Games

      Many years ago, Sports Illustrated offered a board game based on the Olympic decathlon.  Aptly named  "Decathlon", the game allowed players to replicate, at the roll of dice, the performances of true Olympic decathletes.


     If memory serves, the game came to me as a gift from my godfather, Joe Fox, one of two decent NYC High School track coaches I know.  The detail in the game was pretty amazing.  It also took a good two and a half hours to play, in order to get through all ten events.  My father often chose to play as Bill Toomey, who won the Olympic decathlon in 1968 in Mexico City.


    Being a young punk, I countered this paly to compete as Vasily Kuznetsov, because , after all, communism is a great theory, right?  Kuznetsov won bronze twice, in '56 in Melbourne, and in '60 in Rome.  (Remind me to tell you about Abebe Bekila in the Rome Games one day.)


   I currently live with someone silly enough to humor me and play the game.  I wonder who she will choose as a player?  I get the feeling Megan might like Rafer Johnson, and Bee might side with a classic, Jim Thorpe.  I found the game on eBay recently, but the set doesn't have the dice.  As a sort of precursor to Gygax' Dungeons and Dragons, you cant play this game without the dice.  I'll find it, one day.


   The decathlon in Rio will be contested beginning tomorrow, American Ashton Eaton has a very good chance to be at the top of the podium.  Some like Damien Warner from Canada, but I do not believe he can compete at the top level in all events.  That's why we watch!


   Note:  readers of this blog are encouraged to give a listen to NPR's All Things Considered today, or to link later from their site, www.npr.org/programs/all-things-considered  for a discussion on intersex athletes.  The timing seems appropriate, given that the decathlon begins tomorrow, and we are reminded of Caitlyn Jenner's win in Montreal in 1976.