had a jump practice on Christmas Eve one year, because if there was a day I wanted to jump, he was going to be there. If I was willing to put the work in, he was too. He was along with me for the highs and the lows. One year, I broke a pole at NCAA Regionals. I was seeded number two in the country and didn't make it to championships. He's going to cry with you. He jumps every time you run down the runway – there are numerous videos of him jumping up as you take off. He's really just in it with you."
The connection that is evident between Wilbourn and his vaulters does not need much time to be established. It can be felt in the introductory meeting a high school athlete has with him when they first step foot on the Duke campus. The commitment he displays permeates down the roster, from upperclassmen who have gone through all the trials and tribulations associated with the event, on down to freshmen in the initial stages of their pole vaulting development.
The standard set by former vaulters certainly does not hurt when promoting the program, either. For current senior Becky Arbiv, the chance to follow in the footsteps of names like Fryt, Clark and Heath was what enticed her from an early stage. Now a veteran with a pair of all-conference recognitions in her career, Arbiv knows first-hand how far beyond results Wilbourn's coaching goes.
"There is a whole legacy of female pole vaulters, so that in itself kind of sold it," Arbiv said. "It was very clear that he definitely cares about the athletes as human beings as well as how we're pole vaulting, which was definitely good given that over four years, there's definitely going to be ups and downs, so having a coach that not only is going to train you to make you jump higher, but also cares about how you're doing, is a great thing."
If relating with student-athletes on an emotional scale is one staple of Wilbourn's tenure at Duke, perhaps another, more tangible hallmark can be found at the campus' intramural building. Now used as the de facto indoor training facility for Blue Devil pole vaulters, the IM building offers many unique amenities in addition to being a place to practice throughout the winter months and windy days.
The vaulters can often be seen utilizing gymnastic-oriented equipment such as the high bar, trampoline and ropes. According to Wilbourn, its greatest advantage is the instant feedback it provides, as it helps simulate different stages of the pole vaulting motion. However, the usage of the IM building has almost poetically mirrored the success of the vaulters who train in it, as Wilbourn had to assemble the parts piece by piece over time.
"When I first got to Duke, we didn't have the gymnastics equipment and we didn't have a high bar in there, so we actually had to go to Bull City Gymnastics," he recalls. "We would go every Saturday my first few years at Duke to Bull City Gymnastics, and then I was like 'We've just got to start adding some equipment in the IM building.' We've kind of built it up over the years to be a little more pole vault-specific than what a gymnastics center would be."
The IM building is now, Wilbourn believes, one of the program's most valuable assets. No matter what technical adjustments need to be made, vaulters at Duke have found a way to improve when they train indoors. There are harnesses that can be used for plant exercises, rings for swing drills that are geared for the event, and multiple other features that allow for training that is equally as beneficial a pit outdoors.
From a weather standpoint, utilizing the IM building proved to be advantageous in order to keep the consistency that is needed when training throughout the winter. For alumnae like Clark, who arrived at Duke before practices and home meets took place at Morris Williams Stadium, having the indoor access was paramount.
"The IM building basically was our primary training facility because the runway was at the end of Wallace Wade, at the end of the horseshoe, for my first few years at Duke," Clark said. "The winds were terrible. We would practice out there sometimes, but the majority of the time we would jump inside, which is such a privilege to have, especially when the weather gets bad. You really can't take reps and you can't do what you need to do when you're freezing because pole vault is not a sport where you can continually move around and be warm. Being able to be consistent from approach to approach is pretty much everything, so having that facility in the winter, on rainy days, when the wind is bad is a game changer for pole vault."
Arbiv added, "For a southern school, it's not so common that track teams have indoor facilities, so carving out the space, specifically for pole vault – I think it's really unique and it's part of the reason why pole vault has taken front stage on our team."
From Heath's perspective, another benefit of the IM building was the alternative training opportunities that vaulters were granted, which enabled them to work on technique while not having to expend too much physical energy.
"One thing I think coach Wilbourn did really well was he allowed us to rest," she said. "We would have practices that were not hard on our bodies that still helped us train. We would have trampoline days or days in the IM building where we would still be working on things related to the pole vault, but in a really non-stressful way for our bodies. We would be able to recover and learn at the same time, which I think was definitely essential for improving technique and staying healthy throughout the season."
Those days in which a student-athlete could recover while still finding ways to improve on their vaults are indicative of Wilbourn's ability to relate to the people he works with. There remains a teacher-student dynamic – Clark and Heath described their event coach as 'serious' and 'intense' – but a trust is developed over the course of a career that paves way for autonomy among upperclassmen when going about their training regimen.
"It's definitely something I've appreciated," Arbiv said. "Freshman and sophomore year, it's important to buy in to the whole program and then once your junior and senior year rolls around, there definitely is more room to say, 'This is how my body is feeling today.' By then, you do know your body better, you know the program better, you know what you're supposed to be feeling and when you're supposed to be feeling it. I definitely think it's nice to be able to adjust then."
To experience that independence under Wilbourn's watch, however, generally means that one has endured some growing pains throughout their first couple years. The learning curve that he puts his vaulters through does not offer leniency to one over another – each and every athlete deals with the frustration of having their technique broken down and built up again.
It is a journey that requires serious commitment, humility and, most of all, belief in a coach. Through all the peaks of ACC and NCAA achievements, and all the valleys of walking away from a meet without a recorded height, the message that Wilbourn delivers to his vaulters has not wavered: Trust the process.
"That's his phrase – 'Trust the process'," Clark said. "I'd be really mad, just stomping around the back of the runway, and he'd be like 'Just trust the process.' It's so true, but it's probably the most annoying thing to hear when you're frustrated. He would even tell me, 'We're making these changes so that you can jump high later. We're not making all these quick fixes so you can jump really well in two weeks. We're going to commit the first couple years to the last couple years, and any progress you make along the way is great, but we need to make technical changes if we're going to expect something bigger.'"
Words of encouragement and reassurance have become routine for Wilbourn during 'The process.' While it is easy for a student-athlete to pledge their devotion in the planning stages, it makes it no less disheartening to suffer through the early results, as Heath found out right away.
"I no-heighted at my very first meet ever," she said. "It was my very first college meet, I had just been recruited, I had a scholarship and I was devastated – so stressed that I had just failed all expectations. But coach Wilbourn knew exactly what I was working on, he knew exactly where I was and his feedback from that meet was 'You did the thing that we were working on and so that's good. Even though you didn't clear any bars and scored zero points, you did what you were supposed to do and that's good.' That definitely helped me a lot in dealing with the growing pains."
But in time, the heights do come. The growth becomes observable. And, in the case of many vaulters under Wilbourn, the accolades are enjoyed. For Heath, once the process began to show returns, it became clear how valuable it was to undergo immediate adversity for the sake of long-term success.
"A few weeks into indoor season my freshman year, I started to feel more comfortable competing under his coaching, and then by my first meet of the outdoor season, I actually had a really big PR," she said. "I jumped six inches higher than I had previously, which is a really big deal in the vault. I was really excited about it, and I think that was a big pay-off moment where I was like 'Everything that he's been teaching me, everything I've been working on, all of these struggles are absolutely worth it.'"
The advantage of a more distant outlook that the vaulters experience is not so different than what Wilbourn himself had to go through when building the program. There were certain student-athletes, like Fryt and Clark, who gave their coach the feeling that after nine seasons, the women's pole vault had immense potential. But to that point, even with the individual achievements boasted by the two alumnae he worked with, Duke had not yet arrived as a dominant unit in the event.
Then came May 12, 2017 – the opening day of the ACC Outdoor Championships in Atlanta, Ga. The Blue Devils put the country on notice when Heath, Marty and Nati Sheppard – all in different recruiting classes – swept the top-three spots in the pole vault for a Duke takeover on the podium. Freshman Chesney Ward placed sixth for an additional All-ACC recognition as Wilbourn's group left no doubt who stood at the top of the conference.
"That day was when I realized that we have a powerhouse pole vault program," he said.
In the years since, Duke has earned national respect in the pole vault. There is a unique investment in the event made by Wilbourn and the program, and it is reflected in the quality of the recruits as well as the lineage of highly successful vaulters that spend their undergraduate years in Durham.
As far as what the future holds for Duke pole vaulting, Wilbourn – now entering his first season as the Blue Devils' interim head coach – has an immediate goal to place a similar emphasis on the men's side. This process, he feels, is well underway.
