Talk:Decathlon

Bill Toomey
Shouldn't Bill Toomey be added to the list of prominent decathletes?

He was both a world record holder and an Olympic champion. I believe his 1968 400m time remains the best ever. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.152.142.46 (talk) 18:04, 10 February 2007 (UTC).

Removed content
I removed the following paragraph. It is far from encyclopedic, and, lacking citation, contributes no fact. 'To ancient Greeks and modern Germans, the decathlon performer was and is the king of athletes. But to most of the track world, including the United States, the decathlete is a sometime hero, recognized and applauded only when he wins the Olympic Games. Hero or forgotten man, the 10-event performer is a rare and unique breed.' Feel free to post you objections... Be Bold. ~Gertlex 04:31, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Yang Chuan-Kwang
Just a thought... since Yang Chuan-Kwang's entry was for a date in 1963, he would have been competing for the Chinese national team, and not Chinese-Taipei, since the expulsion had not yet occurred. Consider Team Canada, which changed national flags in 1965 - sports articles like Olympic medal results distinguish between the two flags based on the date. Hence, I was thinking that maybe Yang's entry should be listed with the official flag at the time. Any thoughts? Or is there already a policy in place regarding what the resolution is in such cases? Yes, this is a hot potato topic, and I perfectly understand if no one wants to touch this with a 20 foot long pole. --65.93.142.3 (talk) 05:01, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

Bulleting the events
Maybe I'm victim of today's "do it now", can't wait, gotta have it pace, but I was surprised that the ten events that comprise the modern pentathlon weren't in bullet form or some other format that stood out from the prose. Contrast with heptathlon, where they're in a bullet list that immediately draws the eye to them. Would anyone object if I made a change to this page to make the list of events more visible?--NapoliRoma (talk) 02:14, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

National Records
The national records are slightly skewed, favouring old medal tables. Daley Thompson is not actually as close to Clay's or Sebrle's performances since the 80's points table had more points relative to the modern calculations (ie, 5m in 1984 = 1000 but nowadays 5m in polevault is only worth 910). I'll be reformatting the points for every national record by using the modern point calculator, with each respective national competitor's performance. Unless someone can specifically cite the IAAF method for record continuity? --Hurricane Angel (talk) 07:35, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

In the 1985 Edition of the tables, a copy of which I have on the desk in front of me, there is a note on page 103 which says:

Notes For Table

1) Thompson's score using the 1962/71 tables current at that time was less than Hingsen's world record score using the same tables. Hence his performance was not a world record and cannot be made one by a change of the tables. However, by a decision of the IAAF Council "It was decided that for the purpose of the Decathlon, as new tables come into force on 1st April, 1984, the next Decathlon World Record would have to better the best performance to date evaluated on the new tables". Thompson's performance was that target. [Note Ends] Hope that helps.Cottonshirt (talk) 07:48, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

scoring tables
It would be useful for readers to see examples of scoring tables. Can we get at least the current scoring table? Kingturtle (talk) 13:28, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

The whole concept of points and scoring tables needs to be introduced in a general way. The IAAF document (see links), in particular the description of the criteria used to construct the modern tables, on page 18, is a good reference point. Matt Whyndham (talk) 13:29, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Comment withdrawn as the issue I was describing is now fixed.66.255.24.130 (talk) 20:12, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

New points vs. old points
Something should probably be mentioned about these here? -Yupik 10:23, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

How does the scoring work?

Anyone know if women's scores are calculated into points in the same way as men's? I'm a bit suspicious of that record by Skujyte... Gdabski 22:49, 10 August 2005 (UTC)


 * I'd imagine that the women have differnet tables to then, just like I believe there are differnet tables between the women's heptathlon and men's decathlon. I don't know for sure, but I'd guess those events in both the womens heptathlon and women's decathlon have the same points tables. Evil Eye 19:57, 15 August 2005 (UTC)


 * yes, they do have different tables. Matt Whyndham (talk) 14:42, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Isnt the record by Skujyte for a decathlon? Hence, unofficial?


 * the Decathlon is now a defined event for Women, but not many competitions have this event, as opposed to the Heptathlon. Matt Whyndham (talk) 14:42, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

History
The article claims the first decathlon was held, "...in just one single day, October 15, 1911." This is incorrect. Modern combined event competitions as we know them started in America probably around 1880. They were at that time known as the "All Round Event" and consisted of, 100yds, shot put, high jump, 880yds walk, 16lb hammer throw, pole vault, 120yds hurdles, 56lb weight throw, long jump, 1 mile run. The whole event was completed in one day and this format proved so popular that the organisers of the 1904 Olympics in St. Louis arranged for a Decathlon to take place in conjunction, though not as an Olympic event.

Your "history" also omits any mention of the Much Wenlock Olympics, which are an important stage in the evolution of multi-event competition. In 1851 these English rural sports included a Pentathlon of high jump, long jump, putting a 36lb shot, 880yds run and climbing a 55ft rope. There are also reports from around the same time of combined events including stone throw, pole vault and long jump. Similar experiments are also to be found in Scandinavia and Germany around this time.

