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tflagstad@journalnet.com

Watching Dave Nielsen at an Idaho State track and field practice is similar to watching a tennis match.

If you're not prepared to move your head quickly back and forth, you'll miss a lot of action.

One minute, Nielsen will shout instructions to a decathlete honing his discus-throwing skills, but at the precise moment a pole vaulter is moving down the runway, the coach will turn his focus to the pit to offer up a critique.

Then there's the sprinters he's timing and the shot putter who needs advice.

It's tiring just to watch, so who can even guess how Nielsen manages it.

''Oh my gosh, I don't know. I think he has a twin brother,'' said junior pole vaulter Emmy Korth. ''Dave's amazing. He puts himself at the very last of everything and puts us first and his work first and the track program first. He's amazing; I could never do it.''

Even with the demands of guiding the Bengals track and field athletes, Nielsen finds time to coach 2000 Olympic champion pole vaulter Stacy Dragila and Olympic hopefuls Jackie Poulson and Paul Litchfield.

The latter two also serve as Nielsen's assistants, and he dishes out a lot of credit to those two for helping him manage everything.

Poulson, an American Falls native who competes in the heptathlon, spends a lot of time working and training with Idaho State's multi-event athletes. The pole vaulter Litchfield frequently handles that discipline at practice. Longtime assistant Brian Janssen takes care of the distance runners.

But still, Nielsen stays plenty busy.

''I've taken over one or two of his practices, and I'm shot. I'm tired, and I'm beat,'' Poulson said. ''I don't know how he does it. He's done it for so long that maybe it just comes natural, I guess. It's pretty amazing he can keep track of those things, and I guess that's why he's had the success that he's had.''

His achievements include coaching two athletes who competed in the Olympics.

Amber Welty, the 1988 NCAA outdoor women's high jump national champion, cited Nielsen as a big reason why she chose Idaho State out of Twin Falls.

''He was going to allow me to do other events besides high jump,'' said Welty, who now lives in Hereford, Texas, and goes by Amber Welty-Cnossen. ''Everywhere else I talked only wanted me to do high jump. He saw things in myself that maybe the other coaches didn't see.''

After finishing college, Welty stayed in Pocatello to work as one of Nielsen's assistants and to keep training under him. That effort paid off with a spot on the U.S. Olympic team at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.

That vision Nielsen showed by allowing Welty to compete in events other than the high jump led to arguably his biggest achievement.

One day at practice in the early '90s, Nielsen approached Dragila and her fellow heptathletes and asked if they'd like to try pole vaulting. The heptathletes' planned workout was especially grueling that day, so when Nielsen offered a chance to vault instead of the scheduled training, Dragila and her mates jumped at the chance.

At the time, women's pole vault wasn't a recognized sport, but Nielsen kept up his impromptu lessons with the heptathletes. After a few months of practice, the coach had his athletes compete against one another at an outdoor meet in Pocatello.

They started vaulting before the meet began, so as opposing teams entered Davis Field, they saw Dragila and the others making their way down the runway.

''I remember a couple girls from Weber go ask their coaches if they could do it, and they said, 'You're here on scholarship to do X, Y and Z, so go warm up,''' Dragila said. ''I thought, 'Man, how come Dave's so cool, and these guys are so mean.' That's kind of how it happened for a while.''

Of course, that carrot of pole vaulting Nielsen dangled in front of Dragila more than a decade ago grew into a big-time event that she was able to turn into a career.

Without Nielsen, Dragila never would've picked up a pole, and she certainly never would've broken all kinds of records and won the inaugural women's pole vault gold medal at the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

''Sometimes it baffles me with how much success I've had with this. I just feel blessed I had the opportunity to come to Idaho State and Dave had that vision of the women's pole vault,'' Dragila said. ''A lot people say, 'Gosh, Stacy, if you went anywhere else, you wouldn't have the American record, and here in the States pole vault might not have taken off quite like it did if you and a couple other people weren't in the area at that time.' Sometimes I wonder what life would've held for me.''

In his time at Idaho State, Nielsen provided a similar push to the women's weight throw and hammer throw, and it's opportunities to try new things that have kept the coach in the Gate City for what is now his 25th season.

Even though he admits he gets tired with all the work he puts in on the track, Nielsen appears content.

''I've been able to do some things that were, I don't know, I guess a little creative and offer things in some different ways,'' he said. ''I think we've been successful.''

By Tim Flagstad

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