And if the club has its way in 2012, its squad members will have the opportunity to soar with the best of them in future competitions.

Club coaches David Scott and Ken Dickson said they were close to providing the Mount Isa-based club with its own pole vaulting facilities after having limited chances to develop the event.

A local sheet metal company with connections to the club has built and donated a pole vault box and another business is donating money for the purchase of a vaulting pole. The club and senior vaulters will purchase another two poles which will enable the club to train with regulation equipment

Scott said the equipment would see a long held ambition for the club come to fruition.

"In 2009 two of our then 15-year-olds, along with Ken and myself all decided to try our hand at the decathlon," Scott said.

"We were already competing in nine of the decathlon events at club level but facilities for pole vault were few and far between.

"There are only three pole vault facilities in the whole of North Queensland, Townsville, Cairns and Sarina."

Scott said Mount Isa's budding decathletes and fellow competitors from Emerald and the Tablelands all had a crash course in Sarina under the guidance of coach Paul Hallett, the day before the event.

Two years later, ahead of the Athletics North Queensland (ANQ) Championships, and still without a pole vault facility, a squad of eight set about training in whatever manner they could without having any actual equipment.

"All the core strength and speed exercises weren't a problem as they didn't require equipment and we were able to use steel pipes for 'pull throughs' to train for flight and landing on the high jump mats," Scott said.

But again it came down to a crash course before the event at the ANQ Championships.