In recent years, S.Siva’s name has been synonymous with men’s pole vault in the country. He showed potential right from the junior level and the current senior National Record of 5.31m belongs to the 27-year-old vaulter from Tamil Nadu.
Dev Meena is on a similar trajectory. Meena had set a new youth National Record of 4.91m at the Khelo India Youth Games in Bhopal last year. On Sunday, less than a week after turning 19, he successfully defended his crown at the Federation Cup with 5.10m, albeit in Siva’s absence who did not take part despite featuring in the start list.
As soon as Meena realized he had cleared the bar on his first attempt at what turned out to be the gold medal-winning height, he started celebrating while still on his way down to the landing mat.
Even though he could not go further and clear 5.15m, the athlete had shown enough glimpses of his technique and overall ability during the event which started at 5:40pm at the Kalinga Stadium and lasted for more than two-and-a-half hours in humid conditions.
Meena, who hails from Silphod village of Khategaon Tehsil in Dewas district of Madhya Pradesh, tells he wasn’t a vaulter from the beginning. “I used to be a sprinter till 2020 when my coach Ghanshyam Sir and chief coach Sanjay Garnaik told me to switch considering my physique,” Meena tells Sportstar after the medal ceremony.
Making the case for a foreign coach
The teenager is not anywhere close to global standards. Germany’s Hendrik Muller and Qatar’s Seifeldin Heneida Abdesalam lead the U20 charts this season with 5.55m.
Siva had someone in Dan Wilcox, who had discovered and mentored him until he passed away due to COVID-19 in 2021. Under Wilcox, Siva was progressing at a decent pace.
Dev Meena of Madhya Pradesh lifts in the Mens Pole Valut final in the 27th National Federation Senior Athletics Competition 2024 at Kalinga stadium in Bhubaneswar. | Photo Credit: BISWARANJAN ROUT/ The Hindu
However, Meena is making a strong case for better coaching from outside the country.
He scaled a height of 5.16m, the joint fifth-best on the all-time Indian list, at the National Games in Goa last year and booked his spot for the upcoming World Athletics U20 Championships in Peru in August. He also became the first Indian man in 38 years to win a medal in pole vault at the Asian U20 Athletics Championship in Dubai recently.
“I don’t have a sponsorship as such. I train at the Madhya Pradesh Athletics Academy in the TT Nagar Stadium in Bhopal. They are supporting me a lot. There are also talks of bringing a foreign coach. The name has not been decided though. It is just a suggestion for now,” says Meena, an admirer of World Record-holder Armand ‘Mondo’ Duplantis and Emmanouil ‘Manolo’ Karalis.
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