"The next step is to actually start recruiting men's vaulters and getting the men's side as good as the women's," Wilbourn said. "We're beginning to make that step. We just got two verbal commits on the men's side for two transfers that are already very good and will be transferring in next year. Now, it is just bringing the men's side up to where the women are."
For the time being, he maintains that Duke provides everything a prospective vaulter would need, from facilities, to high-end competition, to a distinguished academic experience. Whether the next great Blue Devil pole vaulter follows the path of Megan Clark – who is training now with the goal of making the U.S. Olympic team next year – or Madison Heath – who recently began medical school at Columbia – remarkable achievement can be found with Shawn Wilbourn and Duke pole vaulting.
"We're investing in this event," he said. "Not every track & field program invests in the pole vault. What Duke offers – that athletic-academic, that true student-athlete experience – it's a good fit."
#GoDuke
Among the most notable include the heptathlon, which Curtis Beach captured the national title in at the 2012 and 2014 NCAA Indoor Championships. Then there were various women's relay quartets, which consistently posted All-American results. Several distance runners etched their names in the record books, highlighted by Juliet Bottorff, who emerged as an NCAA champion in the outdoor 10,000-meters in 2011.
Yet with all of the recent success enjoyed by the Blue Devils across different platforms, few events, if any, have boasted the numbers that surround Duke women's pole vaulters.
Since the 2009-10 season, four pole vaulters at Duke have earned a total of 12 All-America honors in their careers. In that period, three Blue Devils have won gold at the ACC Championships six total times, while seven have achieved All-ACC standing 25 total times. In Duke history, each of the program's five highest indoor vaults, and four out of the five best outdoor marks, have been recorded in the past 10 seasons.
It is a trajectory that began modestly but escalated in the blink of an eye, springing Duke into being a preeminent program for high-caliber female vaulters around the country. And as the Blue Devils reload for another indoor season, the remarkable progress of the pole vault as well as the culture its competitors maintain can all be traced back to Shawn Wilbourn.
Wilbourn joined the Blue Devils staff following the Olympic Trials in July of 2008. A decathlete during his collegiate career at Long Beach State University, he spent his first year in Durham as an assistant coach, working with student-athletes in combined events, pole vault, horizontal jumps and hurdles. At that time, Duke had produced just two All-ACC vaulters and no NCAA Championship participants in the event since 2001. Wilbourn would have to build from the ground up, but discovered he had an unlikely foundational piece already on the roster.
"When I first got to Duke, we had a girl in the program that was a walk-on – her name was Amy Fryt," Wilbourn said. "Really, she kind of kick started the program because she went from jumping 11'6 or 12 feet in high school to almost 14 feet. She made indoor NCAA's for us, was a second-team All-American, but to go from the height that she was jumping in high school to almost 14 feet in college – and at that time, 10 years ago, if you jump 14 feet, that's a big deal. Because of her, I was able to kind of get the recruiting started."
Fryt's improvement would prove to be synonymous with a growing event under Wilbourn. She captured ACC outdoor titles in 2009 and 2010, earned indoor all-conference status as a sophomore and junior and culminated her career in the form of second-team All-America honors at both the 2011 NCAA indoor and 2012 outdoor meets.
By the time Fryt had graduated from Duke, Wilbourn was in the midst of selling Durham as a destination for pole vaulters. Like any program on the rise, his recruiting process would be driven by the potential he saw, and not always the numbers that were already attached to a prospect.
One name that he came across was Megan Clark, a high school vaulter who, as part of a military family, moved around the east coast for the majority of her youth. Clark's father and Brigadier General, Robert, traveled from West Point to Duke for an ethics conference in 2010 and had Megan tag along, hoping to track down Wilbourn, even while the possibility of competing for an ACC program appeared distant.
"I went to Duke as a sophomore in high school, when I'd only jumped 10 feet, and I loved the campus," Clark said. "I walked around and I met with coach Wilbourn for the first time. He basically told me that if I jumped 13 feet, he would be the first person to call me. In my head, I was like, 'I would really like to go here, but I just don't know what it's going to take.'"
With the standard set out for her, Clark needed little time, clearing the 13-foot mark during her junior season. True to his word, the first call she received afterwards came from Wilbourn. With Duke near the top of her list, Clark attended a pole vault camp on campus the summer before her senior year, and after an official recruiting visit, she knew it was where she wanted to be.
