After Beijing

I understand what both of you are saying however I still think you are not taking into factor that this is after nine events. You have to take into consideration all the factors like heat how many jumps taken in pole vault and high jump and also how much energy was spent throughout the two days in order for someone to be leading by 500 points.


I believe clay could rnu 4:30 when that is the only event he does that day has a rabbit and great conditions. However to think he could do it or that anyone could do it after nine events and addnig other factors i think it is harder than most people make it out to be.

I love this discussion


Of course it's different if you're just running 1500m or doing a whole decathlon - but that actually applies to all of the athletes. Probably some of them spend a little less energy on the first 9 events, actually that's an interesting question..

And I am certainly not trying to say any athlete could run 4:30 after doing 9 events. I am really admiring everyone who gets through these two days and is still able to run the whole 1500m at all.

I believe Clay could run close to 4:30 even after doing 9 events if he really had to and of course if the conditions were right throughout the two days. Look at Sebrle's time in his WR - nobody thought he could run a 4:21, but he did.

what is harder to do? run 10.4 in the 100 or under 4:30 in the 1500? Well, in my opinion that´s not the question. In the actual tables 10.4 is 999 points, equal as 3.53.00 in 1500 metres. Or 4.30 in 1500 is 745 points, similar to 11.55 in 100 metres.


There is a difference between running 1,5 km in 4.30 minutes and sprint 11.55 in 100 metres. Clay, the biggest decahlete at the moment, has no incentives to train hardly in 1500 metres, because there are probes worthier with the actual rules, leaving speed endurance back in their interests. I don´t have doubts about Clay running 430 after training it more intensively, but not with the actual tables.


Finally, I agree with BJ, I love to speak about decathlon, although I am a simple fan, not as you.


I would like to leave another question just now, I love to make lists, and I was thinking in my job the other day about the decathletes´s top five in Olympic Games from Mathias´ times: I was looking statistics in this page and there was a couple of surprises I didn´t adverted before, first of all Avilov in Olympic Games, and also Sebrle, both of them have been between the six in three consecutive Games (Clay could be the next one in London).


Any comment? :B:B thanks for your very very interesting comments

Of course there's a huge difference between the actual points given for 100m or 1500m, if you look at the number itself.

But if you look at the differences instead of the absolute number of points, you see that someone who runs 1500m in 5:00 gets 560 points compared to 745 points for 4:30 (a more or less average time I think) which makes a difference of 185 points.

For 10.4 in the 100m (which in my opinion is a superb time for a decathlete) you get 999 points, for a 11.10 (probably an average time) 838 points, making a difference of 161 points.

So what I want to say is that Clay does get a lot of points for his great 100m race, but someone who runs a 11.10 only gets 161 points less. On the other hand Clay's rather bad 1500m time makes him lose 185 points against someone running 4:30.


To your other comment: I also think it's a great achievement of an athlete being in the top 6 of 3 Olympic Games as that only happens every 4 years. So you have to be world-class for at least 9 years. And Clay could even achieve 3 medals at consecutive Olympic Games in London 2012.

querido pablo

se que han pasado varios meses , pero queria darte mi opinion.

en mi modesta opinion, creo que el las pruebas multiples esta gozando de muy buena salud, pues los mas veteranos a pesar del tiempo se mantienen por encima de 8300 puntos y que hay unos cuantos jovenes , que vienen empujando fuerte.

en cuando a los resultados del 1500 metros , te dire , que recuerdes que esta es una disciplina muy compleja, y es cierto que todos quisieramos ver a esos atletas correr siempre por debajo de 4,30,00 , pero si te fijas hay una gran tendencia a los hombres un poco mas rapidos y fuertes y si analizas , cada cual tiene su tendencia , smith, es muy bueno lanzando , leonel suarez tambien pero solo en la jabalina y posee buen 1500, pero todavia le falta en las pruebas de velocidad , sin embargo fijese en sus 400 metros, no es pan comido para nadie.

