Exhausting Olympic journey may elevate Matt Ludwig’s career
Matt Ludwig’s frustration and disappointment have given way to gratitude.
His exhaustion of flying across the world and competing in the pole vault qualifying round in the Tokyo Olympics on six to seven hours sleep was replaced by a “nice calm rest,” however brief.
He quickly had to leave his new Akron apartment for a series of meets in Europe and won’t return until Sept. 23.
As the former NCAA champion at the University of Akron looked back, he saw nothing but positives from his Tokyo experience.
He’s finally over the fact that he cramped up after his first failed attempt at 5.65 meters and did not qualify for the final, which he blames on fatigue.
“This is a tough one because it’s such a grand stage’” Ludwig said. “It’s the biggest meet out there. But at the same time, the original plan had me sitting at home watching it on TV. Only good things came from this experience and I’ll take this result 10 times out of 10 if it means I get to be a Tokyo 2021
Olympian.”
Ludwig, 25, a Chardon native from Mentor Lake Catholic High School, learned at 11 p.m. on July 28 that as the team’s alternate he would be taking the place of Sam Kendricks, the 2016 Olympic bronze medalist and reigning world champion who tested positive for COVID-19.
Ludwig didn’t sleep at all that night. He said it took a combined effort by staffers from the U.S. Olympic Committee and USA Track and Field, along with his own management crew, to get him to Tokyo in a day and a half.
What happened after he landed in Tokyo at 4 p.m. local time likely compromised his chances of advancing to the Aug. 3 final.
“[I’m thinking] if I can get to the village kind of quickly, I can get some food, I can rest, I can walk about and get my legs shaken out,’” Ludwig said. “I didn’t get to my room until 10 at night. There was six hours of background work with processing, accreditation, COVID testing, transportation from the airport to the Olympic Village, to the main headquarters, to the Team USA building, to meeting with different representatives
to try to schedule uniform pickup and everything else.
“That was pretty exhausting.” Ludwig went to bed at 11 p.m. and woke up at 4 a.m. so officials could put a uniform together.
Ludwig said his body held up “really, really well’ for warmups and the first two heights he cleared – 5.30 and 5.50.
“It was wasn’t until my second attempt at 5.65 that I got some really vicious cramps,” he said. “Fatigue set in a little faster than anticipated.”
What bothered Ludwig most was that had he made his first attempt at 5.65 meters, he would have qualified for the final.
“It’s hard to not be disappointed
because I know what I’m capable of, but at the same time I can’t compare my performance in Tokyo to my best self because my condition wasn’t at 100%,” he said.
Ludwig said the Tokyo experience has made him even more determined to make the U.S. team for the 2024 Olympics in Paris.
“From what it taught me, pretty much everybody in that field, all 30-plus athletes, I’ve seen around the world and competed against them and beaten a good majority of them,” Ludwig said. “To see what it took to make the final and I had just about done it with as crazy circumstances as it were, my confidence is high.”