Could one pro decathlete win a dual meet against 100 random 20 year olds?

The decathlete will win nine of his events, the triple jump, the 200, the 4x100.

Random dudes will win the 800, 1500, 4x400, 5000.

Score is 12 to 4 in favor of the decathlete.

I think the athlete wins even more. He wins the low hurdles - just like TJ not one of his normal events but he's still better than a rando. He also wins the 200. Hammer? Quite probably. If so, he sweeps sprints, throws, and jumps.

I used to think about Eaton in his prime when males competing in women's sports was either just beginning or just being noticed, or just becoming controversial. So, you could say Mayer or Jenner, or whoever is the current king of the deca. This was not my idea, I read it somewhere, but the gist was: how many events could Ashton (a few years ago or whoever is great when the experiment takes place) win in the women's division of the next WC or Oly.

I always thought he'd pretty easily win every sprint with one exception: the High hurdles, since the on the 100 they're closer together than the 110 and he was pretty tall compared to Sally Pearson et al. Still, he wins it. So that's 100, 200, 400, and both hurdles. All jumps including triple. That's 9 Golds. 3 throws he does all the time and maybe hammer. So 12 for sure. Some have thrown the 800 out there, but I'm don't buy it. So let's say no hammer, no mid-D. And that's against the best of the best women's athletes. Just 12 Gold. It's hard to argue against this. I don't think it would be much of a contest.

So the real question is: are random dudes better than the absolute best women? Not even close. You don't know a 20 year old non-runner who could beat Genzebe Dibaba or Sydney McLaughlin. So our hero in this hypo loses the 4x400, maybe the steeple and 5k. That's a maybe, since they can certainly break a 5-minute mile, a benchmark I'm betting anyone who hasn't ever run a continuous mile can get. So all sprints, throws, and jumps. This would be easy. 800, 1500. Deca 1500 times are faster than gun-to-your head forced gym class times by a lot. So mid-D no problem. The only X-factor would be relays and distance. Overall meet score would be a blowout.

Running an event when fresh is much, much different from doing nearly 20 events in just a few hours. Ever seen a fast twitch guy do all-out runs with little recovery? I have, and it's not pretty.

Eaton would have no chance of getting a sub 5 1500 (let alone a sub 5 mile) if he had to run a dozen events in the hour before the 1500. And even if he could, he would choose not to since he would conserve his energy for the later events.

I'm always amazed at what we think a "random 20 year old" could do. I would guess that any top male athlete on any top college team could prevail in your scenario regardless of their event. A random 20 year old hasn't run a step in anger in years. Having 100 of them doesn't really help if there are only points for first place.

Absolutely the decathlete would win, and it’s not even close. You’d get maybe 10 out of those 100 ransoms capable of beating the pro in a single event, probably less. And only a few of those 10 would end up in the duel meet. The decathlete could do in a workout what most people couldn’t even dream back when they were in shape and younger.

I think it just depends on which random 100 are selected. Will the random hundred folks just happen to have Bolt in it? Good luck winning 100-400m. Maybe it’ll be 100 computer nerds. They won’t win anything so all it depends on is the random selection.

Bolt isn’t 20 obviously btw but the top 20 y/o sprinter might be in that 100 spread :)

I would need more details.. Seems to me like too much of a broad statement to give a really good answer to.

Which decathlete?

What country would the randoms be picked from?

What's a random dude? some overweight slug who plays video games when he's not busing tables or standing behind the counter of a store with his fat gut hidden by his loose shirt?

I think the Decathlete would win every event against most random 20 year olds.

NOT.EVEN.CLOSE.

Decathlon would win the dual meet.

In fact, a heptathlete would win a dual meet against 100 rando dudes.

Pick any random college decathlete and they would most certainly win.

100 randos vs ANY college runner and the runner WINS.

The decathlete easily wins if he can scratch the 5k and 10k. Otherwise, he is toast if he has to give real effort in all events.

break there knee caps and you'll win

This is such an easy question. There are 20 events besides the decathlon at the NCAA championship (100, 200, 400, 800, 1500, 5k, 10k, 110h, 400h, 3k SC, 4x1, 4x4, LJ, TJ, HJ, PV, JT, DT, SP, HT).

The decathlete would need to win 11 events to win the meet. He wins LJ, TJ, PV easily with short approaches on one attempt and isn't even slightly tired. High jump will be a joke. Wins SP, DT, JT with similar ease. 110h will take a little out of him just because it's difficult to half ass the hurdles. 100 and 200 are easy wins. Unlikely he'd need to go faster than 11.5 and 23.0. We're now at 10 event wins. 400h would be the surest bet for the clinching 11th win--it would be embarrassing watching the random guys try that event. The 400 would be another easy win. He wouldn't even need to contest the 8/15/steeple/5k/10k/4x4.

is jussie update wrote:

This is such an easy question. There are 20 events besides the decathlon at the NCAA championship (100, 200, 400, 800, 1500, 5k, 10k, 110h, 400h, 3k SC, 4x1, 4x4, LJ, TJ, HJ, PV, JT, DT, SP, HT).

The decathlete would need to win 11 events to win the meet. He wins LJ, TJ, PV easily with short approaches on one attempt and isn't even slightly tired. High jump will be a joke. Wins SP, DT, JT with similar ease. 110h will take a little out of him just because it's difficult to half ass the hurdles. 100 and 200 are easy wins. Unlikely he'd need to go faster than 11.5 and 23.0. We're now at 10 event wins. 400h would be the surest bet for the clinching 11th win--it would be embarrassing watching the random guys try that event. The 400 would be another easy win. He wouldn't even need to contest the 8/15/steeple/5k/10k/4x4.

LIkely this scenerio......he would lose the 4x4 for sure and there would at least be one guy randomly good at 5k/10k. Probably pick up a win in the 800 also. That would be 12 events

Random dudes win.

Assuming 3,2,1 dual meet scoring, the decathlete could win every event and the dudes could match the score by walking. They might have to have someone make a height in the pole vault and high jump, but they could win the relays by walking unless the decathlete was allowed to run all four legs. So it all comes down to a ruling on the relays.

You can make your own thread but the OP set the rules as 1-0 for every event. Your game makes no sense.