Word: decathlons
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...Olympic competition, the decathlon most closely reflects the original Greek ideal of all-round athletic excellence. An entire track and field meet in miniature, its ten events in two days add up to the toughest individual test of speed, stamina, strength and spirit ever devised. The man who wins the Olympic decathlon well deserves to be known as the finest athlete in the world. That man last week was William Anthony Toomey, a 29-year-old schoolteacher from Santa Barbara, Calif., who not only captured the gold medal but set an Olympic record in the process...
Toomey modestly insists that "behind every good decathlon man there's a good doctor," and indeed the demands of the brutal competition are enough to strain the strongest body. Kurt Bendlin, West Germany's world record holder, arrived in Mexico City complaining of two sore knees and tendonitis in one elbow. Toomey had a pulled hip muscle for which he was being treated with cortisone. Even so, in the first test, the 100-meter dash, Toomey hit the tape in 10.4 sec., best time of the day and good enough for 959 points under the complicated decathlon scoring...
Weary, ready for dinner and bed, Bill started to leave the field, only to find that he had one more trial to pass-the urine test. Checkups for dope are now mandatory in the Olympics, and for decathlon athletes the tests were given at the end of each day. Because he was totally dehydrated, Toomey had to hang around the stadium drinking liquids until he could supply officials with a urine sample...
...Bjoern Perm, 24, a 5-ft. 11-in., 159-lb. university student from Stockholm, rode, fenced, shot, swam and ran his way to victory in the modern pentathlon, a quasi-military test of skill and stamina that many experts consider to be even more demanding than the decathlon. After four days of brutal competition, Perm ran 4,000 meters across country in 14 min. 25.7 sec. to edge Hungary's Andras Balczo for the gold medal by the thin margin of 11 points...
...Mexico City than they did at Tokyo in 1964, when they won twelve out of 24 gold medals and broke two world records. Impressive as that 1964 showing was, the U.S. won no medals at all in three track events: the 800-meter run, the steeplechase and the decathlon. One indication of the superiority of this year's team is that Americans may well win all three. New York's Tom Farrell and Oregon's Wade Bell are top contenders for the 800 meters. They ran one-two at last month's Olympic trials, and Farrell...