Decathlon

Day One

     Olympic Decathlon Champions

  Year Name                           Points  
----------------------------------------------
  1904 Thomas Kiely, Ireland            6036  
  1912 Jim Thorpe, United States        8412  
  1920 Helge Lövland, Norway            6803  
  1924 Harold Osborn, United States     7711  
  1928 Paavo Yrjölä, Finland            8053  
  1932 Jim Bausch, United States        8462  
  1936 Glenn Morris, United States      7900  
  1948 Bob Mathias, United States       7139  
  1952 Bob Mathias, United States       7887  
  1956 Milt Campbell, United States     7937  
  1960 Rafer Johnson, United States     8392
  1964 Willi Holdorf, Germany           7887
  1968 Bill Toomey, United States       8193
  1972 Nikolai Avilov, Soviet Union     8454
  1976 Bruce Jenner, United States      8617
  1980 Daley Thompson, Great Britain    8495
  1984 Daley Thompson, Great Britain    8798
  1988 Christian Schenk, East Germany   8488
  1992 Robert Zmelik, Czechoslovakia    8611  
  1996 Dan O'Brien, United States       8824
  2000 Erki Nool, Estonia               8641
  2004 Roman Šebrle, Czech Republic     8893 
  2008 Bryan Clay, United States        8791

Good old Decathalon for the Atari 2600. This is one of those games that you keep playing and playing, because you get just a tiny bit better every time you play. All 10 events are represented, (event list in node above). At its heart Decathalon for the Atari is just about timing your presses on that red button. But it seems like so much more. This is a great multiplayer game, (for up to 4 players).

You could get a patch from Activision if you got a score of 8,600 points. 10,000 points would get you a Gold Medal patch.

EVENT                     SCORE                PERFORMANCE
100-Meter Dash             991                  10.29 seconds
Long Jump                 1148                   8.66 meters
Shot Put                   949                  17.81 meters
High Jump                 1025                   2.2 meters
400-Meter Race             989                  46.2 seconds
110-Meter Hurdles          937                  14.19 seconds
Discus Throw              1052                  60.75 meters
Pole Vault                1052                   5.0 meters
Javelin Throw              996                  80.68 meters
1500-Meter Race            994                  3:41.00
       TOTAL            10,133 points

This game is valued at around $3 USD, (white label version is worth $20). Games with boxes and manuals are worth more.

Apology

This is a "How-To" on "Decathlon". But if you came here for information on how to train for a Decathlon, I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed!!

Fact 1

I had Decathlon for my Atari 400 (and Atari 800XL and Atari 130XE) computers. And as others have mentioned, it was a great game that you just kept coming back for more, just to try and score one more point in each event!

Fact 2

I was a member of an electronics club in my school (yes, I'm a geek). We learned the basics of electronic components and "building block" circuitry. Including multivibrators.

Fact 3

I was a subscriber to Atari User magazine. This was for a number of years the only mainstream magazine in the UK dedicated to the Atari 8-bit computer range. On occasion, it would run a "series" of articles in consecutive magazines. And one of these was about controlling external hardware devices from your Atari computer - which was pretty simple because the joystick ports could easily be changed into output ports, giving you 8 on/off control lines. But as part of this, they had published the pinout for the joystick port.

Benjy the cheating geek

So, you can probably see where this is going.

I built an astable multivibrator using the components from my electronics club. I then, using a joystick extension cable, connected it across the "left" and "right" pins of the joystick input. All I then needed to do was play with the resistors and capacitors in the circuit (which determine the period of the astable) until they sent pulses into the computer at the optimum rate for Decathlon to think I was running as fast as is possible! It also had a switch to connect the pins through to the joystick, so I could play other games!

Somewhat like an "autofire" button on a joystick - but for running!

Needless to say I set some amazing scores with this. I think at one point, I managed to score over 1000 in every event, although unfortunately I have no pictures or record of this. Of course, while it made the 3 straight running events (100m, 400m and 1500m) no-brainers, there was still an element of skill in the throwing and jumping events as your timing was crucial as well.

Did I ever use this to cheat against friends? I couldn't possibly say!

De*cath"lon (?), n. [See Deca-; Pentathlon.]

In the modern Olympic Games, a composite contest consisting of a 100-meter run, a broad jump, putting the shot, a running high-jump, a 400-meter run, throwing the discus, a 100-meter hurdle race, pole vaulting, throwing the javelin, and a 1500-meter run.

© Webster 1913.