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PREP RALLY SPRING SPORTS | 2.26.2023 18 Auto-Home-Life-Business Proudly Serving Bentonville with over 50 years of experience. Dan Cheek Agency 304 SW 16th St #12, Bentonville, AR 72712 479-636-4919 HENRY APPLE NWA Democrat-Gazette Cade DeWitt has set the bar when it comes to the pole vault for Bentonville West's boys track team. And in true pole vaulter fashion, the senior now wants that bar to be raised a little higher before he leaves. DeWitt, who cleared 16 feet, 5 inches to set the school record during the West Relays last spring, has 17 feet on his mind and wants to clear that height before his high | career is completed — and sooner rather than later. "I've got over 17 feet during a practice," he said. "But I haven't done it in a meet yet. I'm getting some good heights, and now I'm trying to do that consistently. "I'm putting so much pressure on myself to get that 17-foot bar. It's because I want to go into college with that big PR. I want to leave one more legacy behind before I go off to college." College won't be an obstacle DeWitt needs to overcome. He has already signed a national letter of intent to join the track team at Louisville. With that already behind him, DeWitt can turn his total focus on the pole vault and reaching the goal he has set for himself. "He's a competitor," West coach B.J. Parish said. "He wants to win, and he wants to jump high. That's two good things to have when he's out there. "And it's not afraid. Pole vaulters have to be a little bit wacky. They're a different breed. and I think Cade comes from a background of him doing extreme sports. He always likes to really test his limits." DeWitt said he grew up on the track — literally — as his mother Tricia served as an assistant boys track coach in Ozark, Mo., for 5 years and later became the ninth-grade girls track coach at Bentonville for 3 more years. It was during that time at Ozark that DeWitt watched one of the pole vaulters perform and became fascinated by it. So it became no surprise to anybody when DeWitt was able to compete in track, he picked the pole vault as the event he wanted to try. "The guy I started watching was a decent pole vaulter, and I thought he was going really, really high," DeWitt said. "So I asked if I was capable of doing that. So I just tried it, and I loved it. It was so awesome because it's such a unique event." DeWitt said it took him his entire seventh grade to be able to clear 8-6, which was the | record at that time, then he increased that to 10-6 the next year. It eventually grew to last year's personal-high of 16-5. "He had a few really good weeks of practice last spring," Parish said. "Man, we ran into a situation where we couldn't get a pole to stop him. We got the right pole, the right run and the right grip. It worked, and it was a great day, but we had trouble replicating that the rest of the season. "I fully expect him to jump a lot higher this year. He's faster and he's stronger, and that's huge. The faster and stronger you are, the bigger the pole you can jump on. He's moving bigger poles than he ever has. We got on our two biggest poles two times, and always in meets, but he uses those poles every day in practice." Wolverines' DeWitt ready to soar to new heights CADE DEWITT BENTONVILLE WEST