Ehi, today I have an answer…. at least for what concerns the Winterberg track.
No, in Winterberg it is NOT SO DANGEROUS, because you have enough track, after the finish line to be able to stop just going uphill, but please beleive me, it would be much better to brake at least when you are still because it would not be funny to go backward at 100 km/h…

Just to recap in a few words, today we had the second training session before the 4 men bob Europe Cup.
In the first run, pushing the bob, three (yes, all the three brakemen) newbies (me included, in a sense) and the youngest one at the brakes, I was the 3rd, just in front of him.
Before starting, we asked him if everything was ok with the brakes and it seemed to be (really) OK… but it wasn’t. Just a couple of meters after the finish line I got up a little bit outside the bob, just to make his life easier while braking; unfortunately he couldn’t find the handles, went through the parking area, and shouted: “Where are the handles?”… too late.

The worst thing would have been to go back downhill, pass again the finish line in the opposite direction and go up 3 or 4 corners backward .
Finally, when we were still,  I was able to turn by myself and pull the brake, so we stopped up there, waiting for some men of the track who helped us sliding back to the parking area.

Uhfff… it would have been more dangerous in some other tracks; for the next time I’ll remember to really check if everything is ok and eventually to pull that handle a little bit in advance!

Eptathletes after Osaka Eptathlon 2nd day.

Let’s guess who they are! Read the following names in order of appearence from right to left (fotofinish rules )))

Vasilikí Delinikóla, Linda Züblin, Yvonne Wisse, Aryiró Stratáki, Jessica Samuelsson, Olga Kurban, Ida Marcussen, Karolina Tyminska (I suppose… ) preceding for some centemeters Sonja Kesselschläger, Irina Naumenko and Nataliya Dobrynska.

It would be nice to have them all! OK, I’ll search some other photo

Post Update…

As promised, I found another one

Same order: Marie Collonvillé, Simone Oberer, Aiga Grabuste, Linda Züblin, Carolina Klüft, Jessica Ennis, Sylvie Dufour, Lyudmila Blonska and Kelly Sotherton

These pics were taken from Talence Decastar Official Site

I immediately felt some pain, but not so much, because my foot was warm.. The problem revealed after the Shot Put event, when, warming up for the High jump, I could not even lean my heel on the floor.

I tried to resist, in order to finish the first day and waiting for the next morning, so I cleared 1.74, 1.77 and 1.80 at the first attempt (it never happens , mumble mumble…) and stopped that event. Later I run the 400 and hoped…

… not well enough! Yesterday morning my heel conditions were even worse (as I expected, I admit) and I could not run 110 hurdles, neither do Pole Vault. The good thing is that I set my PB in Discus: 45.15 and did a good Javelin: 57.74.

The crowd was terrific here in Talence, and that is the reason why I would have loved to finish 1500 meters, together with such strong guys. So I started and struggled for 1000 meters, using 1 leg and a half, before not being able to go on .

It was a pity not to be able to set a decathlon PB here in such an amazing challenge but I am very happy to have been here. Hey: this meeting is really fantastic, the atmosphere is magic and French People are so fired for combined events!

The Decathlon was won by Andrej Kravchenko with 8553 points and the Heptathlon by Lyudmila Blonska with 6437 points. More to come about results….

I really hope to have my second chance, in no more that one year, to tell ‘merci beaucoup’ to French People with a great rocky decathlon!

And, I have to say, not suitable for my back problems! It was too small for a standard tall man, and even worse for a 1.95m guy… with some problems at his back

Anyway, we arrived in the meeting Hotel, and met some of the athletes taking part of the competition, in particular: Rudy BOURGUIGNON, Pelle RIETVELD, David GERVASI, Andrej KRAUCHANKA, Roman SEBRLE and Maurice SMITH.

Tomorrow we will have a work out in tghe morning and the official presentation in the afternoon. Well, I hope that this presentation will not be so long as expected…. 3 hours from 5pm to 8pm, the day before the race!

I will be a fast competition, I suppose, because we will be 12 athletes. The best thing is that there are several world class guys, and I’ll try to be pushed by being on the same track!

No, I’m not doing any prediction, nor saying which kind of result I would like. We will see after each event what’s going on

I’m sorry for the low image quality

You can download the much better PDF version

I have to say that I am a great fan of this kind of events, because I think they can make Combined Events and, Athletics in general, more understandable to non technical people. A lot of people, infacts is used to watch football matches (especially in Italy ) that last 90′ minutes plus 15′ break… well, 100 minutes decathlon is exactly what they are used to: 85′ of athletics action and 15 minutes break!

In this post I would like just to recount my first (and only) experience in this event. It took place in Pavia in 2004 and it was amazing for me; I competed together with Luca Ceglie and Marzio Viti.

Here are my results:

100\\\' Decathlon: Pavia 2004

Since then I wished to repeat that good experience, but always had some other reason to prepare or to compete for . So this is the the time I was waiting for long! This time we will be 6 athletes (unfortunately i don’t know yet exactly who), so there will be 2 heats, each one for 3 athletes. I’ll write a single post just to explain some technical matters; for now I’m just doing some predictional evaluation.

The most important thing to say is that I will compete in the Talence Decastar just 4 days before (22nd and 23rd), and I am not supposed to be as rested as I should be!! I just hope to have a lot of fun in this 100′ Decathlon, in order not to feel too much tired. Anyway, I would like to use a very different approach for my 400 meters; last time I run in 58”08, that is almost 10 seconds slower that my PB!! It was because I did not know how I would have felt for the ‘second day’. This time, I’ll try to get a lot of points more in 400, and hope not to loose so much in the last 5 events. Considering my actual good condition in middle distances runnin, 52” could be the right time.

Anyway, we have still to see how I am coming out from that Decastar and then maybe do some more realistic considerations! My coach would say: “Non facciamo i conti senza l’oste”!!!