Even then, however, perhaps neither of them could foresee the Fort Benning, Ga., product becoming the most prolific vaulter in Duke history over the next four years.
"Next in line was Megan Clark," Wilbourn said. "Megan had come to my camp, so I got a chance to see her firsthand. She wasn't heavily recruited. She jumped 13 feet one time in high school, but I saw her in our camp and just saw how special she could be. We recruited her, and then she really blossomed obviously. She jumped 15'3, broke our school record, was runner-up twice at NCAA's, multiple time All-American and fifth place at the Olympic trials."
Clark finished her career at Duke in 2016 with a laundry list of accolades. She was named the 2015 ACC Women's Field Performer of the Year, and her school records in both the indoor and outdoor vault stand to this day. She doubled-up as an ACC champion her junior year, taking gold at the indoor and outdoor meets, and she competed at the USA Track & Field Outdoor Championships in 2014 and 2015.
For Wilbourn, Clark's repeated appearances at national events helped enable him to recruit top-end talents such as Madison Heath and Laura Marty, who both went on to have illustrious careers of their own in Durham. In fact, for Heath – a three-time All-American and six-time All-ACC honoree – a decisive moment in her choice to attend Duke came when she saw an interaction between Wilbourn and his then-top vaulter.
"I think what really pushed Duke over the edge was coach Wilbourn, for me personally," Heath said. I sat in on a practice with him and Megan, and I liked the way he communicated with her. He would give encouraging type of feedback, but he would also look at her video with her and say 'This technique is what you really need to be working on,' and 'This is what you should focus on in the next jump' – just really technical, specific things that I thought were really helpful."
That rapport between Wilbourn and the student-athletes he coaches has proven to stand out among recruits making their decision. When Heath had a chance to meet Wilbourn on a visit, it struck a chord with her how much he pledged to individualize her development.
"I had a lot of potential, but I was a brand new vaulter," Heath said. "I had not been vaulting for a long time. I was pretty messy, I guess you could say, technique-wise. I actually really connected with coach Wilbourn because on every visit I went on, I asked every coach, 'What do you think I should work on? What would be your strategy for me jumping higher?' Coach Wilbourn, unlike some others, just really analyzed my video. He really looked at my technique and he had a plan for what I needed to work on technique-wise.
"He really saw what I could be, not just what I was."
That sentiment is echoed among just about every Duke pole vaulter who has undergone Wilbourn's tutelage, from Fryt to current sophomore Brynn King. King always had Duke near the front of the line in her college decision, as both of her parents were student-athletes for the Blue Devils. Even while she began pole vaulting as a junior in high school, she cleared over 13 feet, earning herself looks from Division-I schools while she focused heavily on academics. Upon meeting with Wilbourn and discussing the outlook of her college career, it didn't take long for King to confirm the choice she had been leaning towards.
"I think what kind of sold me was on my recruiting was we sat down and had a meeting, and he asked me what my goals were," King said. "I told him and he gave me a very detailed plan and was like 'I can help you achieve these,' which is something that a lot of the other coaches that I was talking to didn't say. He pointed to past vaulters and showed that he's had results."
While Wilbourn's ability to provide a comprehensive layout for each prospect has paid off in recruiting efforts, it is his unwavering dedication that alumnae and current vaulters refer to most when talking about him. According to Clark, there is a distinct emotional investment that Wilbourn makes during a student-athlete's years at Duke that separates him from other coaches.
"He's really committed to his athletes," she said. "I remember we had a jump practice on Christmas Eve one year, because if there was a day I wanted to jump, he was going to be there. If I was willing to put the work in, he was too. He was along with me for the highs and the lows. One year, I broke a pole at NCAA Regionals. I was seeded number two in the country and didn't make it to championships. He's going to cry with you. He jumps every time you run down the runway – there are numerous videos of him jumping up as you take off. He's really just in it with you."
The connection that is evident between Wilbourn and his vaulters does not need much time to be established. It can be felt in the introductory meeting a high school athlete has with him when they first step foot on the Duke campus. The commitment he displays permeates down the roster, from upperclassmen who have gone through all the trials and tribulations associated with the event, on down to freshmen in the initial stages of their pole vaulting development.
