Daily Journal Athlete of the Week: Aragon’s Jarod Nunnemaker

Nunnemaker has earned Daily Journal Athlete of the Week honors for obliterating that record this season, one he first broke Feb. 28 in a dual meet against Woodside, recording a height of 15-3.

“[Personal records] are always awesome,” Nunnemaker said. “Especially in pole vault, it’s rare to get a PR. … For pole vaulting, it’s so technical, you have to train so much just to improve by an inch.”

And sometimes you improve by leaps and bounds.

It turns out, the senior was just getting warmed up with his Feb. 28 season debut. Saturday at the Willow Glen Track and Field Invitational, he nailed a vault of 15-7.5, a height that not only re-breaks his own Aragon record, but marks the second best performance in the history of the Peninsula Athletic League.

The only PAL pole vaulter to fly higher was Menlo-Atherton’s Steve Toney at 16-2 in 1986, the 10th best recorded vault in Central Coast Section history. Nunnemaker’s vault of 15-7.5 ranks 29th all-time in CCS history.

“The last two years — because he cleared 14-7 last year, so, he basically went from 10 to 14 feet in two years — that’s a pretty big leap.” Aragon assistant coach Norm Bennett said. “Then, getting to 15 — when he did 14-7, I thought he’s going to be able to do 15 — but with the performance he turned in Saturday, that was very extraordinary.”

Aragon head coach Greg Alvarado refers to Nunnemaker as the miler that became a vaulter. Nunnemaker arrived at Aragon in 2020-21 as more of a middle-distance runner, but a runner nonetheless. But with Bennett coaching an elaborate pole vaulting program — one that currently rosters 19 athletes at varying skill levels — it didn’t take Nunnemaker long to make the discipline his primary focus.

“To be honest, I wasn’t keen on running when I was a freshman,” Nunnemaker said. “I wanted to try something else. I always loved rock climbing, climbing trees, more hardcore sports. I kind of took that and saw pole vaulting as a cool combination of all that.”

Alvarado still boasts Nunnemaker as being the fastest runner on the team. The senior runs the 100 meters in a casual setting at 11.4 seconds, Alvarado said. Not only that, he has topped 19 feet in the long jump, and 39 feet in the triple jump.

“He’ll be a college decathlete, I’m sure, at some point,” Alvarado said.

It was something of happenstance that Nunnemaker gravitated toward his lifelong friend Dodge when he discovered pole vaulting upon arriving at Aragon. The two have a generational history, starting with Nunnemaker’s father Victor, and Dodge’s father Tony, being boyhood friends growing up in Fort Bragg.

Nunnemaker and Dodge have plenty in common. The two are Boy Scouts, literally, and recently shared the ultimate honor of being promoted to the rank of Eagle Scout at a shared ceremony. However, Nunnemaker said Dodge, who was a year ahead of him at Aragon, didn’t influence his decision to take up pole vaulting.

“It was definitely good having him because we were more advanced than the rest of the crowd,” Nunnemaker said. “So we could kind of compete against each other. That kind of helped us get those better heights.”

The two were vigorous competitors, something that was on display April 11, 2023 in a home dual meet against Westmoor. It’s no coincidence the two vaulters each set their respective season records at that meet, both hitting a height of 14-7, then pushing each other at the 15-feet mark. Nunnemaker missed his shot at eclipsing 15 feet, but the day belonged to Dodge, as this was the day he’d set the Aragon pole vaulting mark with a height of 15-1.

“The two of them are the best I’ve ever coached,” said Bennett, who has been of staff at Aragon for 11 years, after spending four years at Burlingame.

Dodge is now at UC Santa Cruz. Nunnemaker is still fielding college offers, but has several NCAA Division I schools on his list of potential destinations. Topping the 15-6 plateau will do wonders to stoke Division I interest.

It was an emotional performance Saturday at Willow Glen, one that saw Nunnemaker again tap into a friendly rivalry. This one was with longtime friend Lex Lehnert, a senior at St. Ignatius. Like Nunnemaker, Lehnert opened the season with the first vault of 15 feet in his career, executing a height of 15 feet flat Feb. 24 at a three-team dual meet with Sequoia and Woodside.

Lehnert recorded another 15 at Willow Glen, dueling with Nunnemaker for over an hour and a half. Once Lehnert’s day ended, he passed the baton, so to speak, to Nunnemaker, by loaning the Aragon senior his 175-pound capacity pole. This was significant, as the most advanced pole Nunnemaker has in his arsenal is a 165-pound capacity pole.

“If it’s a heavier weight and the vaulter can handle it, it will give you a bigger recoil and a better spring,” Bennett said.

With the high-tech loaner, Nunnemaker certainly delivered on his potential. He’s earned the chance, having trained in the offseason at various top-flight venues, including attending clinics at UC Berkeley and Stanford, and traveling to Idaho to train at the Stacy Dragila Vault Club, a prestigious track club run by the 2000 Olympic gold medalist in the pole vault of the same name.

“He has goals of going to (this year’s elite invitational meet in) Arcadia, matching up against the top kids in the state,” Alvarado said. “He’s already No. 4 (ranked in the state). He’s driven. ... He works out like a dog.”

That work ethic translated to an outpouring of crowd support Saturday. Vaulting alone at 15-7.5, Nunnemaker was down to his third and last attempt. As is traditional at track meets, the crowd got into it, rooting Nunnemaker on with a slow cadence of clapping as he prepared at the top of the runway, and speeding up into a rally clap as he sprinted toward the vault.

What was different about this crowd support was the number of onlookers. As it turns out, two vaulters reaching the 15-feet mark draws quite a crowd. And Nunnemaker rode that crowd support to one of the greatest vaults in PAL history.

It isn’t the first time Nunnemaker — who has ambitions of breaking the PAL record of 16-2 this season — has been in such rare air. Last month, he competed in the Simplot Games, a prestigious indoor track meet. He set his non-varsity personal best at that meet Feb. 15-17 at the ICCU Dome on the campus of Idaho State University in Pocatello, Idaho, topping out at 15-6.

“So I knew he had the potential,” Bennett said. “And then Saturday was in season, which is recorded. So, I think he’s got the potential for 16-plus.”

“I think my goal is to vault 16-6,” Nunnemaker said. “That’s kind of been my goal since I started this season.”