Night of records in Eugene

I was not planning to write something on the Eugene Diamond League. But when I saw those superb images of Béatrice Chebet celebrating Kipyegon's 1500 record more than her own in the 5000 m I felt that I had to do something. 

Chebet and Kipyegon

But let us start at the beginning. And I will start with a missed record, that of Winfred Yavi in the 3000 m steeple. She ran in 8:45.25 at less than a second form the world record of Béatrice Chepkoech. This is the second time that Yavi gives the record (that goes back to 2018) a scare. And since she is just over 25 years old she has several good years ahead of her that would probably allow her to bring the record bellow 8:40. (But she should beware of Faith Cherotich and Peruth Chemutai who are just 21 and 25 respectively and who ran in 8:48.71 and 8:51.77 finishing behind Yavi. In fact Chemutai was second behind Yavi last year in Rome when Yavi ran her best 8:44.39, finishing in 8:48.03). Those who follow my blog know that I am a great admirer of Béatrice Chepkoech (I insist on her given name because there is a second Chepkoech, Jackline, running also the 3000 m steeple, with a 8:57.35 from 2023 and who is not quite 22 years old. She looked at some point as the successor to her homonyme. Unfortunately her last two years have been really below-par: her 2024 best was 9:19 and this year she has not done better than 9:30). However when Yavi made her appearance I immediately saw that we had there a pure gem. She did take her time to reach the summit (and there was a time, like in my report on theTokyo Olympics, when I was voicing my disappointment for her 10th place in the final). And thus whenever the two, Chepkoech and Yavi, ran together I knew I was going to be frustrated, since only one of the two could win. 

Béatrice Chebet confirmed (it's not as if anybody had a doubt) her position as the queen of middle distances. After having broken the 29 min barrier in the 10000 m, she did break another magical barrier, that of 14 min in the 5000 m. The men's 15 min record was improved in 1904 and the 14 min fell in 1942 when G. Hägg ran 13:58.2. His record was improved by such illustrious names as Zatopek and Kuts in the mid fifties. Things are even more spectacular in the 10000 m. It took Zatopek from 1949 to 1954 and five successive records before he managed to finish under 29 minutes. Seventy years later a woman manages to do as well as Zatopek! Paola Pigni was the first woman to run under 16 minutes in 1969 and Ingrid Kristiansen broke the 15 minutes barrier in 1984. Then it took another 40 years for the next barrier to fall. In the case of the 10000 m  Mary Decker Slaney was the first to run under 32 minutes in 1982, Kristiansen went under 31 just three years later but the 30 minutes barrier fell under the highly questionable chinese 1993 boom, thus muddling the statistics. Chebet, with last year's 28:54.14, set the record straight (pun intended).

I did not like the idea of the sub-4 mile but I do like the 'Nike Fly Suit'

I was somewhat skeptic concerning Faith Kipyegon's chances at a world record. In particular after the crazy, publicity-motivated, attempt at a below-4 mile. (Let's get real. Kipyegon's record is a great 4:07.64. Asking for a 3% improvement in one go is ridiculous. And one could see that Kipyegon, running already all out in the first three laps, was struggling on the stretch opposite to the finish. She managed a 4:06.42, but I am convinced that she could have done equally well in a normal race with just one or two female pacers and a sensible race strategy. And in Eugene she adopted the best possible one. She followed the pacer, S. Hurta-Klecker a 4:01 runner, who did a great job, up to 1100 m and then took off. While in Paris she faltered over the last two hundred meters, in Eugene she was flying. Even J. Hull, who is admittedly the second best 1500 m runner, could not follow her opponent's devastating sprint. Kipyegon finished in 3:48.68 and the celebrations followed. And Kipyegon redeemed herself after the Paris failure. 

PS No, I am not going to comment on the article "Could a female athlete run a 4-minute mile with improved aerodynamic drafting?" by da Silva and collaborators (Roy. Soc. Open Sci. 12: 241564).  It is easy to fiddle with parameters and obtain the result you wish when it is just a 3% effect. Obtaining that on the track is a totally different matter. But let us not be negative and just rejoice at these two superb records we watched in Eugene.

The one-day decathlon

This article is directly inspired by a discussion I had with my Décapassion friends, Frédéric and Pierre Gousset. We were talking about one-hour decathlon and then they mentioned the Iron Deca organised in Arles roughly ten years ago. I don't know how long this event survived (probably just two-three years) but it piqued my curiosity and I decided to follow the trail. The Gousset had devoted an article to this event entitled "how long should a decathlon take?" where they were mentioning an article by ukrainian coach, A. Fatieiev, published in New Studies in Athletics and who was addressing the question whether a one-day decathlon was possible.  Having read Fatieiev's article I decide to present my ideas in this post.

