June 15, 2019 Justin Fedich
MIDDLETOWN — “Oh, I had open-heart surgery.”
Hugh Cauthers says this as if it’s an item he mistakenly left off his shopping list. If such a list existed, it would also include triple-bypass surgery and Parkinson’s disease, the former occurring nearly 10 years ago and the latter the most visible indicator of his current physical limitations.
Of the torn mitral valve a few years back that led to the open-heart procedure, Cauthers smiles and says, “That’s kind of a big deal.”
The 71-year-old pole vault coach has handled this past decade of health complications and personal loss with the same equanimity and grace of the champions he develops.
That includes Michelle Kercado, whose athletic ability in the late 1990s was a motivational force behind Cauthers suing the state of New York to allow girls to compete in the pole vault. It also includes Kaeli Thompson, the Warwick senior vaulter and Duke commit who is currently wrapping up her high-flying high school career in North Carolina, competing for a national championship.
“I wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for him,” Thompson said.
Cauthers, a coach at Hudson Valley Flying Circus, fell in love with the sport for both its simplicity and its impossibility. There’s always a mathematical explanation for why a jump landed a certain way, which excites the former Monroe-Woodbury calculus teacher. But there’s also the joy of proving to young athletes that pole vaulting is not a Sisyphean challenge; Cauthers, more than 40 years later, is still enamored by the ability to, as he puts it, “get you to do something physically that you never thought you’d be able to do.”
Those who enter with doubts look to Cauthers for inspiration.
I’ll never forget what he told me in the beginning of the season when I was probably at my lowest point, when I just couldn’t get over 13 feet,” said Wallkill sophomore Louis Martinez. “He told me I had a lot of potential and I have the skill set.”
Martinez cleared 15 feet at the outdoor state qualifier. One of his competitors, Nicolas Villanueva of Monroe-Woodbury, faced long odds of advancing to the state meet when he was concussed in a car accident only six weeks prior. “He saw me at my worst and my best,” Villanueva said of Cauthers, after celebrating a jump that qualified him for states.
In return, the athletes who train at the Flying Circus, at the Barn in Warwick, have seen their mentor at his worst. Cauthers said he’s missed more time coaching this year than any other year, cutting back from six days a week to two or three. Coaching partner and longtime friend Tim St. Lawrence recalls multiple instances when either he or coach Stephanie Duffy needed to give Cauthers a ride home from practice because he appeared in no condition to drive.
Although Parkinson’s has sapped Cauthers of his energy, it hasn’t touched his spirit.
“I don’t see him walking away from this,” St. Lawrence said. “I think he’ll stay right with it in a limited capacity but still make an impact.”
During the OCIAA championships in May, Cauthers’ legs trembled slightly as he stood. He spoke for a few minutes before he was greeted with hugs from athletes who couldn’t wait to tell him all they’d accomplished since their last conversation. At the state meet in Middletown a couple weeks later, he was planted more firmly, wearing a cap with the message “Raise the bar” — apropos for Cauthers’ personal struggles and his coaching approach.
As his health deteriorates, Cauthers must raise his own figurative bar so that he can keep helping kids improve for as long as his body will allow.
“I’m not going to let the disease win,” he said.
Parkinson’s, by its nature, won’t relent either. But as the degenerative disorder renders simple tasks into difficult chores, Cauthers will remain steadfast in his love of the sport and his innate desire to convince athletes they can do something they never before thought possible. That’s his game plan for winning.
“I don’t allow that to dominate my life,” Cauthers said of the disease, “and as soon as I get done with the procedure, I’m anxious to get back to the track or anxious to get back to practice. Get back doing what I want to be doing.”
His heart is open to whatever comes next, so long as the pole vault is involved.
https://www.recordonline.com/sports/20190615/fighting-parkinsons-warwick-pole-vault-coach-cauthers-sets-high-bar?rssfeed=true
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