Decathlon points breakdown: How Tejaswin Shankar's score was calculated

Table 1.0: A break-down of Tejaswin Shankar's decathlon performance at the National Inter-State Athletics Championship.

The scores expectedly show that Tejaswin excels in track events while field events are generally his weaker events. Despite it only being his third decathlon event overall, it can be said Tejaswin has succesfully made the transition from high jump to decathlon after securing Asian Games qualification.

Earlier, he had clinched the decathlon silver medal at the 2023 Jim Click Shootout competition in Arizona. He accumulated 7648 points at the event, just shy of the national record of 7658 set by Bharatinder Singh in 2011.

This leads us to our question – How exactly are points in Decathlon calculated?

Decathlon: How Does It Work?

Decathlon comprises ten disciplines over the course of two days. For one to compete in the decathlon, it is not sufficient to excel at only one or two disciplines. There is a compulsion to be a jack of all trades.

On day one, events such as the 100 meters, long jump, shot put, high jump and 400 meters take place. Whereas on day two, competitors are tasked with the challenge of overcoming the 110 meter hurdles, discus throw, pole vault, javelin and the 1500 meters. The athlete with the most number of points after completing ten tedious disciplines, is regarded the winner.

But on what basis are points allotted for the decathlon events?

If you’ve ever wondered how the decathlon points system operates and how points for each discipline are calculated, bring out your calculators now. For each discipline, there is a table structure with pre-demarcated points allotted for the athletes’ performances. You can find the table below.

The Decathlon Formula: Simplified

In the decathlon, there is more emphasis on the athlete’s individual timings than on the athlete’s final standing in a particular discipline. When it comes to allotting scores, the following formulas are utilized.

Track events = A(B-T)^C [Here, T is the athlete’s timings in seconds]

Field events (such as shot put, javelin throw etc.) = A(D-B)^C [Here, D is the distance measured in meters]

In all of the two aforementioned events, the values of A, B, C varies from discipline to discipline, as seen in the table below. Furthermore, ‘B’ is considered as the cut-off time. ‘T’ is always less than ‘B’ and if an individual’s timing is more than the quantity of ‘B’. Simply put, if T = B or T > B, the athlete is left with zero points.

In contrary, for events involving distances (such as discus throw), greater the value of ‘D’, greater is the number of points awarded. Here, if D=B or D < B, then the athlete is left with zero points.