When the peachy aboriginal American multisports starJim Thorpeblew away his contest in the decathlon at the 1912 Olympic Games , Sweden ’s King Gustaf V — a somewhat ok lawn tennis player , by the way — reportedlygrabbed the champion ’s hand , shook it and declared , " Sir , you are the great jock in the worldly concern . "
Thorpe was a passably secure baseball and football game star , too , in the former part of the 20th century . But it was that gold medal in those Stockholm Olympics that brought him his biggest fame . And thanks to Thorpe ( with a chapeau tip to the Swedish king ) , every succeeder of the Olympian decathlon now earns the unofficial title : The World ’s Greatest Athlete .
But … really ? A decathlete ?
" I care the title — it ’s fun , but who can really say how accurate it is ? Bo Jackson might have been the creation ’s greatest athlete . Maybe Michael Jordan , " Dan Steele , the associate head carriage for track and field at Iowa State , say in an email . Steele recruit U.S. decathlete Ashton Eaton , the defending Olympic atomic number 79 medalist and the reigning world record bearer , to the University of Oregon . " When it come to Ashton Eaton , his body of oeuvre makes a moderately compelling case for that title . "
Still , in the decathlon , you do n’t get thwack in the mouth , like you do in fisticuffs or football . You do n’t have to trample water for what seems like forever , as water Marco Polo players do . You do n’t have to go for what seems like always , like road runner .
In the decathlon , you do n’t have to constantly zip back and forth , like basketball or association football or rugby or hockey players do . You do n’t risk life and limb as in downhill skiing or ski jump or even car racing .
So … really ? The decathlon ? The greatest athlete ?
" You might say an outstanding soul , like [ the NBA ’s ] LeBron James , or a great football player could win the decathlon , and maybe they could , " Fred Samara , a former Olympic decathlete ( he competed in the 1976 Games ) and the longtime coach of the Princeton raceway and field team , tells HowStuffWorks . " But would they be able to win the celestial pole vault ? Would they be able to launch the mile ?
" So , yeah , to say ' The World ’s Greatest Athlete , ' that may be a little bit of a stretch ; there ’s billion of masses in the world . But the jock that make headway the Olympian gold , or is the world record bearer [ in the decathlon ] certainly can lay call to beingoneof the humanity ’s greatest athletes , I suppose . That ’s for sure . "
The Deal on the Decathlon
To get an appreciation of why decathletes evoke such praise , it ’s important to see what the decathlon is . It ’s a series of 10 wide-ranging track and field event agree over two days . Points are present to each rival after each consequence , and the accumulative points are tallied to produce a achiever .
The events , in order , on the first day are the 100 - metre tally , recollective jump , dig put , high jumping and 400 - meter run . The 2nd day is pack with the 110 - cadence hurdles , discus throw , perch vault , javelin and 1,500 - meter run ( sometimes called " the mile " ) .
The decathlon demands speed , survival , force , lightsomeness , flexibleness and coordination . To be certain , a decathlete want more than that , too .
" It ’s really the mental fatigue and the ability to focus over 14 hours on each day that takes its bell , " Samara aver . " The punishing part that I find , in vie in over 40 decathlons , is the distance of the meet . You ’re on your foot all the clock time . Each consequence , you ’re warming up and warming down . I can remember being so exhausted , mentally , that I just was out of it . I recollect that ’s the existent exam . "
enounce Steele , who was a silver medalist in the decathlon at the 1999 Pan - American Games : " The decathlon is operose and humbling . If you do n’t love the fight , you wo n’t last long in the event . "
Evaluating Athletes
Despite Gustaf ’s ever - ringing language about the decathlon title-holder of 1912 — to which , by the direction , the famously stoical Thorpe reportedly answer , " Thanks , King " — many other athlete might exact that their sport produce the greatest or , at least , the " good all - around " athlete .
Several years ago , ESPN take on the dubiousness , asking eight experts to rank 60 sports on " point of trouble . “When the ciphering was done , package was declared the " toughest " sport .
Most of the categories in the ESPN study , if not all , were single that apply to decathletes : endurance , effectiveness , power ( short explosion of lastingness ) , speed , agility , flexibility , durability ( the power to keep going under physically challenging circumstances ) , face ( no fear ) , hired hand - eye coordination and analytic aptitude ( the power to evaluate and oppose to changing situations in a competition ) .
Interestingly , though , the ESPN study did n’t order the decathlon . It did include individual track and field result . The rod bank vault was denounce the tough of those , amount in 16th overall .
Whether the decathlon create the outstanding or not , one stage is exonerated : You ca n’t be slow or weak or faint of meat in the decathlon . You ca n’t be one - dimensional . The decathlon is the real raft .
" There are amazing athlete in all professional sports , but at the remnant of the Clarence Day unless they pace out on the track and compete in 10 events over two days we ’ll just never get it on how keen an jock they really are , " Nate Davis , an adjunct coach at the University of Wisconsin , said via electronic mail .
" I mean it ’s a respected deed amongst all sporting men and women because it is the one challenge in sport where you have to have all of the sporting acquirement , " Davis write , " and you have to execute them at a high spirit level . "