The standard set by former vaulters certainly does not hurt when promoting the program, either. For current senior Becky Arbiv, the chance to follow in the footsteps of names like Fryt, Clark and Heath was what enticed her from an early stage. Now a veteran with a pair of all-conference recognitions in her career, Arbiv knows first-hand how far beyond results Wilbourn's coaching goes.
"There is a whole legacy of female pole vaulters, so that in itself kind of sold it," Arbiv said. "It was very clear that he definitely cares about the athletes as human beings as well as how we're pole vaulting, which was definitely good given that over four years, there's definitely going to be ups and downs, so having a coach that not only is going to train you to make you jump higher, but also cares about how you're doing, is a great thing."
If relating with student-athletes on an emotional scale is one staple of Wilbourn's tenure at Duke, perhaps another, more tangible hallmark can be found at the campus' intramural building. Now used as the de facto indoor training facility for Blue Devil pole vaulters, the IM building offers many unique amenities in addition to being a place to practice throughout the winter months and windy days.
The vaulters can often be seen utilizing gymnastic-oriented equipment such as the high bar, trampoline and ropes. According to Wilbourn, its greatest advantage is the instant feedback it provides, as it helps simulate different stages of the pole vaulting motion. However, the usage of the IM building has almost poetically mirrored the success of the vaulters who train in it, as Wilbourn had to assemble the parts piece by piece over time.
"When I first got to Duke, we didn't have the gymnastics equipment and we didn't have a high bar in there, so we actually had to go to Bull City Gymnastics," he recalls. "We would go every Saturday my first few years at Duke to Bull City Gymnastics, and then I was like 'We've just got to start adding some equipment in the IM building.' We've kind of built it up over the years to be a little more pole vault-specific than what a gymnastics center would be."
The IM building is now, Wilbourn believes, one of the program's most valuable assets. No matter what technical adjustments need to be made, vaulters at Duke have found a way to improve when they train indoors. There are harnesses that can be used for plant exercises, rings for swing drills that are geared for the event, and multiple other features that allow for training that is equally as beneficial a pit outdoors.
From a weather standpoint, utilizing the IM building proved to be advantageous in order to keep the consistency that is needed when training throughout the winter. For alumnae like Clark, who arrived at Duke before practices and home meets took place at Morris Williams Stadium, having the indoor access was paramount.
"The IM building basically was our primary training facility because the runway was at the end of Wallace Wade, at the end of the horseshoe, for my first few years at Duke," Clark said. "The winds were terrible. We would practice out there sometimes, but the majority of the time we would jump inside, which is such a privilege to have, especially when the weather gets bad. You really can't take reps and you can't do what you need to do when you're freezing because pole vault is not a sport where you can continually move around and be warm. Being able to be consistent from approach to approach is pretty much everything, so having that facility in the winter, on rainy days, when the wind is bad is a game changer for pole vault."
Arbiv added, "For a southern school, it's not so common that track teams have indoor facilities, so carving out the space, specifically for pole vault – I think it's really unique and it's part of the reason why pole vault has taken front stage on our team."
From Heath's perspective, another benefit of the IM building was the alternative training opportunities that vaulters were granted, which enabled them to work on technique while not having to expend too much physical energy.
"One thing I think coach Wilbourn did really well was he allowed us to rest," she said. "We would have practices that were not hard on our bodies that still helped us train. We would have trampoline days or days in the IM building where we would still be working on things related to the pole vault, but in a really non-stressful way for our bodies. We would be able to recover and learn at the same time, which I think was definitely essential for improving technique and staying healthy throughout the season."
Those days in which a student-athlete could recover while still finding ways to improve on their vaults are indicative of Wilbourn's ability to relate to the people he works with. There remains a teacher-student dynamic – Clark and Heath described their event coach as 'serious' and 'intense' – but a trust is developed over the course of a career that paves way for autonomy among upperclassmen when going about their training regimen.
"It's definitely something I've appreciated," Arbiv said. "Freshman and sophomore year, it's important to buy in to the whole program and then once your junior and senior year rolls around, there definitely is more room to say, 'This is how my body is feeling today.' By then, you do know your body better, you know the program better, you know what you're supposed to be feeling and when you're supposed to be feeling it. I definitely think it's nice to be able to adjust then."
