Hartwig a kid at heart

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BEIJING — The old guy sounded like a kid at Christmas when he was talking about the opening ceremony.

Maybe it’s because Jeff Hartwig didn’t expect to be there, and not merely because it was hard to imagine a 40-year-old pole vaulter at the Olympics.

Hartwig’s original plan was to arrive Friday, the day of the opening ceremony, but he was advised against it, perhaps because Beijing’s airspace was to be closed for several hours as a security measure. So he landed Thursday and decided to attend the ceremony.

Neither the suffocating heat and humidity in the Bird’s Nest stadium nor the hours of waiting to march bothered Hartwig, who held the U.S. pole vault record until this season.

There was a spark in Hartwig’s eyes Sunday as he described the excitement of posing for pictures with President Bush, who addressed the U.S. team while it waited in a staging area — appropriately, it was the venue where three U.S. women fencers would sweep the saber medals on the official first day of Olympic competition.

Hartwig also was impressed by the patience and graciousness NBA stars Kobe Bryant and LeBron James showed in posing for pictures with everyone who asked.

Hartwig’s appreciation for the whole experience undoubtedly was heightened by missing the 2000 and 2004 Olympics despite coming into the U.S. trials as the record-holder. Both times, he had failed to clear a height in the qualifying round.

‘Had I made those teams, who knows whether I would be here now,’ Hartwig said at the 2008 Olympic trials. ‘This one doesn’t make up for those other years, those other teams, but at the same time, I feel very fortunate.’

He made the Olympics in 1996, finishing 11th. He will finish his career as the oldest U.S. vaulter in Olympic history.

But a kid at heart.

— Philip Hersh