Hooker Returns to Action

With an extraordinary finish to last year’s season, all eyes were on Steve Hooker when he returned to action on Saturday.

Jumping on Saturday at an inter-club competition in Perth, Hooker declared jumping “5.70m plus would be a very good result for a first competition back on a full run up” Hooker easily achieved this on his second jump after joining the competition at 5.50m.

With this being such a small competition, Hooker admitted it is difficult to perform highly when jumping against yourself. “Jumping at those heights becomes more of a challenge as you’re generally the only person left jumping and you get a bit fatigued”.

Despite this, Hooker manages to use this potential disadvantage to his advantage by taking control of the competition. “You try and turn it into an advantage and run the competition at that point”.

In his return following the off season Hooker wasn’t sure what to expect, saying “you never know how you’ll go when you start competing”. With the advantage of jumping at the new stadium, his training ground, Hooker was looking forward to his return saying “it is great jumping at the new stadium; it definitely gives an extra couple of percent for performance”.

Many people weren’t sure what to expect either following Hooker’s last competition where he produced a heroic World Championship win, with an injury. After his success, Hooker’s commenced his off season immediately.

This resulted in a longer off season which gave his grade one adductor tear recovery time, along with preparing himself for a longer season due to the Commonwealth Games in October.

Hooker has since declared this off-season “was one of the most consistent warm ups I’ve ever had, I’ve missed hardly any training sessions (through injuries, soreness etc) and my body feels ready to go”.

Now that he’s back competing, Hooker is looking forward to the Commonwealth Games where he will defend his title from Melbourne in 2006. Furthermore his immediate focus is on Interstate competitions in Perth, Sydney and Melbourne before the World Indoor Championships in Doha.

He will then aim to compete in the National Championships, the Diamond League and one or two other competitions around that.

– Emily Raynor