To experience that independence under Wilbourn's watch, however, generally means that one has endured some growing pains throughout their first couple years. The learning curve that he puts his vaulters through does not offer leniency to one over another – each and every athlete deals with the frustration of having their technique broken down and built up again.
It is a journey that requires serious commitment, humility and, most of all, belief in a coach. Through all the peaks of ACC and NCAA achievements, and all the valleys of walking away from a meet without a recorded height, the message that Wilbourn delivers to his vaulters has not wavered: Trust the process.
"That's his phrase – 'Trust the process'," Clark said. "I'd be really mad, just stomping around the back of the runway, and he'd be like 'Just trust the process.' It's so true, but it's probably the most annoying thing to hear when you're frustrated. He would even tell me, 'We're making these changes so that you can jump high later. We're not making all these quick fixes so you can jump really well in two weeks. We're going to commit the first couple years to the last couple years, and any progress you make along the way is great, but we need to make technical changes if we're going to expect something bigger.'"
Words of encouragement and reassurance have become routine for Wilbourn during 'The process.' While it is easy for a student-athlete to pledge their devotion in the planning stages, it makes it no less disheartening to suffer through the early results, as Heath found out right away.
"I no-heighted at my very first meet ever," she said. "It was my very first college meet, I had just been recruited, I had a scholarship and I was devastated – so stressed that I had just failed all expectations. But coach Wilbourn knew exactly what I was working on, he knew exactly where I was and his feedback from that meet was 'You did the thing that we were working on and so that's good. Even though you didn't clear any bars and scored zero points, you did what you were supposed to do and that's good.' That definitely helped me a lot in dealing with the growing pains."
But in time, the heights do come. The growth becomes observable. And, in the case of many vaulters under Wilbourn, the accolades are enjoyed. For Heath, once the process began to show returns, it became clear how valuable it was to undergo immediate adversity for the sake of long-term success.
"A few weeks into indoor season my freshman year, I started to feel more comfortable competing under his coaching, and then by my first meet of the outdoor season, I actually had a really big PR," she said. "I jumped six inches higher than I had previously, which is a really big deal in the vault. I was really excited about it, and I think that was a big pay-off moment where I was like 'Everything that he's been teaching me, everything I've been working on, all of these struggles are absolutely worth it.'"
The advantage of a more distant outlook that the vaulters experience is not so different than what Wilbourn himself had to go through when building the program. There were certain student-athletes, like Fryt and Clark, who gave their coach the feeling that after nine seasons, the women's pole vault had immense potential. But to that point, even with the individual achievements boasted by the two alumnae he worked with, Duke had not yet arrived as a dominant unit in the event.
Then came May 12, 2017 – the opening day of the ACC Outdoor Championships in Atlanta, Ga. The Blue Devils put the country on notice when Heath, Marty and Nati Sheppard – all in different recruiting classes – swept the top-three spots in the pole vault for a Duke takeover on the podium. Freshman Chesney Ward placed sixth for an additional All-ACC recognition as Wilbourn's group left no doubt who stood at the top of the conference.
"That day was when I realized that we have a powerhouse pole vault program," he said.
In the years since, Duke has earned national respect in the pole vault. There is a unique investment in the event made by Wilbourn and the program, and it is reflected in the quality of the recruits as well as the lineage of highly successful vaulters that spend their undergraduate years in Durham.
As far as what the future holds for Duke pole vaulting, Wilbourn – now entering his first season as the Blue Devils' interim head coach – has an immediate goal to place a similar emphasis on the men's side. This process, he feels, is well underway.
"The next step is to actually start recruiting men's vaulters and getting the men's side as good as the women's," Wilbourn said. "We're beginning to make that step. We just got two verbal commits on the men's side for two transfers that are already very good and will be transferring in next year. Now, it is just bringing the men's side up to where the women are."
For the time being, he maintains that Duke provides everything a prospective vaulter would need, from facilities, to high-end competition, to a distinguished academic experience. Whether the next great Blue Devil pole vaulter follows the path of Megan Clark – who is training now with the goal of making the U.S. Olympic team next year – or Madison Heath – who recently began medical school at Columbia – remarkable achievement can be found with Shawn Wilbourn and Duke pole vaulting.
"We're investing in this event," he said. "Not every track & field program invests in the pole vault. What Duke offers – that athletic-academic, that true student-athlete experience – it's a good fit."
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