Athletics World Championships 2023 – Rico Freimuth criticizes the delayed start of the decathlon groups: “Impudence”

The fact that disciplines such as discus and pole vault in the decathlon are held in two groups due to the large number of participating athletes is quite common, if only to streamline the timing of the competition. However, the fact that the medal candidates are separated from each other on the second day seems at least questionable in terms of fairness.

From Rico Freimuth’s point of view, this division is even “absurd. If you think about it logically, the medal contenders should definitely throw and jump in a group in terms of time, also just because of the breaks, which of course make a difference,” criticized the 35th -year-olds.

However, this was not the case in Budapest on Saturday. While Canada’s Pierce LePage, the leader in six disciplines, and third-placed Leo Neugebauer in discus and pole vault belonged to Group A, second-placed Damian Warner had to compete in Group B.

For group A the discus competition started at 11:00 a.m., for group B at 11:55 a.m.

And because the first group was supposed to continue with the pole vault at 12:40 p.m., the curious situation arose that just five minutes after Warner had completed his third attempt in the discus, Neugebauer jumped in at the pole vault facility. For the Olympic champion from Canada, on the other hand, the baton only continued at 1:30 p.m.

With regard to the javelin throw in the evening, in which Warner, Neugebauer and LePage will again compete in the same group, this means a break difference of 50 minutes.

“Of course that’s a difference that can be decisive in the end,” explained Freimuth with a view to the fight for the medals and then became even clearer: “It’s ridiculous for the association to do it that way. If we’re honest, that’s actually it an impudence.”

After all: From a purely sporting point of view, Damian Warner didn’t seem to mind the different classification at first. In the pole vault, he equaled his personal best by jumping 4.90 m and, given his qualities over the final 1,500 meters, put himself in an excellent starting position in the fight for the medals.