los europeos son muy buenos lo que pasa es que deben estabilizar los resultados en sus resultados para lograr un buen promedios de puntos en 5 o 6 competencias ,

como te decia antes vienen jovenes con mucho talento , como los cubanos suarez y yordanis garcia , krauchanka, los que vienen de la categoria juvenil, asi como otros que todavia no han dado señales porque esta es una prueba sumamente compleja y se necesita tiempo.

en cuanto a la tabla de puntuacion tienes algo de razon , pero las reglas son asi, y hay que adaptarse a ellas y trabajar en base a los puntos que te da la tabla en cada uno de los eventos y por ahi trazar cada cual su estrategia.

y de los que decias de los decatlonistas de los ochenta pasaba lo mismo, y recuerde que, sin menospreciar a ninguno de los de esa epoca, ni minimizar sus cualidades, ni mucho menos blasfemar , ni especular , los analisis antidoping de aquellos años no tenian el mismo rigor que en estos momentos.

y hay un dicho que dice que cada cual en su tiempo.

espera sorpresas para los proximos años con esos atletas que vienen subien ,

puede que las prubas combinadas sean una de las mas atractivas de las principales competencias, por la rivalidad y buenos resultados que habran

saludos

:B

Hi all!


You all actually miss one important point, while discussing 1500 m times.

It's competitor's responsibility before spectators...

If you run below your real possibilities you are actually cheating.


Think about it....


Best wishes

Enn

Hi Enn,


when I read the first part of your post about "competitor's responsibility before spectators" I thought that's absolutely right: athletes are competing not for the spectators but only for themselves.

But would you actually consider acting below your real possibilities cheating? That everytime you don't give everything you have and go to the limit, it's cheating yourself? In my opinions it's a very hard term to use. Especially if you see the situation Bryan Clay is in: he already has 2 days with 9 disciplines of great performance behind him and he doesn't have to go to the very limit, because his 1st place is secure. I suppose a lot of athletes wouldn't give everything in that situation. And every athlete acts below his possibilities sometimes - probably not on purpose of course.


Best wishes,

Jessica

Hello everyone,


this is definitely one of the most interesting discussions I've read here recently.


I think there are some point with Pablo's approach with comparing 1500m points relatively with other events. Getting 500 points in 1500m meter seems a tiny bit harder than getting the same results at other events. Though it is only 1/10 of the complete decathlon and it is going to almost higher math here to get the points "balanced" correct, I think it is still very important pointing out that kind of comparisons sometimes


As with the Beijing competition, it was one of the most interesting ever. Having been watching the decathlon since early nineties, I really think having most of the places in top five open before final event is a good thing. Anything can happen, though it is just to run 1500m. So I really enjoyed the competition


I absolutely admire Bryan Clay's abilities and it's pretty slippery road to predict a competitor up to his abilities this year, culminating with the world championships in Berlin, this year in August. We could come back to this discussion after HypoMeeting in Gotzis, which is traditionally is one of the most watched event in terms of understanding who could make the weather this season.

I would also have liked him to run faster, but we don't know his reasons, and as long as we do not score 8800 in decathlon, our rights to judge about it are not too big


Bright talents at single events (Drozdov just had 17.06 at shot put yesterday here in Tallinn, Erki Nool was known as "miracle man" in pole vault with PB 5.60, Maurice Smith throwing discus over 58 meters, etc) makes it all even more saturated, so decathlon for me is like a good light athletics event, but with ten times emotions, drama and show


As pointed out before, level of decathlon in Atlanta at 1996 was one of the toughest competition in decathlon; but as also pointed out before, the "toughness" can be measured in several ways - I guess even in more ways than there are events in decathlon Who could predict Frank Busemann gets silver medal in Atlanta? Pretty nice surprise, as there often tends to be in decathlon.


So again, very nice discussion and great thoughts!