Decathlon World Record holder Roman Sebrle of the Czech Republic competes in the men's Decathlon Long Jump in Berlin (© Getty Images)
A real tragedy was close for Cuban world leading athlete Leonel Suárez in the second Decathlon event, the Long Jump.
The 21-year-old who has scored a personal best 8654 points this season only had a result of 6.76m after two jumps which would have left him badly short of points in this event, but he came back to jump 7.24m with his last attempt 20 centimetres behind the board.
With the Cuban still the best pick for the Decathlon gold, as usual he is way back in the rankings at this stage of the competition having scored 1703 points for 23rd place at the moment. American Ashton Eaton topped the Long Jump competition with a 7.85m personal best with countryman Trey Hardee also setting a PB 7.83m to lead the competition after two events with 2004 total points. Eaton is in second place having scored 1990p with Oleksiy Kasyanov of Ukraine in third place with 1955p after a 7.80m jump in the Long Jump.
Reigning champion Czech Roman Sebrle also jumped 7.80m and is in fifth place with 1835 points behind Cuban Yunior Diaz who has 1928p (7.72m Long Jump). Looking at the overall situation the competition at the top is quite tight. World leader Suárez has fallen about 50 points behind his 8654 personal best series and Trey Hardee has gained 29 points in comparison to his 8516 score from earlier this season. Cuban Yordanis García, German Pascal Behrenbuch, Belarussian Andrei Krauchanka, who jumped a 7.62m season’s best in the Long Jump, Sebrle and Russian Aleksandr Pogorelov seem to be the other athletes fighting for a medal here.
Mirko Jalava for the IAAF
