Decathlon - List of Sports
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College decathlete competitors pose at the 2009 NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships in Fayetteville, Arkansas, USA.
The decathlon is a  combined event  in  athletics  consisting of ten  track and field  events. The word decathlon is of Greek origin (from ???? deka [ten] and ????? athlos [contest]). Events are held over two consecutive days and the winners are determined by the combined performance in all. Performance is judged on a points system in each event, not by the position achieved. The decathlon is contested mainly by male athletes, while female athletes typically compete in the  heptathlon .
Traditionally, the title of “World’s Greatest Athlete” has been given to the man who wins the decathlon. This began when King  Gustav V of Sweden  told  Jim Thorpe , “You, sir, are the world’s greatest athlete” after Thorpe won the decathlon at the  Stockholm Olympics  in 1912. The current holder of the title is American  Bryan Clay , the gold medal winner of the event at the 2008  Beijing Olympics , who took the title from  Athens Olympics  Czech champion  Roman Šebrle .
The event developed from the ancient  pentathlon . Pentathlon competitions were held at the  ancient Greek Olympics . Pentathlons involved five disciplines –  long jump ,  discus throw ,  javelin throw ,  sprint  and a wrestling  match. [4]  Introduced in Olympia during 708 BC, the competition was extremely popular for many centuries. By the 6th century BC, pentathlons had become part of religious games. The  Amateur Athletic Union  held “all around events” from the 1880s and a decathlon first appeared on the  Olympic athletics program  at the  1904 Games .
Format
Men’s decathlon
The vast majority of international and top level men’s decathlons are divided in to a two-day competition, with the  track and field  events held in the order below. Traditionally, all decathletes who finished the event do a round of honour together after the competition, rather than just the winner or medalling athletes.
Day 1
1500 metres
Women’s decathlon
At major championships, the women’s equivalent of the decathlon is the seven-event  heptathlon ; prior to 1981 it was the five-event  pentathlon . However, in 2001 the  IAAF  approved scoring tables for women’s decathlon; the current world record holder is  Austra Skujyt?  of  Lithuania . Women’s disciplines differ from men’s in the same way as for standalone events: the shot, discus and javelin weigh less, and the sprint hurdles uses lower hurdles over 100 m rather than 110 m. The points tables used are the same as for the heptathlon in the shared events. The schedule of events differs from the men’s decathlon, with the field events switched between day one and day two; this is to avoid scheduling conflicts when men’s and women’s decathlon competitions take place simultaneously.
Day 1