But let's start at the beginning. The Stade Olympique Arlésien organised, in 2013-15, what they called the Iron Déca, a meeting where the whole decathlon (heptathlon for the women) was held in one day instead of two. The organisers were planning two sessions of 2h30 separated by 4 hours of rest. Given the tight schedule, the competition was limited to groups of 8 athletes. Preparing the soil marks for the jumps had to be done before the competition. But, most important, no rule modification concerning the jumps and throws were introduced. So, it was a perfectly normal decathlon, condensed in just one day. 

The only result I could find is that of the 2013 winner, Bastien Auzeil, with 7396. His best "normal" decathlon performance that year was 8022 points, situating the one-day performance at 92% of the best. This is, and by far, not exceptional. Both the world and the french best one-hour decathlon performances (Zmelik, 7897 and Blondel, 7715 points) are at roughly 92% of their maximum, of the same season (Zmelik, 8627 and Blondel, 8387 points). And when one thinks about the out-of-this-world 96% performance of Dadic in a one-hour heptathlon, 6325 to 6552, the performance of Auzeil looks somewhat paltry. 

While writing this article I did revisit some of my old articles on decathlon variants. And I ended up invariably at the article on C. Beach's amazing 10 minute decathlon. (If you are a decathlon fan and haven't read it, take a minute to do so).

What is the problem of the one-day decathlon? This is best summarised in the words of M. Avilov, who won the olympic title in Munich, 1972, with a world record of 8454 points: "without the 400 and 1500 m I could easily do a decathlon in one day". And while one can argue that when it comes to the 1500 m one can use his last reserves, the 400 m poses a major difficulty. There is simply no way one can go all out in the 400 m and recover completely in the 4 hours resting period so as to attack the remaining events in top condition. Just to realise the impact of the 400 m it suffices to look at the performances of C. Beach in the 30-minute decathlon (where he scored 6242 points to be compared to his 8084 best). With a personal best of 46.72 s in the 400 m he ran in 53.26 s during the 30-min, followed by 16.96 s in the 110 m hurdles where he has a personal best of 14.23 s. And Beach is not just anybody: he is exceptionally resistant with a 3:59.13 personal best in a decathlon 1500 m (and an even better 1:47.36 in the 800 m). So, even with a 4-hour rest, the one-day decathletes must run a cautious 400 m and, even thus, their 110 m hurdles may be below par.

But let us go back to Fatieiev's proposals. He is worried by the fact that the decathlon, spread over two days, does not attract the interest of the un-informed spectator. Well, let us be serious: if somebody does not care about a two-day decathlon, would he be attracted to a one-day one? I beg to differ. Fatieiev proposes to reduce the number of attempts for throws and long jump to two instead of three. I don't see any appreciable time savings due to this. The proposal of Iron Déca organisers, to prepare the marks for jumps in advance, makes more sense. The one point where Fatieiev is correct is that a disproportionate time is spent in the two vertical jumps. But there is not much one can do about this. In a one-hour decathlon, where the stopwatch for the 1500 m starts at precisely 60 min, whether one is present at the start or not, the athletes have their own strategies for the vertical jumps. But what Fatieiev suggests is to limit the attempts to one at every next height or to allow for three attempts in total. In their article, the Gousset, comment that something like this would convert Athletics to Circus Games. I totally agree with them. Decathlon is the king of events in athletics (an event where, to date, women are banned from, due to World Athletics spinelessness). A two-day decathlon is a perfect event.  A one-hour one, albeit totally different, is equally perfect. A one-day decathlon a futile exercise in style. 

PS I have just watched the European Athletics team championships and I discovered a new rule applied to vertical jumps: an athlete is out after 4 misses (while at every height the regulatory 3 misses apply). Perhaps a 4 (or 6, or any number obtained after a statistical analysis of existing results) misses rule could be used to speed up the decathlon vertical jumps. This would make more sense than limting the number of attempts.

The first women's decathlon of the year

In a previous post of mine I included the announcement of the DécaMontreuil competition to be held on June 14-15. I was otherwise occupied that week-end and I could not follow the competition. 

My Décapassion friends were present and you can find a very nice collection of photos (and videos) from that competition on their facebook page and an analysis of the event in their blog.

Twelve female decathletes started in this event which served also as a qualifier for the national women's decathlon championship. Well, "Open de France" for the time being, but the difference is only in the name and there is good hope that it will soon become a championship on par with the men's event. It will be held over the week-end of July 26-27 in Thonon les Bains. 

And, what is more interesting, is that the results are listed in the World Athletics site.

You can follow this link and get the details of the competition. Let us hope that World Athletics will do the same with the 2nd women's decathlon world championships to be held in Ohio on August 16-17.