Experiments with early combined events competitions also include an Olympic Pentathlon in 1906, standing long jump, discus (ancient style), javelin, 200m, wrestling. By 1910 the Swedes, due to host the Olympics in 1912, were preparing to include a decathlon and pentathlon in their games and that is where your "first" decathlon comes from. There is also much fascinating insight to be gleaned from the history of multi-event scoring tables and it is to be regretted that you have not coverd this. Perhaps a whole article on scoring tables is appropriate. What do you think? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cottonshirt (talk • contribs) 08:18, 29 January 2009 (UTC)

This article also says, "So, the first decathlon world-record holder was the winner of the first completed meet. Karl Hugo Wieslander, a Swede, and Karl Ritter von Halt, a German, were announced world-record holders." which is, quite frankly, nonsense. There was no offcial World Record for the decathlon until 1922, when the Estonian athlete Aleksander Klumberg was ratified as the inaugural record holder for his performance on Sep 16/17 1922 in Helsinki, where he scored 7481.69 points. Cottonshirt (talk) 12:21, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

Copyright problem removed
Prior content in this article duplicated one or more previously published sources. The material was copied from: http://decathlonusa.typepad.com/deca/nature.html. Infringing material has been rewritten or removed and must not be restored, unless it is duly released under a compatible license. (For more information, please see "using copyrighted works from others" if you are not the copyright holder of this material, or "donating copyrighted materials" if you are.) For legal reasons, we cannot accept copyrighted text or images borrowed from other web sites or published material; such additions will be deleted. Contributors may use copyrighted publications as a source of information, but not as a source of sentences or phrases. Accordingly, the material may be rewritten, but only if it does not infringe on the copyright of the original or plagiarize from that source. Please see our guideline on non-free text for how to properly implement limited quotations of copyrighted text. Wikipedia takes copyright violations very seriously, and persistent violators will be blocked from editing. While we appreciate contributions, we must require all contributors to understand and comply with these policies. Thank you. SFB 13:16, 7 May 2011 (UTC)


 * I have removed a great swath of the article which has been present since 2006. This is a direct copy of information from the DECA/Decathlon Association website. Although I can't seem to find their earlier website address prior to 2007, I've a strong belief that this is the source as copies of the material can be found on discussion forums pre-dating its presence here. Not a great day for the free encyclopaedia! SFB 13:16, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Ashton Eaton
Eaton is now the WR holder...doesn't that make him the 'best in the world'? Or does this go by the Olympic gold medal holder? -- Erroneuz1 (talk) 01:47, 24 June 2012 (UTC)
 * A bit premature. Eaton's world record is barely an hour old with a rush of editing happening by multiple parties.  Give it a little time to get sorted out.  And seriously there is a ratification process on top of that, which takes significantly more time before the record is deemed official. Trackinfo (talk) 01:58, 24 June 2012 (UTC)
 * You'll note I didn't edit the article, I'm just asking for clarification, which I think is necessary. -- Erroneuz1 (talk) 05:15, 24 June 2012 (UTC)


 * A Google search for greatest athlete decathlon turns up a USA Today article that refers to the title as going to the Olympic champion. Adding -eaton turns up an article from Forbes that agrees, as does an AOL News article linked from WP's article World's Greatest Athlete.  (Not sure whether any of those qualify as Reliable Sources, though.)  It strikes me that whoever added Eaton to that sentence was perhaps a bit overexcited, to the point of believing what commentators said.  ;-) &mdash;Dah31 (talk) 06:00, 25 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Someone has now edited this article for it to read 'Eaton.' I thought we were still discussing this? Which is it, the WR holder or the gold medal holder? -- Erroneuz1 (talk) 01:05, 26 June 2012 (UTC)
 * It was a mistake. I've corrected the information and left the world record info in the lead too. SFB 17:23, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

Readability and sortability of all the tables
It would be helpful if the very useful and interesting table comparing world individual event records to world decathlon event records could be sorted as the other tables can. As a first step, I've split the absolute differences between event scores/points and the percentage difference into two separate columns. In my view, this improves readability of the values because now one can look down either column to see at a glance which absolute score differences stand out, and which percentage score differences stand out. In my view, the next step is to add the sort function to the table. When I do this, of course, the results are a mess because of the way the table has been constructed. I have non-existent programming skills, so if an editor can see how to get the table to sort in an elegant and efficient manner, perhaps they could make the necessary changes whilst preserving the integrity of what one currently sees.124.185.122.155 (talk) 13:49, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Added date column and dates of records to comparative table above.124.185.122.155 (talk) 16:32, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Added location column and locations of records to comparative table above.124.185.122.155 (talk) 17:39, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Caitlyn Jenner
We can debate the name, but there's no question that Caitlyn is a notable exception to the statement that men typically compete in the decathlon and women in the heptathlon. A woman who has accomplished the amazing feat of winning the Olympic decathlon - an event completely dominated by males -deserves at least a statement about it in this article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 162.235.91.193 (talk) 18:52, 2 June 2015 (UTC)


