The Moll twins focus on gratitude while soaring to phenomenal heights
Where else is there to go after breaking countless national records as high school students? The obvious answer for twins Hana and Amanda Moll: You fly even higher at the University of Washington.
The remarkable twins from Olympia, heralded as the greatest high school pole vaulters in U.S. history, have continued their record-breaking success, earning first-team All-America honors their first two seasons.
In 2024, Hana became the first freshman ever to win the NCAA Indoor Pole Vault Championship. This year, Amanda secured the title, after what was unquestionably the best season ever for a women’s collegiate pole vaulter — which earned her Women’s Indoor National Field Athlete of the Year by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association.
The twins kicked off their sophomore campaign by clearing 15-feet, 3.5-inches, a new Big Ten Indoor Conference Record. Amanda made history weeks later, becoming the first collegiate woman and just fourth American woman ever to clear 16-feet. At the Big Ten Indoor Championships, Amanda broke her own NCAA record by clearing 16-feet, 1.25-inches, with Hana setting a new personal record of 15-feet, 9.25-inches.
“It’s that feeling of flying that drives us. We’re in it for the joy,” Hana told endowment donors at a recent event. “And it’s such a gift to be able to surround ourselves with motivated people who have similar goals and values.”
Amanda and Hana channeled their unbridled energy into gymnastics when they were little. By the age of 12, they traded the “super competitive, serious and intense sport” for pole vault, “where everyone is friends, people are smiling, and at end of the day you’re flinging yourself into the air with sticks,” laughs Amanda. Inspired by their mom, who ran Track & Field but was barred from pole vault as a female, the two set out to break expectations and records.
Of course, every college Track & Field team wanted them. They chose to follow their dad, a former Washington rower, to a school that “offers both excellent academics and excellence in Track & Field, so we didn’t have to sacrifice one passion for the other,” explains Hana. As fourth-generation Huskies, donning the purple and the gold felt natural, something they’d been doing their whole lives.
Identical in so many ways, the twins are both majoring in Business through the Foster School. After graduating, they hope to become entrepreneurs — after fulfilling their dream of competing in the Olympics. Last year, Amanda and Hana were U.S. Olympic Trials Finalists, just missing the cutoff with 5th and 6th place finishes.
The twins are grateful to their parents for keeping them grounded and teaching them compassion and humility. They speak passionately about the culture of UW Track & Field, which inspires them not just to be better athletes but better human beings. They also deeply appreciate the scholarships that enable them to avoid worrying about college debt while they focus on their studies and their sport.
Washington’s 550 student-athletes are all very different, Amanda said to donors, “but we have one important thing in common. We’re all getting an incredible start on the rest of our lives because people like you care about us.”
