Why isn't the women's decahtlon being adopted?

dimitry

The IAAF recognized the Women's Decathlon in 2004: http://iaaf.org/statistics/toplists/inout=O/ageGroup=N/season=2004/gender=W/discipline=DEC/legal=A/index.html
and immediately an 8150 WR was posted by France's Marie Collonvillé in Talence (a meet that no longer runs the decathlon for women). The next year a stellar 8358 was posted by Lithuania's Austra Skujyte in Columbia, MO (again, a meet that no longer holds a women's decathlon.) Prior to 2004 Women have competed in the decathlon, although these records are not recognized by the IAAF (in 2004 they standardized the women's order of events to have the opposite field event order from the men, such that meets -- whenever they might be held -- an run more smoothly.) Anna Snetkova of Russia and Olympic Heptathlete Tiffany-Lott Hogan from the US both have scored over 7500 using the ""old" order of events the same as men. (Stacy Dragila also scored 6999 in 1997, in what must have been a heartbreaking 1500 finish.)

So, the women's decathlon exists, a handful of meets are run every year (for a complete list of every performance since 2004 go to http://yakoushkin.com/track/womens_dec_all-time.htm) but since 2004 the women's decathlon has less than 60 women (worldwide!!) that have finished an event since 2004. There are no plans for even an exhibition event in 2008 or 2012. Probably not what the IAAF had in mind when they decided to switch the order of field events such that meets with many competitors would not be hindered. After discussions with many people knowledgeable and intimately involved with the sport, I've decided to post a more public discussion about this.

Some reasons I've heard so far as to why the heptathlon is not being phased out by the decathlon:

* Elite heptathletes make a decent living at their sport. To cross over into another event with much more difficult training (vault, disc) and forfeit their livelihood is going to require an awfully big reason to do so.
* Sponsors already avoid the multi-events, and the men's decathlon is struggling as it is. ( http://www.yakoushkin.com/track/trend.htm )
* This isn't a new event, like the vault was for the women -- in 1996 vaulters dis not have a "home". Heps already have an event, as do vaulters. (However, this brings up an interesting argument -- vaulters or heps that just miss the Olympics or other championship events would love to do even an exhibition decathlon rather than go home, particularly vaulters that can do other events or heps that can vault.)
* At the NCAA level, coaches can have their heps do 2-3 more events at conference and nationals, something that would be almost impossible to ask of a heavier-loaded decathlete.

Of course, the answer to these is "so what?" In this century women didn't have an event over the 800 as to not interfere with their ability to reproduce. The pentathlon moved to the heptathlon to make it more equal in difficulty to the men's decathlon. Decades later all other events are equal for women ... except the multis. Why a switch to the decathlon at major national or international championships is at least not being phased in (where there is no prize money) is odd.

In general, sponsorships of course is a big easy fix. If someone offered $1M to the first athlete, male or female, to get over 9026 points in the dec, Carolina Klüft would start vault practice this afternoon. But that's probably not going to happen soon.

The USATF and other governing body's views on multi event athletes ("What are they complaining about? Don't they have a big Iron-thing competition for them in Hawaii every year?") is another issue.

So, the question becomes what, if anything, to do. More meets, to start with, and more recognition and support from the USATF, high school, and NCAA ranks. The IAAF might have "recognized" the women's decathlon, but now what?
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