Jenn Suhr

Jennifer Lynn Suhr (née Stuczynski; born February 5, 1982) is an American former pole vaulter.

At Fredonia High School, she played softball, basketball, soccer, and track and field, and won the New York State pentathlon title in 2000 as a senior.

Suhr attended Roberts Wesleyan University in Rochester, New York, where she competed in basketball and track and field.

She averaged 24.3 points and 6.7 rebounds a game for Roberts Wesleyan in 2003–04, taking her team to the NCCAA national championship game.

She graduated as the school's all-time leading scorer in basketball with 1,819 points.

In the 2005 USA Indoor Championships in Boston, Jenn Stuczynski entered as an unknown, unseeded competitor and won the US title having only trained for 10 months.

She went on to set three personal bests, eventually clearing on her first attempt to leapfrog from a tie for third.

Later that indoor season she won the NAIA indoor national title in the pole vault.

Suhr began her career with her coach Rick Suhr providing financial support to her by re-mortgaging his home.

She has been an Olympic and World champion, has been ranked #1 in the World, has been the #1 American pole vaulter since 2006, and has won a total of 17 US National Championships (7 Indoor, 10 Outdoor).

She holds the world indoor pole vault record at 5.03m.

She holds the American women's pole vault record indoors.

Suhr started the 2006 indoor season with personal bests at nearly every meet and becoming the #2 American all time, behind only Stacy Dragila, with her clearance of 4.68m.

She captured her first USA Outdoor title with her winning clearance of 4.55m at the 2006 AT&T USA Outdoor Championships.

She finished third at the 2006 World Athletics Final.

Suhr won the USA Indoor Track & Field Championships in Boston on February 25, 2007.

On May 20, 2007, Suhr broke the American outdoor pole vault record with a clearance of 4.84m at the Adidas Track Classic in Carson, California, beating the previous record set by Stacy Dragila in 2004 by one centimeter.

Two weeks later, at the Reebok Grand Prix on June 2, 2007, Suhr cleared 4.88m, breaking the American record for a second time and becoming the second highest vaulter in history behind Russian Yelena Isinbayeva.

Suhr then attempted a new world record vault of 5.02m – one centimeter higher than Isinbayeva's record at the time – but failed on three attempts at the height.

Suhr took her second national outdoor title at the USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships in Indianapolis with a vault of 4.45m, her only successful clearance of the competition The victory secured Suhr a place on the US team for the 2007 World Championships in Athletics, held in Osaka, Japan.

In 2008, she won the U.S. Olympic trials, setting an American record of 4.92m and won a silver medal in the Beijing Olympics.

Track & Field News named her American Female Athlete of the Year for 2008.

Suhr was born to Mark and Sue Stuczynski, grocery store owners in Fredonia, New York.

The grocery store was previously owned by her grandfather, "Bunk" Stuczynski.

She got involved in sports at a young age, playing softball at age 6.

At 9, she competed in an adult golf league with her grandfather.

Suhr won the Indoor U.S. Nationals, which qualified her for the 2008 IAAF World Indoor Championships – Women's pole vault in Valencia, Spain, where she finished second on a countback to Yelena Isinbayeva.

Both cleared 4.75m.

At the Adidas Track Classic on May 18, 2008, Suhr cleared 4.90m, breaking her own American record.

She missed all three attempts at 5.02m, which would have been a world record.

The U.S. Olympic Committee named her its female athlete of the month for May.

At the U.S. Olympic Trials on July 6, 2008, Suhr cleared 4.92m, winning the trials and breaking her own American record.

At the Aviva Grand Prix on July 25, 2008, two women attempted the world record in the same meet for the first time.

Both Suhr and Isinbayeva were unsuccessful.

At the Olympics in Beijing on August 18, 2008, Suhr finished second to Isinbayeva, clearing 4.80m.

Isinbayeva broke her own world record with a jump of 5.05m.

On January 3, 2010, Jenn married her coach, Rick Suhr, in Rochester.

Jenn began pole vaulting with coach Rick Suhr.

Competing in her first major global championship, Suhr finished in 10th place in the final, with a 4.50m clearance.

She won the gold medal at the London Olympics on August 6, 2012.