RIO DE JANEIRO — Ashton Eaton didn’t set the world record in the decathlon, as he had hoped at these Summer Games. Instead, he’ll go home to Oregon with a consolation prize shared by only two Olympians in history.
Eaton captured the gold medal, his second in a row in the discipline. In doing so, he joins the USA’s Bob Mathias (1948 and 1952) and Great Britain’s Daley Thompson (1980 and 1984) as the only two-time decathlon winners in Olympic history.
Eaton scored 8,893 points, ahead of Kevin Mayer of France (8,834) and Damian Warner of Canada (8,666).