A portion of the opening ceremonies of the 2012 U.S. Olympic Track and Field Trials will serve as a tribute to the centennial anniversary of the modern decathlon. All-time greats in the event will be honored at 4 p.m. on Friday.
Jim Thorpe, who became the first Native American to ever win an Olympic gold medal, will be honored posthumously and will be represented at the event by two of his sons, Bill and Richard. Along with Thorpe, six other American gold medalists in the decathlon will be honored: Milt Campbell (1956), Rafer Johnson (1960), Bill Toomey (1968), Bruce Jenner (1972), Dan O’Brien (1996) and Bryan Clay (2008). Younger fans may know Jenner better as the stepfather of the Kardashian family on the popular reality television series “Keeping Up with the Kardashians.”
Thorpe, who is considered one of the most versatile and accomplished athletes in modern history, will headline the ceremony. He had also won gold in the pentathlon in 1912 and played professional baseball and basketball. He was initially stripped of his Olympic titles after it was discovered he had played semi-professional baseball before competing in the games. In 1983, 30 years after his death, the International Olympic Committee restored his medals.
Johnson was an incredible all-around athlete in his own right. In addition to winning a gold medal in the decathlon in 1960, he started under legendary basketball coach John Wooden at UCLA and was also selected as a running back in the 1959 NFL draft.
Campbell, like Thorpe, was a trailblazer in the Olympic arena. In 1956, he became the first African-American to win a gold medal in the decathlon of that year’s Olympics.
O’Brien is a native of Portland, Ore., who won an Olympic gold medal in Atlanta in 1996 after claiming world titles in 1991, 1993 and 1995. He is of African-American and Finnish heritage and grew up in an Irish-American family in Klamath Falls, Ore. In 2005, he was inducted into the Oregon Sports Hall of Fame, and in 2012, he was elected into the United States Olympic Hall of Fame.
Clay is the reigning Olympic champion in the decathlon and a favorite to compete in London in 2012. His margin of victory in Bejing — 240 points — was the largest since 1972. He was also world champion in th e event in 2005. He claimed a silver medal in the decathlon at the 2004 Olympic games in Athens.
“We’re tremendously excited to honor members of the Thorpe family, along with all the living U.S. Olympic gold medal decathletes at Hayward Field,” said Vin Lananna, co-chair of the TrackTown12 Local Organizing Committee in a press release. “The Opening Ceremony is going to be a fantastic celebration of the unrivaled success Team USA has had in the decathlon.”