This article first appeared on the World Athletics website in November 2019 Two years ago, behind the medal-winning trio of Kevin Mayer, Rico Freimuth and Kai Kazmirek at the World Championships decathlon in London, a breakthrough was happening. The 23-year old Estonian Janek Õiglane was having the performance of his career, finishing fourth in a…
Tag: Janek Oiglane
The February Ten
Every month, I share a digest of ten decathlon-related facts, figures and features. Here’s my pick of the best of February 2019. 1 The first day of February was marked by the arrival of Maicel Uibo (from Götzis 2018) on the Decathletes of Europe Calendar. But Maicel wasn’t the only Estonian throwing shapes. The Tallinn…
Glasgow 2019: A Game of Fire, Ice and Blood
From the Balkan lands in 2017, the European Indoor Championships moved west, to the frozen (well, wet) fringes of the continent. Beyond Hadrian’s Wall, Europe’s fearless decathletes arrived in Caledonia and the City of Glasgow, 200 miles south of Wester Ross. Who would become the King of Heptathlon in the North? And would they find…
TAPS AFF: The Glasgow Ten
The line-up for the heptathlon at the European Indoor Championships has finally been decided. Twelve contenders will descend upon Glasgow to fight for gold, silver and bronze. But what do they need to know about Scotland’s biggest city? Here is the Glasgow Ten – ten things all decathletes of Europe should know about Glasgow. 1…
I Can Has 6000 Points?
There’s no humour like niche athletics humour. There’s no meme like an athletics meme. And no country does athletics memes like Estonia does athletics memes. On the Number 35 bus last weekend from Tallinn city centre to the Estonian Athletics Combined Events meeting at Lasnamäe Sport Stadium, the site of Ashton Eaton’s then world heptathlon record…
The January Ten
Every month, I’ll share a digest of ten decathlon-related facts, figures and features. Here’s my pick of the best of January – read it quickly because it looks like February is going to be even more fun… 1 2019 started the way 2018 ended with Kevin resplendent and expressing himself 100%. Kevin kicks off the…
The Enigma of Kevin and the Unit of Arthur
To the discerning Decathletes of Europe fan, the Berlin European Championships were all about whether Kevin Mayer would pull out a big score, after teasing us with individual PBs throughout the season so far. A 13.71 hurdles and a 16.51 shot in Paris, and a jaunty 52.38 discus in Germany. He didn’t do Gotzis and…