By Matt Gade

605 Sports

BOX ELDER — A year after suffering a devastating arm injury at the state track meet, Lead-Deadwood’s Piper Rogers is glad to be back.

During the middle of the competition, the senior pole vaulter cleared the bar at 9 feet, 7 inches before putting her left arm down onto the mat to brace her fall which resulted in a lateral and posterior dislocation.

Which led to a trip to the hospital in Sioux Falls to reset her arm. 

Now, Rogers is happy to be back and thinks she’s in a good position to keep pushing herself this year.

“It was tough,” Rogers said of her abrupt ending to her junior year.  “And then the year before that, I broke my other elbow, in regions, so it was just, I just tried to find the positive in it, because I knew there was nothing I could do about it.”

Despite being taken to the hospital in a lot of pain, Rogers was able to make light of the situation by posting videos and pictures of herself in the hospital. In some cases, laughing and joking about the pain medications.

“I feel good. I’ve actually done a pretty good job of just not letting it get in my head,” she said. “Obviously it was very, very painful. So I just try to put it behind me and just keep doing what I know how to do because I love it so much.”

So far this season, the Golddiggers vaulter has cleared nine feet in their two meets to start this season.

“I think I'm sitting higher than that — like I'm not upset about it because I've come back from that injury. It's pole vault. In this sport your arms play a really big role in it,” Rogers said. “So I'm trying to just stay consistent. I've been consistently hitting that nine-foot and at practice, I've been doing good too. So I know it's gonna start rolling for me soon.”

Rogers said she was only able to practice the pole vault a couple of times before the season started, getting cleared to pole vault again back in October.

Rogers personal best in the pole vault is 10 feet set during her junior season. She went into the state meet with the ninth-best vault. 

Now she’s hoping to cap her senior campaign on a better note.

“I'm really excited to be back and at it again and hoping for a better season,” she said.