The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS 

Chief Sports Editor 

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

PARIS, France — As the first Bahamian to compete in the decathlon at the Olympic Games, Ken Mullings ended the two-day, 10-event competition with a Bahamian national record-breaking performance.

Combining his first day total of 4,255 points on Friday to 3,958 points on Saturday for 8,226 points enabled him to surpass the record held by Kendrick Thompson with his previous best of 8,182 points.

Mullings, who ended up 13th overall out of a field of 20 competitors, said he was hoping to have a much higher position and point tally, but he will enjoy what he got.

“It feels pretty awesome doing it at the Olympics,” he said. “What’s bigger than the Olympics? So I’m really happy with my performance, even though I didn’t place as high as I wanted to, I was able to come back strong on the second day and make my country proud.”

Mullings said it was a mental challenge, but he was thinking about his wife and family and wanted to put out his best in each event to score as much as he could to score as many points as he could.

“It feels amazing competing with them. It shows that I have more in the tank and I can compete against the best in the world,” he said.

“Even though I didn’t score as much as I wanted on day one, I was still able to come back and move up in the end results, so I know there’s much more in me.”

On day one, Miullings was seventh overall in the 100m in 10.60 for 952 points, 12th in the long jump with 7.36m for 740 points, 17th in the shot put with a heave of 14.19m for 727 points, fifth in the high jump with 2.02m for 822 points and 19th in the 400m in a season’s best of 49.43 for 841 points.

Then on Saturday, he picked up 1,014 points for second in the 110m hurdles in 13.70, 11th in the discus with a personal best of 46.97 for 789 points, 10th in the pole vault with 4.80m for 849 points, a PB of 59.83m for third place in the javelin and 4:55.84 for 20th place in the gruelling 1,500m for 584 points.

“I was really happy with the 100m because that was the first event where we just shake off the nerves and then it sets me up for the long jump where my speed carries me in the long jump,” he said.

“The shot put was a let down for me. I had one of the furthest PBs and I threw away a lot of points, which really hurt me, as well as the high jump, just to jump 2.02m, that hurt me overall.”

But with a mission to accomplish, Mullings said he wasn’t going to let anything get him back.

“I had a season’s best in the 400m and from the 400m up, everything else just started to fall in terms of how practice was going. I got a season’s best in the 400, I did the second fastest time I ever ran in the hurdles, a big PB in the discus, an outdoor season’s best in the pole vault, a PB in the javelin and a season’s best in the 1,500m. I can’t ask for more than that.”

After spending the past six weeks training with local coaches Demaris Cash and Jason Edwards, who were both in Paris through the sponsorship of Powerade and Oak Tree Medical,

Mullings said he just had to keep it into his routine.

With the World Championships set for 2025 in Tokyo, Japan, Mullings said he is looking forward to an awesome off-season to “get my body right” before he takes that next step to be a contender for a medal.

Cash said Mullings is just coming into his own as a decathlete because he now believes that he has the ability to hang with the top guys in the world. “Day one is usually his strongest day, but based on his adjustment, day two turned out to be his strongest,” Cash said. “So we have a balance for him and hopefully he can be a top top, top five and a medallist down the road.”

Edwards said the performance was great.

“The first day was rough and obviously he needed some personal assistance, but he came back on the second day and got the national record. we couldn’t be more proud of him.”

Although they were not able to secure their accreditations to work directly with Mullings here, Cash thanked Team Bahamas’ coaching staff for assisting them.

“At this high level, athletes need their personal coaches who work daily with them,” he said. “We don’t know where the breakdown went, but we want to thank all of the coaching staff on Team Bahamas for assisting.”