1956 Summer Olympics / Athletics - Pole Vault (Men)

sport	athletics
discipline	Pole vault
gender	Men
Attendees	19 athletes from 12 countries
Competition location	Melbourne Cricket Ground
Competition phase	November 24, 1956 (qualification) November 26, 1956 (final)
Medalist Bob Richards ( USA )   Bob Gutowski ( USA )   Georgios Roumbanis ( GRE )

Eeles Landström (FIN) was seventh in the final.

Training jump by Manfred Preußger (GER), who reached eighth place in the final - four years later in Rome he was fourth.

The Italian Giulio Chiesa finished ninth in the final.

The men's pole vault at the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne was held on November 24 and 26, 1956 at the Melbourne Cricket Ground . 19 athletes took part.

The American Bob Richards became Olympic champion . He won ahead of his compatriot Bob Gutowski and the Greek Georgios Roumbanis .

Swiss and Austrian athletes did not take part. The only German participant was Manfred Preußger , who finished the competition in eighth place.

Existing records

World record	4.77 m	Cornelius Warmerdam ( USA )	Modesto , USA	May 23, 1942
Olympic record	4.55 m	Bob Richards ( USA )	Helsinki Final , Finland	July 22, 1952

Conducting the competition

The athletes competed in a qualifying round on November 24th. The required qualification height was 4.15 m. For all qualified jumpers the final took place on November 26th.

Note: The qualified athletes are highlighted in light blue.

Time schedule

November 24, 10 a.m .: Qualification
November 26, 1.30 p.m .: Final

Note: All times are local Melbourne time (UTC + 10)

qualification

Date: November 24, 1956, 10:00 a.m.

space	Surname	nation	3.70 m	3.85 m	4.00 m	4.15 m	height	annotation
1	George Mattos	United States	-	O	-	O	4.15 m
2	Vladimir Bulatov	Soviet Union	-	O	O	O	4.15 m
	Giulio Chiesa	Italy
	Zbigniew Janiszewski	Poland
5	Ragnar Lundberg	Sweden	O	O	O	O	4.15 m
	Georgios Roumbanis	Greece
7th	Bob Gutowski	United States	xo	-	-	O	4.15 m
8th	Anatoly Petrov	Soviet Union	-	O	xo	O	4.15 m
	Vitaly Chernobai	Soviet Union	-	xo	O	O
	Zenon Ważny	Poland
11	Bob Richards	United States	-	O	xxo	O	4.15 m
12	Eeles Landström	Finland	-O	O	O	x o	4.15 m
	Manfred Preussger	Germany	O	O	O	x o
	Matti Sutinen	Finland
15th	Allah Ditta	Pakistan	-	xxo	x o	xxx	4.00 m
16	Rolando Cruz	Puerto Rico	O	O	xx o	xxx	4.00 m
17th	Bruce Peever	Australia	O	O	xxx		3.85 m
18th	Peter Denton	Australia	-xo	O	xxx		3.85 m
ogV	Victor Sillon	France	-	x--				without height

final

space	Surname	nation	4.00 m	4.15 m	4.25 m	4.35 m	4.40 m	4.45 m	4.50 m	4.53 m	4.56 m	4.59 m	result	annotation
1	Bob Richards	United States	O	O	O	O	O	O	O	O	x o	xxx	4.56 m	OR
2	Bob Gutowski	United States	O	O	O	xo	xo	xxo	O	O	xxx		4.53 m
3	Georgios Roumbanis	Greece	O	O	xo	xo	O	O	O	xxx			4.50 m
4th	George Mattos	United States	O	-	O	O	xxx						4.35 m
5	Ragnar Lundberg	Sweden	O	-	O	xxx							4.25 m
6th	Zenon Ważny	Poland	O	O	O	xxx							4.25 m
7th	Eeles Landström	Finland	O	-	x o	xxx							4.25 m
8th	Manfred Preussger	Germany	O	xo	x o	xxx							4.25 m
9	Vladimir Bulatov	Soviet Union	xo	O	xxx								4.15 m
	Giulio Chiesa	Italy
11	Anatoly Petrov	Soviet Union	O	x o	xxx								4.15 m
12	Zbigniew Janiszewski	Poland	xo	x o	xxx								4.15 m
13	Vitaly Chernobai	Soviet Union	O	xxx									4.00 m
ogV	Matti Sutinen	Finland	xxx											without height

Date: November 26, 1956, 1:30 p.m.

The favorite was defending champion Bob Richards, who had slight problems in qualifying. The Swede Ragnar Lundberg and the Finn Eeles Landström were also highly rated. But the two Scandinavians were eliminated early at 4.25 m. Only Richards, his compatriots Bob Gutowski and George Mattos and the Greek Georgios Roumbanis were still in the race. Mattos failed at 4.40 m, which his opponents were able to cross. Richards, Gutowski and Roumbanis also stayed at 4.45 m and 4.50 m. Roumbanis, who had surprisingly come this far, had to end the competition only at 4.53 m. Gutowski then failed at 4.56 m, which Richards jumped over in the second attempt. However, he also failed at 4.59 m. Richards improved his own Olympic record by one centimeter, but Cornelius Warmerdam's world record from 1942 was another 21 centimeters higher.

At these Olympic Games, completely unnoticed by most of the people, a fiberglass rod was used for the first time in a major event. The Greek bronze medalist Georgios Roumbanis experimented with this new type of rod and it is not entirely understandable why this new type of material initially disappeared again. Only after the Olympic Games in 1960 did fiberglass rods gain unstoppable worldwide acceptance and it was only through their use that Warmerdam's ancient world record fell.

In the 13th Olympic final, Richards jumped to the 14th gold medal for the USA - in 1908 there were two winners, both from the USA.

literature

• Ekkehard zur Megede , The History of Olympic Athletics, Volume 2: 1948–1968, Verlag Bartels & Wernitz KG, Berlin, 1st edition 1969, pp. 140f

Web links

• SportsReference pole vault
• Official report p. 330f, engl. (PDF), accessed on October 5, 2017
• Melbourne 1956 Official Olympic Film - Part 5 | Olympic History , range 1:36 min - 5:39 min, published on July 22, 2015 on youtube.com, accessed on October 5, 2017

Individual evidence

1. ↑ IAAF Statistics Handbook, Berlin 2009, page 556 ( Memento from June 29, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
2. ↑ ^{a b} Official report p. 284, engl. (PDF), accessed on October 5, 2017
3. ↑ Official report p. 330, engl. (PDF), accessed on October 5, 2017
4. ↑ SportsReference (Eng.)
5. ^ Ekkehard zur Megede , The History of Olympic Athletics, Volume 2: 1948–1968, Verlag Bartels & Wernitz KG, Berlin, 2nd edition 1970, p. 140