Lindon Victor in the decathlon discus at the Decastar meeting in Talence (© Michel Fisquet)
Global medallists Lindon Victor and Emma Oosterwegel will be among the athletes looking to end their seasons on a high at the Decastar meeting, this season’s final World Athletics Combined Events Tour Gold event, in Talence this weekend (14-15).
Grenada’s Victor claimed Olympic decathlon bronze in Paris, matching the colour of medal he secured at the World Championships in Budapest last year, while Tokyo Olympic bronze medallist Oosterwegel of the Netherlands finished seventh in the heptathlon in Paris.
Now they return to Talence on the hunt for further victory, following their wins in 2022, and 2022 and 2023, respectively. Victor achieved 8550 points when winning his Decastar title two years ago and that remains the third-best score of his career behind the national record of 8756 he set in Budapest and the 8711 he managed in Paris. Oosterwegel’s PB of 6590 was set when she claimed her Olympic medal in Tokyo, with the score of 6495 that she set to win in Talence last year remaining the second-best mark of her career. In 2022 she was a joint Decastar winner alongside Ivona Dadic, and the Austrian athlete also returns to Talence this weekend.
The decathlon field features 12 athletes who have surpassed 8000 points in the 10-event discipline, with Victor joined by fellow 8600 point-plus athletes Johannes Erm of Estonia, Sander Skotheim of Norway and Sven Roosen of the Netherlands.
Erm won the European title in Rome in June, setting a PB of 8764 that puts him third on this season’s top list and 14th on the world all-time list, one place above Victor. He followed that with 8569 to finish sixth at the Paris Olympics and also claimed world indoor heptathlon bronze in Glasgow in March.
Talence gives him the opportunity for a rematch with Skotheim, who claimed heptathlon silver ahead of Erm in Glasgow but finished runner-up to his Estonian rival in Rome.
Roosen finished fourth, one place behind Victor, at the Paris Olympics as he scored a national record of 8607.
Germany’s Manuel Eitel has finished runner-up at the past two editions of Decastar and will be looking to go one better this time around. Also returning are USA’s Devon Williams and Belgium’s Jente Hauttekeete, while Brazil’s Jose Fernando Ferreira Santana joins them on the entry list following a PB performance of 8213 in Paris.
In the heptathlon, Oosterwegel and Dadic are among 15 athletes in the field who have surpassed 6000 points in their careers so far.
Like Oosterwegel, Dadic has a PB above 6500 points, thanks to the 6552 score she achieved at the European Championships in Berlin in 2018. She will be looking to rebound after falling in the 100m hurdles in Ratingen in June as she contests her first heptathlon since then. Prior to that she scored 6115 at the Hypomeeting in Gotzis in May.
Her compatriot Verena Mayr also returns to Talence and as it was for Dadic, Gotzis was the scene of Mayr’s most recent full heptathlon as she scored 6196.
Poland’s Adrianna Sulek-Schubert gave birth to her son in February, but she returned to competition in June, scoring 6033 at an event in Warsaw, and competed at the Olympics, finishing 12th with 6226.
Colombia’s Martha Araujo secured seventh place at the Paris Olympics with a PB of 6386 and she also scored 6329 at the Colombian Championships in June and 6274 at the Ibero American Championships in May.
Another athlete looking to make a statement will be USA’s Michelle Atherley, who scored a PB of 6465 in Gotzis in May, while Germany’s Vanessa Grimm will also want to build on her Hypomeeting performance, having scored 6307, just off her PB of 6323 from 2022.
