TOKYO :Norway’s gold medal favourite Sander Skotheim suffered another decathlon heartbreak on Sunday when he was disqualified from his 110 metres hurdles heat and departed the competition.
Skotheim, who went out of the Olympics last year after three no-heights in the pole vault, was in second place overnight, but with his strong second day had been expected to push on for the title.
However, he caught a hurdle, then pushed over the next, and departed the competition.
Last year Skotheim won a fair play award after opting to remain in the Paris competition, despite his pole vault travails, to pace fellow Norwegian Markus Rooth through the final 1,500m en route to his gold. Rooth missed Tokyo through injury.
Overnight leader in Tokyo Kyle Garland of the United States had a solid start with the fifth-fastest 110 hurdles, as Puerto Rico’s Ayden Owens-Delerme clocked the best time of the day with 13.65.
Germany’s 2024 Olympic silver medallist Leo Neugebauer had a poor hurdles but gained considerable ground with the discus, where his decathlon championship record throw of 56.15 metres was almost four metres better than anyone else in the field and eight metres ahead of Garland.
Heading into the pole vault, the eighth of the 10 events, Garland has 6,473 points, Neugebauer has 6,328 and Owens-Delerme 6,297.
