Leo Neugebauer finished fifth in the decathlon at the World Championships in Athletics in Budapest. The dream of the medal remains unfulfilled, but the German shooting star is still a winner. Because he overcomes resistance and even breaks an unofficial “world record”.
The decathlon was long over when Leo Neugebauer attempted another top performance. The 23-year-old stressed that he was “not dissatisfied” with his competition. As if “understatement” were an eleventh discipline. “Not dissatisfied” with his 8645 points, with fifth place at this World Championships in Athletics and the fact that he shook up the world leaders in Budapest. Seen from the outside, the two meter tall model athlete had delivered an impressive competition, even setting an unofficial “world record”. If the statistics have not overlooked anything, then in the long history of athletics a decathlete has never collected so many points and still “only” finished fifth.
“The decathlon level is getting higher and higher,” Neugebauer summed it up when he found out about it, and immediately took responsibility for this development: “I’m also one of those people who are driving it up.” At 16 of the 18 previous World Championships, 8645 points would have been rewarded with a medal, this time four other decathletes were better: Canadians Pierce Lepage (8909) and Damian Warner (8804) won gold and silver, bronze went to Lindon Victor (8756) with a national record for Grenada, fourth was Karel Tilga (8681) from Estonia. Alone: With all the not being dissatisfied, the thought popped up from time to time what would have happened if …
After all, Neugebauer started the second day as the leader and maybe even dreamed of gold. Then, however, followed over 110 meter hurdles and a “somewhat bumpy start” in the discus throw. Another sentence that bordered on understatement. After all, Neugebauer initially caused a false start and then stepped heavily into the first two hurdles. He was able to avoid the impending fall, but not the weak time (14.75 seconds) and the loss of points that went with it.
“Small restart” after the discus throw
ARD expert Frank Busemann, who was second at the 1996 Olympics and third at the 1997 World Cup in the decathlon, said “as if he had been changed” when the hopeful appeared: “Yesterday he was so light-hearted”, which, however, was lost overnight. When asked about the causes, Neugebauer said that “my legs were a bit heavy after the first day”, but that the head also played a role. In the discus throw, Neugebauer also fell short of his own expectations, throwing the two-kilogram disc 47.63 meters. At his German record in June, it was almost seven and a half meters more.
That’s why “after the discus I made a little restart,” says Neugebauer: “I had to be annoyed for a moment.” After all, he had meanwhile slipped down to fourth place in the overall standings, and the gold chance given an ideal course had turned into the prospect of being able to fight for bronze at best. “One thinks what could have been.”
Above all, the weak discus throw annoyed him, “that’s actually one of my favorite disciplines”, in which he could also make up points on the competition on a good day. That didn’t work in Budapest. Instead, Neugebauer now had to win the most important fight in the decathlon: the one against himself. With his 8836 points in June, the 23-year-old floated through the competition at his home facility in Austin/Texas like on a cloud and with almost no weaknesses – on the world stage threatened now the brutal crash.
The fun returns and the performance is right again
Especially since the pole vault, the eighth discipline, also quite literally enables such a crash landing. Neugebauer’s US university teammate Kyle Garland got it this time with three failed attempts at the starting height: zero points. The German, meanwhile, struggled and achieved the second-best result of his career with 5.10 meters. He “had fun again,” said Neugebauer, who had identified having fun as elementary for a successful decathlon.
After the successful jump over 5.10 meters, he even encouraged the fans in the curve to do a little Laola, which sloshed through the block around the DLV supervisor. “The atmosphere in Europe is simply unbelievable,” said Neugebauer, who raved about the committed and knowledgeable audience. The spectators also quickly took the German to their hearts and chose them as one of their favourites. Whenever he ran, jumped, or threw, it got noticeably louder.
Very good pole vaulting was followed by an excellent javelin throw. With 57.45 meters, Neugebauer primarily did damage limitation, because compared to the competition he fell behind here. Nevertheless, he had “fun again”, which immediately seemed to have a positive effect on his performance. Before the final 1,500-meter run, Neugebauer was still in fourth place, well behind the top three. Even the middle distance, which some decathletes sometimes perceive as a marathon, is not one of his strengths. “Given everything again,” he said, and after the time of 4:43.93 minutes the abbreviation “SB” even appeared: best performance of the season.
Neugebauer better than Kaul at the European title
However, because only one other decathlete after Neugebauer had reached the goal, any thoughts about an improvement were quickly over. The last two disciplines are his weakest. Which also means that there is probably the greatest development potential there, together with pole vaulting. There, its somewhat rudimentary-looking technology enables it to achieve respectable results compared to the competition. In disciplines nine (javelin throw) and ten (1500 meters), on the other hand, everyone else usually gets more points.
Exhausted, Neugebauer fell onto the track after the run, to the other completely exhausted decathletes. They lie scattered on the floor and yet exude a collective sense of relief at having finally made it. Gradually the final result trickled onto the scoreboard, showing Neugebauer fifth. The Este Tilga had literally run past him.
The comparison with Niklas Kaul shows how good Neugebauer’s 8645 points are. He had won the European Championship gold in Munich last year, but collected 100 fewer points. In his World Cup coup in 2019, when he was crowned the youngest champion in decathlon history in Doha, it was 8691 points. In Budapest, however, he had to drop out after four disciplines and therefore on the first day because a technical error in the high jump caused an earlier foot injury to resurface.
All in all, it was “a great season”
Nevertheless, Neugebauer was not the only German who started the lap of honor with the other athletes: Manuel Eitel had also fought through, but was noticeably dissatisfied. The man from Ulm had hoped for more than 8191 points and eleventh place at his first World Championships – but was rightly proud of having mastered the ups and downs of the decathlon in this special setting. Among other things, he had realized that in future he shouldn’t let poorer partial performances spoil his mood. His keyword: frustration tolerance.
Meanwhile, on the lap of honor, Neugebauer seemed to have put his thoughts behind him about what might have happened if this or that had gone differently. Relaxed and with a grin on his face, he diligently wrote autographs, was available for numerous photos and thus fulfilled various wishes from the fans, some of whom he may have gained with his appearance in Budapest.
“He enriches the scene,” said Busemann, who incidentally was there as an active player when the now-broken record of “fifth with the most points” was set. At the 1996 Olympics, he sensationally stormed to silver at the age of 21 with 8706 points in a field that, in retrospect, was historically good. The then fifth Eduard Hämäläinen (Belarus/later Finland) scored 8613 points. Neugebauer has now surpassed this mark, even if there is no additional honor for it.
“Things could have gone better”, Neugebauer drew a mixed conclusion, “but it was the first highlight where I was one of the top favourites”. He did very well and proved that he can be counted on in the years to come: “I can’t be dissatisfied with that.” The US-Swabian with the engaging smile then formulated his overall conclusion a little more euphorically: “Fifth place, good score, German record – that was a great season.” Anything else would be a slight understatement.