 * Are we to change the past now? He was not in any sense except by mental time travel a woman in 1976.  I agree it would be worth a mention when Wiki decides that he has to be referred to as Caitlyn in this article, but not one of amazement that a woman won the Decathlon.  --Richardson mcphillips (talk) 00:04, 3 June 2015 (UTC)
 * I think IP is trollin', I wouldn't bother. A lot of people are super freaked out and are acting out, plus it's Wild Edits season since a lot of schools let out about now in the US/Canada at least. Ogress smash! 10:19, 3 June 2015 (UTC)

Bruce won the decathlon, not Caitlyn. To put Caitlyn in that slot is a little silly. It should be handled like the page for the 1976 competition is -- Bruce in the name box with a footnote about the transition/name change. The article on the 2010 LA Lakers championship team doesn't say Metta World Peace (or whatever he's calling himself now) was part of the winning team, it says Ron Artest was. 173.160.130.14 (talk) 19:57, 8 June 2015 (UTC)


 * It is the same person. Why are you treating her as if she is not the same individual? That's just rude! Skyerise (talk) 19:59, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * Thanks for assuming bad faith. It's not rude, it's the fact of what happened in 1976. In 1976, there was no notable individual named Caitlyn Jenner. Suggesting that Caitlyn won the decathlon is nonsensical, similar to saying that Metta World Peace was on the winning Lakers team. (He wasn't. Ron Artest was) What's wrong with listing Jenner like on the 1976 page? 173.160.130.14 (talk) 23:29, 8 June 2015 (UTC)
 * She is the same person, but to pretend there is something remarkable about her exploits in decathlon on a gender basis is disingenuous. How she feels about her gender identity is not really of great significance to historic decathlon exploits from a gender-divided sports perspective. Gender orientation isn't a profoundly impacting aspect upon ones ability to reach a high decathlon score. SFB 01:39, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

I see that this topic was discussed four years ago, with a user pointing out the mistake and yet the name has not been corrected. Is there any particular reason for that? I’ve always assumed that wikipedia would just state the facts and not make mistakes based on political correctness. Dezoekster (talk) 17:30, 8 June 2019 (UTC)

Jenner discussions
We have discussions about the policy going on at Village pump (policy)/Archive 121 and about the other usages of Jenner's identity at Talk:Caitlyn Jenner. There is a lot of discussion to read at both locations. Trackinfo (talk) 03:10, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

Benchmark Units
The Benchmark table could be modified to provide the Jumping events in cm as required in the Points Calculation formula, and the 1500 m event in seconds rather than mm:ss. SquashEngineer (talk) 16:19, 11 July 2016 (UTC)
 * While you are correct about the calculation method, the benchmarks report in a form that is more readable and understandable. 3:53.79 is far more understandable than 233.79.  In the same sense, all measurement marks in the sport are reported as decimals to meters, rather than in cm.  Essentially, wikipedia's voice is making the conversion to cover the specifications the rule designers used to make their math easier to function.  The time is understandable.  Why they couldn't built the movement of the decimal point into their formulae confounds me.  It further confounds me why the only did it in certain events, not all. Trackinfo (talk) 16:36, 11 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Idea is good for calculation purposes. But first of all you don't need to make calculation for Decathlon by hand, as they are published by IAAF. Well when world record is updated we do need to, but that is a minor inconvenience. But keeping all the data formats consistent over all track and field events is more important really. And formulas written for cm, I suppose it is for historical reasons, back in the days when computers didn't exist it made things easier... Trimutius (talk) 20:51, 11 July 2016 (UTC)

Daley Thompson's flag
Why doesn't Daley Thompson have a UK flag for 1980? Why is it an Olympics flag? If that's correct it needs a footnote. -- Doctorx0079 (talk) 19:20, 20 September 2016 (UTC)


 * Okay, I see the explanation is here. I will add a footnote about it.

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National Records
Applied World Athletics limit of 8,000 points. Most of the countries (>100) were still missing, so a limit makes sense. The table in the former state was incomplete and misleading. I did update the NR's up to 8,000 points - they're now up to date (as of December 2020). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A0A:A547:2E5C:0:A883:E6F1:B8D0:9073 (talk) 13:07, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Top results before 1985
The Top 25 list should mention that it shows only results from 85 and newer, because the point table was different before. Looking e.g. at https://worldathletics.org/athletes/germany/jurgen-hingsen-14355805 it says under personal best:

Decathlon (62-84) 8798 Mannheim (GER) 09 JUN 1984

Also the article about Hingsen says that his personal best is 8832, which I think is the above result recalculated using the 85 point table. 2003:F6:1728:9B5:979C:3594:65EA:FE1E (talk) 12:54, 27 August 2023 (UTC)

Women's all-time top 25
Since the decathlon is not an official women's championship event and we do not have a source for all results, the table is original research and should be removed. Scratch line (talk) 17:33, 18 November 2023 (UTC)
 * That's fine to start a discussion about possible removal, but you shouldn't remove it before a decision is made. Fyunck(click) (talk) 18:07, 18 November 2023 (UTC)
 * I understand the problem with the sources. Also, many of the athletes in the list are not notable. I propose to keep the performances above 8000p which are all from Olympic heptathletes.Nico (talk) 07:50, 4 December 2023 (UTC)