It’s the eve of the 2021 British Championships in Manchester, and the 2019 European Indoor silver medallist Tim Duckworth is back in Loughborough. Reunited with his teammates after a long pandemic-enforced separation. Older, wiser, more assured and self-sufficient but – most importantly of all – healthy and ready to tackle his first decathlon in two…
Category: Interviews
Interviews
10 Question Takeover: Andy Murphy, Howard Bell and Matt Chandler
The natural follow-up to the first ever 10 Question Takeover on training camp in Tenerife is, of course, a competition in the pouring rain of Kilmarnock in the West of Scotland. Here are Scottish decathletes Andrew Murphy, Howard Bell and Matt Chandler with a few competition clips and their quick fire 10-question takeover. Enjoy! All…
10 Question Takeover: Jonay, Pablo, Reinis, Mario and Jose Luis
Fresh from their April training camp in Tenerife, Jonay, Pablo, Reinis, Mario and Jose Luis bring you the first ever Decathletes of Europe “Ten Question Takeover.” You can check out their training clips on Instagram and watch them answering the 10 Questions in the video below. INTRODUCTIONS JONAY: My name is Jonay Jordan, I’m from…
Cassandre Evans: Decathlon is for Everybody
Debate on the shape of combined events for men and women appears every so often, usually when something happens in order to provoke that debate. Just over a year ago, in June 2019, Jordan Gray broke the 19-year old US decathlon record, shining a light again on the asymmetry of the paths laid out for…
Swiss Decathlon: The Rock Star, The Daredevil, The Bon Vivant, The Good Guy and The Champion
In July 2019, a few days ahead of the European Combined Events Super League competition in Lutsk, I shared a story celebrating (and if I’m honest, fangirling about) the return of the 2008 Olympic silver medallist, Andrei Krauchanka. A few hours later, I received a message from Matthias Steinmann, on his way to the match…
Adam Sebastian Helcelet: International Man of History
“When I was a kid,” Adam Sebastian Helcelet recalls, “Czech Republic had the greatest decathletes in the world. I watched them with my father. He said ‘You are coordinated. You can feel your body, and I guess that you’re going to be a big guy. You should try it.’” He did. His story would quickly…
Carolin Schäfer: What If?
Changing coach in the run up to the Olympics. Trying out a new technique and waiting out the critics. Deciding to forgo a World Championships place and playing the long game. Carolin Schafer has made a number of big decisions in the last year. All of them brought risk, questions and a test of faith. …
Vanessa Chefer: The First Girl, on the First Day
On the first day of the first competition at the 2016 Olympics in Rio, the heptathlon was the first event. The first discipline was the 100m hurdles, and the first girl, in the first lane was Brazil’s own Vanessa Chefer. Four years later, and 25 years after she first told her mother that she wanted…
Garrett Scantling: Is it a bird? Is it a plane?
After finishing fourth at the 2016 US Olympic trials, Garrett Scantling disappeared from decathlon. But he streaked back into the world of multi-events earlier this year, with one of the best global heptathlon marks of the indoor season. Faster than a speeding bullet, he tried his hand at NFL. He then channelled his inner Clark…
Darko Pešić: Combined Events and Cannonballs
The world has been plunged into chaos by the spread of coronavirus. Meetings are cancelled. The Olympics have been postponed for a year. Entire countries are in lockdown for the foreseeable future. But few athletes are better equipped to cope with the need to be self-sufficient than Montenegro’s finest, Darko Pešić. Growing up in…