Success breeds success, and during the last six seasons the Sedona Red Rock High School’s pole vaulters have proven that.

Six Scorpions, including at least one from every class, qualified for this year’s Division IV state track and field championship meet. Since the 2013 season, when current pole vault coach John Ortiz took over, 25 have qualified.

“They’re just really special kids. They’re really hard workers, all of them, and they love the sport,” Ortiz said. “If that’s the only thing they’d do, that would be it. Even though they do other events, they love pole vault, it’s in their blood I think. They like being upside down, hanging on a pole.”

Ortiz has coached 10 medal winners at Red Rock: One champion, two runners-up, five third-place finishers and two fourth places. Before his time, two Scorpions also brought home medals, in 2011 and 2012. Until moving down in the 2017 season, Red Rock competed in Division III.

This year’s group is the largest since Ortiz has taken over, and includes four boys, also the most. The group’s dynamic and experience level is varied, from seasoned veterans with heaps of state meet experience to newcomers who learned the ropes quickly enough to qualify.

It was made up of senior Julia Koss, juniors Drake Ortiz and Forrest Hartley, sophomore Dylan Beattie and freshmen Serena Allen and Eric Schrader. Despite high expectations, Koss was the only one to walk away with a medal, a bronze. She was runner-up in 2017 and third in 2016.

Drake Ortiz took home a fourth-place medal as a sophomore, but Hartley improved from his 15th place finish in 2017 up to fifth this season. Meanwhile for the three newcomers, it was all about getting experience at the state’s most important competition.

“Some kids handle it well and some kids really freak out,” said John Ortiz, who carries more than 30 years of coaching experience. “That’s what we’re looking for, that’s why we try to get them here as freshmen. We want to know how they handle it. It helps to get them here.”

Koss and Xan Hawes, a 2017 Red Rock graduate, made it to the state meet all four seasons, racking up five medals between them. Before joining Red Rock, Ortiz coached at Mingus Union High School for 15 years, where the Marauders dominated the event, at one point having the girls sweep the podium.

He gets the younger vaulters up to speed, starting from a pole that does not bend. He helps them learn their steps, takeoff and plant with the aim of learning to swing and get upside down, when the real vaulting begins.

“It’s totally just the coaching. Ortiz is just an amazing pole vaulting coach, he pole vaulted in high school and college, and he’s very relaxed and chill, and he tells you exactly what you need to do without overwhelming you,” said Koss, who cleared 11-03.5 to break the school record this year.

Koss learned from the success of vaulters before her as well. There were Scorpions like Michelle Dafov, the former school record holder, Walker Eaton and T.J. Ryan. Learning how to vault from a coach is one thing, but to carry yourself like a high-level vaulter is another.

“They get to emulate that, which they get to understand how you carry yourself and how you enter the stadium and the responsibility of, ‘We’ve got this,’” John Ortiz said. “It’s a confidence thing, it really is. Younger vaulters will learn it as they come through because they get to watch the success. Julia came in, and we had Michelle Dafov and Xan Hawes. They got to see that and they’re taking it to the next level now. It’s pretty cool.”

As the Scorpions get older and move up through the ranks, they help perpetuate the program’s success by helping their novice teammates. John Ortiz said practice is lighthearted, filled with laughter, but the hard work is not lost on them. The type of advice the older Scorpions impart is not of the technical kind.

“My biggest thing that I tell them is literally just to vault, just to have fun. Because if you think too much in vaulting, it’s all going to go wrong. You just have to get up there, go and just vault, and I think that’s the biggest thing I can say to them to calm them down,” Koss said.

Due to the teacher strike, the vaulters practiced just once between April 26 and the meet, held on Friday and Saturday, May 4 and 5 at Mesa Community College. That might have affected their performances, but getting there was a good sign for the future.

Allen cleared 6-06 to tie for 19th while Schrader vaulted 10-09 to tie for eighth. Beattie cleared 9-03, tying for 17th. Making it to the state meet alone shows that the underclassmen are on the right track.

“I guess they just give me motivation right before. I guess not thinking too hard on it and just doing it,” Allen said.

Drake Ortiz and Hartley, who had the second and third best heights entering the meet respectively, will return for one more shot at dominating the division. With experience at the highest level under their belts already, the rest will surely do better in 2019. Perhaps a freshman or two will catch on quickly.

No matter what, Scorpions pole vaulters will continue to set the bar, quite literally, higher and higher.