Zachary Klobutcher '19 Recruiting Profile

When I was 10 years old my parents replaced a broken pipe in our sprinkler system. I found a long piece of PVC pipe in the yard and tried to copy what I saw those guys on the Olympics doing—the pole vaulters. I played with that pipe for days and it wasn’t until much later that I learned my mom had actually tried to find a place for me to learn how to vault but discovered I needed to be 100 pounds to go there. At this point in my life, 100 pounds was still several years away. The summer ended, I continued with competitive gymnastics and forgot about pole vaulting.

The summer before my freshman year of high school I decided to retire from gymnastics and lucky for me a pole vault gym had opened up right across the gym from where I had been working out. My official pole vault career started in August of 2015 and I learned some new things about myself. I learned that failure is inevitable. Even when I win, I end on a failed jump. Every vaulter does. That wasn’t the case with gymnastics so it was a new way of thinking and accepting failure.

There are some things that didn’t change though. In gym, the harder I worked the more fun I had, because the better I got at whatever skill I was trying to master. The same is true for pole vault, and the climate and attitude of the other vaulters makes it even more fun. I love to compete and I’m friends with almost everyone I compete with which makes it even better.

I have a lot of fun in the sports I do but my academic life has, in some ways, been a long road. In third grade my parents moved me and my younger brother to public school from private school and learned within two weeks that I was behind in every subject. Severely behind. Apparently the curriculum at my private school was not very challenging because my grades were always stellar. But by the end of my third grade year I saw a tutor on a regular basis. We mainly worked on reading and math but over the two years I worked with her we touched on all subjects from at one time or another. School did not get easier for me until middle school; that’s when I finally caught up with all my peers. Now that I’m in high school, it’s just hard for all of us and I definitely work hard for my grades.

For the remainder of my high school career I want to succeed to the best of my ability both academically and in the sports I compete in. I hope to continue that trend in college and earn a degree that will help me secure a comfortable living and be a productive member of society.