Australian Olympic pole vault gold medalist Steve Hooker has developed a bad case of what golfers call "the yips," casting doubt over his ability to successfully defend his crown in London in July, The Daily Telegraph reports.
Hooker revealed Wednesday he would not compete in the Australian Olympic selection trials in Melbourne on March 1-3 or the Perth Track Classic in his adopted hometown of Perth this Saturday.
The Australian athletic team's national captain explained his "auto pilot" — the proprioceptive awareness to aggressively execute the life-threatening plant and ride of the fiberglass vaulting pole — had deserted him.
He said it was the result of "a build-up of a number of things mainly linked to the knee injury which haunted me for almost 18 months."
Until recently, Hooker held every major title open to him — the Commonwealth Games, Continental Cup, world championship, world indoor championship and the Olympic Games — making him one of the most successful competitors from any nation in the history of athletics.
But the 30-year-old said he would not compete again this domestic season, putting his Olympic selection in jeopardy.
"I desperately want to defend my crown in London, I want to be there with my teammates," he wrote in The (Sydney) Daily Telegraph.
"Thankfully, I believe it's achievable. I believe there's enough time and, more importantly, I believe I can get the auto-pilot switched back on. My auto-pilot is not working at the moment.
"The confidence I require to stand at the end of the runway and then charge down, land my pole and soar almost six meters [20 feet] into the air has left me for the time being.
"The problem is that if we take off 20 cm [eight inches] too close or 20 cm too far out the outcome isn't just a foul like for the long-jumpers — you can do serious damage to yourself."
The question now is if there is too much going through his mind or whether his thoughts are tilted toward the negative — the potentially life-threatening consequences of a bad vault. Hooker experienced the same nightmare back in 2003 when he simply could not bring himself to take off.
Yet, despite a debilitating knee injury, he pulled off one of the truly heroic victories at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, clearing the bar at his third and final attempt.
