Capps pulls off dramatic decathlon victory
5/14/2009 12:00:00 AM | Men's Indoor Track, Men's Track and Field, Women's Track and Field
Idaho State senior Nathan Capps scored 7,272 points to win his third career decathlon title in dramatic fashion Thursday afternoon at the 2009 Big Sky Conference Outdoor Track and Field Championships at Dornblaser Field in Missoula, Mont.
Capps, the 2006 and ???07 Big Sky decathlon champion, trailed 2008 champion Nick Trubachik of Portland State by 11 points entering the day???s final event, the 1,500 meters. The pair ran within feet of each other until the final 200 meters, when a strong finishing kick by Capps gave the Bengal the victory. Trubachik finished 36 points back at 7,236.
???My plan was just to stick on Nick???s hip the whole way, then in the last 300 just kick it and hope for the best,??? Capps said shortly after the 1,500 meters.
The final lead was Capps??? only overall lead of the two-day meet.
Capps scored 7,046 points in 2006 to win the title by 30 points. He scored 7,033 points in 2007 to win by 56 points. Trubachik won in 2008 by 81 points with a winning score of 7,058.
???It was definitely a lot tougher competition this year,??? Capps said. ???Nick???s such a good athlete, and he???s improved a ton. This one really made me work a lot harder to secure my spot.???
Capps entered Thursday???s five events in second place, 113 points back of day-one leader DeShawn Shead of Portland State.
Shead, who???s ranked second in the Big Sky in the 110-meter hurdles, extended his lead to 179 points with a dominant showing in the hurdles with a time of 14.74. Capps had the day???s second-fastest time of 15.29.
Capps and Shead went one-two in the discus, but Capps pulled within 95 points with the day???s best throw of 149-7. Shead went 136-2.
Shead, Capps and Trubachik, who were one through three after seven events, all finished well off Idaho State???s Levi Keller???s 16-2.75 height in the pole vault. Trubachik went 13-11.25 to tie for fourth, Capps went 13-3.5 to finish ninth and Shead went 12-3.5 to place 11th.
Keller???s performance in the pole vault moved him into third place ahead of Trubachik, though Shead (5,902), Capps (5,889), Keller (5,831) and Trubachik (5,785) were all within 117 points entering the final two events.
Trubachik, who???s ranked sixth in the Big Sky in the javelin, blew away the field with a throw of 202-11 to out-point his nearest competitor by 115 points and take the overall lead. Capps had a clutch throw on his final of three attempts, going 177-9, to keep Trubachik???s lead at only 11 entering the 1,500 meters.
Shead threw 147-11 to drop out of the overall lead for the first time in two days. He fell back to third, 36 points ahead of Keller.
Trubachik jumped out and set the early pace in the 1,500 meters, though Capps and Idaho State???s Logan Henderson joined him. The three ran together for the first 1,300 meters.
Trubachik fell to the back of the pack of three with 300 meters to go and couldn???t answer when Henderson and Capps made their move with 200 meters to go.
Henderson would pull Capps to the win, with Henderson running a 4:30.40 and Capps a 4:31.99. Trubachik came in at 4:39.25 to place third.
???Logan helped me so much. He was a big influence on how it turned out,??? Capps said. ???On that last lap he took the wind, and I went with him hoping Nick would drop back, and he did.???
Keller ran a 4:57.65 to move up to third in the final overall standings. Shead tumbled to fourth with a time of 5:18.41.
ISU???s Brad Silvester scored 6,410 points to round out the top five and give the Bengals 20 early points heading into Friday and Saturday???s running and field events.
Montana picked up three points in the event, though from unlikely sources. Junior Chris Hicks, who was the decathlon runner-up to Trubachik in 2008, no-heighted in the pole vault and dropped out of the competition. His absence left junior Michael Blanchard and sophomore Evan Stokken, both of whom were competing in just their second career decathlons, as the only Grizzlies.
Stokken was sitting 13th after day one, but made his way up to seventh by the end of day two to score two points. He moved up to 10th with a 15.76 in the 110-meter hurdles, remained in 10th with a 103-2 in the discus and hit scoring territory by creeping up to eighth with a pole vault of 13-7.25.
Stokken had the day???s third-best javelin throw of 162-4 to improve to seventh and held that spot with a 1,500-meter time of 4:57.25.
Blanchard, who was 14th after day one, had a big three-event closing to rally up seven places to finish eighth and pick up a point for the Grizzlies.
Blanchard was ranked 15th after seven events, but he had the day???s third-best pole vault of 14-3.25 to move up to 12th, had the day???s fourth-best javelin of 160-11, a personal best by over 15 feet, to move up to 10th and closed with the day???s fourth-fastest 1,500-meter time of 4:42.19 to jump up to eighth.
