Britain's Molly Coderie won gold at the World Indoor Championships in Glasgow. Photo: Reuters/Hannah Mackay
Molly Coderie Britain's first world or Olympic champion in the pole vault. Now she's aiming to become the first British woman to win an Olympic field title in 40 years, and she comes from a county with just one track and no indoor athletics complex.
Not that Coderie, whose Instagram following has topped 215,000 following her impressive gold at the indoor championships in Glasgow on Saturday, believes that coming from Cornwall, the region most associated with surfing, is any disadvantage to the sport. which was historically dominated by the United States and the old Soviet Union. Union
“Growing up in Cornwall made me who I am. It makes you a little tougher,” she says. “We didn't have any special conditions, but I still had the support I needed. We trained outside all winter. If we wanted to go to the house, we would have to drive three or four hours to Bath.
“There aren't a lot of people from Cornwall who are involved in high-class athletics, so when someone does you have the whole county behind you. Cornwall's support is second to none.
“I have vivid memories before the 2018 Commonwealth Games… I was still training in Cornwall and funnily enough it was in March but it was snowing and we were just jumping around in the snow outside. We'll just have to deal with it — rain and wind. While it's nice to have luxury, it's really adapted me to this environment, so when it comes to competition, when things aren't perfect, I handle it pretty well.»
What a moment ❤@MollyCaudery wins pole vault gold at #WorldIndoorChamps 🥇 pic.twitter.com/VStnNgZLp3
— BBC Sport (@BBCSport) March 2, 2024
Saturday's final in Glasgow, where Coderie cleared 4.80m shortly after another competitor, France's Margot Chevrier, suffered a horrific ankle fracture, was certainly a test of both mental and physical resolve.
The remaining paratroopers had to wait 15 minutes for Chevrier to receive emergency medical treatment at the exact spot where they then took off. “I ended up crying to my coach,” Koderi says. “I really take on other people's emotions. I tried to pull myself together and I just couldn't. My coach Scott [Simpson] knows me very well. He said, “Don't hold back, let it all out,” so I had a minute to cry, reset, and send them all love.
“After that, I had to regroup and execute. I'm very proud of myself. I'm definitely not one to outsmart anyone. You are against yourself — jump as high as possible. Especially at away competitions, everyone is friendly and wants others to succeed.”
Koderi also has first-hand experience dealing with career-threatening injury. In December 2021, she was finishing a workout at a gym in Cornwall when her index finger got stuck between the barbell and the power rack at the end of the exercise. Her finger was «90 per cent drooping» and her parents had to make a five-hour drive to Derby on Christmas Eve for emergency treatment from a hand specialist. Coderi later posted on Instagram an X-ray of the bone between the two middle joints, literally completely torn in two. It would require three surgeries, but she still returned to claim Commonwealth Games silver in 2022. It then required two more surgeries on her Achilles tendon, but over long periods of rehabilitation she learned that it was possible, especially in a sport like pole vaulting with so many parts that can be improved even while injured.
< p>“I was still mentally practicing pole vaulting and imagining the competition when I was going through rehab,” she says. “I visualized non-stop and that’s all I could see. When I returned to jumping, some of the things I needed to work on almost disappeared because I was visualizing the perfect jump so much. It had a huge impact.»
Fifth place on Caudrey's return to major competition at last year's World Championships highlighted her potential, and having finally managed to stay injury-free all winter, the benefits of consistent training are now finally being felt.
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“I was really really unlucky with injuries and this was the first time since I was 17 that I had no injuries,” she says. “Mentally I’m stronger, physically I’m stronger. The combination of all this allowed me to move up.”
Coderie lived in Cornwall until she was 18, where her father Stuart coached her at the Redruth circuit near her home village of Illogan. She was a gymnast until the age of 11, but progressed to all-around athletics, also excelling in the hurdles and high jump, and then focused on pole vaulting from the age of 15.
She went to university in Miami when she was 18 and then returned to the UK and Loughborough where she wrote a dissertation on resilience and mental health. Her current Loughborough training group also includes World, European and Olympic bronze medalist Holly Bradshaw, and New Zealander Eliza McCartney, who won silver on Saturday. Caudrey's victory in Glasgow follows world-leading clearances peaking at 4.86m (just 4cm off the British record) already this season at competitions in Birmingham and France.
Caudrey passed 4.80 million and won gold Photo: Reuters/Fabrizio Bensch 
She became the champion, beating New Zealand's Eliza McCartney on countback. Photo: Getty Images/Michael Steele
After such an emotional competition on Saturday, which was also briefly paused to watch Josh Kerr win the 3000m, there were still tears in the victory as Coderie tracked down her boyfriend, high jumper Joel Clarke-Khan, and her parents Stuart and Barbara, who made a nine-hour car journey from Cornwall to find themselves stranded on the roadside. “It was an indescribable feeling,” she says. “Especially in front of the home crowd, knowing that you have the whole nation behind you, knowing that you're sharing this with them and they're as proud of you as you are. You have a split second to fall [after being eliminated] and realize what you've done, and then you can absorb it.»
Now the holiday looms as Caudry, a self-described «adrenaline junkie,» admits she will have to consciously limit some of her hobbies in the five months leading up to the Olympics. This includes wanting to try skydiving (“I'll do that when I'm done with my career”) but not trips home to Illogan and the nearby beaches of Portreath, Gwithian and Perranporth.
“If I was ever feeling a little down or anything like that, I have a great relationship with my coach Scott and he would just say, 'Okay, go to Cornwall for the weekend,' and every time I come back, he says : “You just look rested and energized,” says Koderi. “I just love it there. This is a great place to go home and visit. This is my happy place. I'm very active, I love being in the sea, being outdoors and surfing.
“We do pole vaulting for the adrenaline and the rush we get. This is what I thrive on. Although it can be a little scary at times, I think that's what makes it so exciting. I think 2028 in Los Angeles will really be the best year, but going into [2024], I can't deny that I have a shot at the Olympics. I really think I need to re-evaluate. This is madness. Winning an Olympic medal is the dream of every athlete. If I could get Olympic gold one day, my dream would come true.”
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