After a record setting season, red-shirt junior pole-vaulter Mick Viken was eliminated from the NCAA National Championships after failing to make his fourth jump at a height of 18 feet.  He finished 12th out of 24 competitors.

Viken marched through the first and second jumps.  

When the standards were raised to 17-feet, 9-inches (5.40m) in the third round, Viken got up from the mat rubbing a spot on his right thumb after a miss on his first attempt.  Pole-vault coach Kyle Ellis said Viken’s thumb had been bothering him as a result of blistering and raw tissue from his work while competing in the NCAA West Regional. 

“He had some open cuts from regionals,” Tom Akers, Eastern Director of Track and Field said.  However, Akers said he is not convinced it was the thumb pain that was bothering him.  

Viken, who was battling a hamstring injury sustained at the Ohio Valley Conference championships, had a strip of compression tape on his leg for the competition Wednesday.

“He had to take three weeks off because of the hamstring at the conclusion of our conference meet (during which) he was vaulting very good,” Akers said.

At the NCAA championships, the pole vault began at 16 feet, 8 inches and then progressed to 18 feet, 2 inches before going by five-centimeter increments for the remainder of the competition.

Athletes are allowed to miss on three consecutive attempts before being eliminated from the competition.  After a first miss, an athlete can choose to pass to the second round but then only have two chances to make the vault.

In the fourth round, Viken, the Rolling Meadows, Ill. native failed to clear the bar on all three tries at the 18 foot level and was eliminated from the competition.

 “We’re a little disappointed because he had great clearance on his first two attempts, but he just took (the bar) off with his chest and then on the last attempt he got a little too far under on takeoff,” Akers said.

Akers said he hopes that Viken has not created a mental barrier for himself when the standards are raised to 18 feet. 

“I think that 18-foot barrier is a mental barrier for a lot of vaulters,” Akers said.

Ellis felt Viken fell short of his potential.

 Ellis said directly following the competition. 

However, Viken’s exit from the national championships is not a fair indictment of his season as a whole.  

The OVC conference champ set school records in indoor and outdoor track while qualifying for his third straight NCAA National Championship.

“He should have gained a lot of confidence this year with the way he vaulted today, and the way he has been vaulting in practice, there is nothing but bigger and better things next year,” Akers said.

The defending 2012 pole vault outdoor national champion and Oral Robert’s senior Jack Whitt fell to Mississippi sophomore Sam Kendricks who captured the NCAA national championships with a final jump of 18 feet, 8 inches- two inches better than Whitt.  

Kendricks’ victory is an upset as he entered the competition with a seed of 17 feet, 2 inches.  

Whitt competed at the Olympic trials last summer and made the Olympic team as an alternate for the pole vault.  Next, Whitt will look to climb the latter to the international stage. 

The next step for Mick Viken is to have a good off-season.  

“I think the biggest thing we’re going to work on next year is to continue getting faster and stronger,” Ellis said. “He had high aspirations and goals for (Wednesday) and he was pretty disappointed.  I know he will be hungry to come back next year and kick some butt.”

Viken will have another chance to prove himself on the national stage as the Wisconsin transfer redshirted his freshman year with the Badgers before coming to Eastern.

“I think he could do big things next year,” Ellis said.

Michael Spencer can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected]