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Slashing down the runway like a sprinter, Natalie Moser drove down on the tip of her fiberglass pole and catapulted herself into the air.
The Wharton High junior nearly cleared the landing area during her warmup jump before plunging onto the end of the foam-padded pit.
Last year, she would have hit asphalt.
Moser owes her soft landing to new rules and a new emphasis on safety in the wake of a rash of injuries and fatalities in the pole vault last year.
The National Federation of State High School Associations ordered the width of the padded landing area be increased from 16 feet to 19 feet, 8 inches and the length from 16 feet to 20 feet, 5 inches. The NFHS also requires at least 2 inches of foam padding around the vault box, where competitors plant the pole.
"I'm glad that the padding is there," said Moser, who finished fourth at the Class 4A state meet last season. "Each time I land at the far end of the mat, I say to myself, "Oh, thank you, padding, for saving my life."'
The changes were made after the deaths of three vaulters last season: Kevin Dare, 19, of Penn State, Jesus Quesada, 16, of Clewiston and Samoa Fili, 17, of Wichita, Kan. All died when their heads struck hard surfaces outside the designated landing area.
On average, one pole vaulter has died each year during the past two decades. With about 25,000 participants, that ratio gives pole vaulting the highest death rate per participant of any sport, according to a study published in the American Journal of Sports Medicine.
The fatalities, which occurred during a two-month span last spring, brought public awareness to the perils of the sport and the need for reform. But the push for tougher safety standards came at a price.
The increase in padding required more money from school budgets at a time when schools were being forced to spend less. New landing pads cost about $8,000 and additions to existing pads about $2,500.
Schools were forced to decide whether to pay or not play. Some states chose the latter.
Maryland eliminated the pole vault from state and region competition. Utah dropped it for at least a year to determine if enough schools are still interested.
Ron Allen, the Florida High School Activities Association administrator for track and field, said the organization never considered getting rid of pole vaulting. In Dade County, the event was excluded from three major meets this season because the landing area was not up to standard.
Participation also has declined. At last week's Class A and 2A region meets, 16 athletes could qualify to compete in each event. Only the pole vault had fewer competitors. The numbers ranged from four to 15. "We knew it would be hard for the schools," Allen said. "It's an expensive sport. But it's also a great event and something we wanted to keep. We alerted schools in advance that they must comply with the dimensions or they would not vault.
"I know some schools could not afford it, and some counties decided to consolidate and pay for one pit at one site."
For the most part, bay area schools have complied with the changes. The only glitch was the additional padding ordered by some schools in Hillsborough, Pasco and Pinellas came a month after the season started.
"Some schools got a late start, but that's really the only hardship we've had to endure," said Wharton coach Dave Watson, a vault specialist. "The changes to the pits were a good thing. It makes it safer.
"No one ever wants to see someone die while participating in a sport, but maybe there is some good that can come out of it. Hopefully, this will help open some people's eyes to changes that need to be made."
Jan Johnson, a bronze medalist in the 1972 Olympics and now the chairman of the USA Track and Field pole vaulting safety committee, said bigger pits for high schools were planned before the deaths.
He was one of the authors of the AJSM study that reviewed catastrophic injuries. The deaths of Dare, Quesada and Fili, along with 16 others recorded since 1982, were the result of common occurrences, the head whipping off the pad and striking the surrounding hard surface, the head landing in the vault box or the head missing the pad.
Johnson said most deaths could have been prevented. Of the 12 that occurred since 1995, when safety measures requiring hard surfaces be covered with padding were established, 11 were on non-compliant facilities. The exception was Dare, who was clearing 15-7 when he tumbled onto the metal box, the area used to plant the pole.
"I know it's kind of an unfortunate time to be adding costs," Johnson said. "There are budget deficits, and teachers are losing jobs. I'm sure some schools think the sport is more of a liability, and we expected some to drop off.
"But that's the tradeoff we had to make."
Johnson's next priority is an emphasis on proper instruction. He helped form the Pole Vault Safety Certification Board, which offers an online course to certify a coach in teaching the event, and has traveled to clinics and seminars across the country.
Ed Dare is lobbying for other changes. His reasons are personal. He was sitting in the stands when his son died at the Big Ten indoor championships Feb. 23.
"I'm a big advocate for change," Dare said. "It's a long time coming. Had I known what I know, Kevin would have been competing in another sport. It was that unsafe. No one had taken the initiative to reform the event before.
"If somebody had done what I'm doing right now, I'd still have my son."
In the past year, Dare has pledged to revamp the sport. He launched a Web site, www.vaultforlife.com dedicated to safety improvements.
Penn State has joined Dare in his crusade. The school was the first to install a soft box, a cushioned planting area that eliminates all hard surfaces.
Researchers at the school also are working on a process to evaluate the strength of poles and have teamed with the American Society for Testing and Materials on a helmet designed specifically for vaulters.
The lightweight prototype helmet is made of Kevlar, the same material used in bulletproof vests. Dare said the product could be on the market by this summer.
"I'm really pushing the use of helmets," Dare said. "I want it to be mandatory at the high school and college level."
Currently four states - Wisconsin, North Dakota, South Dakota and Minnesota - require helmets. New York considered a similar bill that didn't make it past a committee, and the NCAA cited the lack of a vaulting-specific helmet.
Fort Lauderdale St. Thomas Aquinas is the only Florida school that requires its vaulters to wear helmets. Allen said there is no talk of making helmets mandatory at the state level.
Regardless, Johnson said the sport needs to be reformed.
"We can't keep sending people to unsafe facilities," he said.
"In my view, we've been lucky to have only this many fatalities."