Christian Plaziat

Christian Plaziat (born October 20, 1963 in Lyon ) is a former French athlete who was European champion in decathlon and indoor heptathlon, in 1995 he became the first indoor world champion in all-around. From 1985 to 1996 he reached over 8000 points in 34 decathlons.

With a height of 1.91 m, his competition weight was 87 kg.

Career

In 1981 Plaziat was twelfth in the high jump at the Junior European Championships. Then he devoted himself to the all-around competition. Plaziat achieved his first final placement in international championships at the 1986 European Championships in Stuttgart, when he finished seventh with 8196 points. He was one place ahead of his compatriot and long-time companion Alain Blondel . A year later at the World Championships in 1987 Plaziat was fourth with 8307 points, he was 68 points behind the bronze medal won by Pavlo Tarnowezkyj from the USSR. In 1988 at the Olympic Games in Seoul , Plaziat was fifth with 8272 points, 56 points behind Canadian Dave Steen in third place.

Christian Plaziat celebrated his greatest success at the European Championships in 1990 in Split. He was 138 points ahead of the second Dezső Szabo from Hungary. Plaziat's winning performance of 8574 points is still a French record in 2007. In Tokyo at the 1991 World Championships , Plaziat finished ninth with 8122 points.

At the European Indoor Championships in Genoa in 1992, the heptathlon for men was held as a demonstration competition. Plaziat won this competition with 6418 points and 300 points ahead of the Czech Robert Změlík . In the summer of 1992, Plaziat was struggling with injuries and traveled to the Olympic Games in Barcelona without a single decathlon . While Změlík became Olympic champion with 8611 points, Plaziat gave up after the high jump. 1992 is the only year between 1985 and 1996 in which Plaziat did not get over 8000 points, he ended the year without a decathlon result.

In Stuttgart at the 1993 World Championships , Plaziat was back in the world class. He finished sixth with 8398 points. Plaziat was 150 points behind the bronze medal of the German Paul Meier . The heptathlon was held as an official competition for the first time at the European Indoor Championships in Paris in 1994. Plaziat won with 6268 points ahead of the Swede Henrik Dagård and Alain Blondel. In the summer of the European Championships in Helsinki in 1994 Blondel won ahead of Dagård and the Russian Lev Lobodin , 74 points behind Lobodin Plaziat reached fourth place.

At the World Indoor Championships in Barcelona in 1995 , the heptathlon was held as an official competition for the first time, after Dan O'Brien had won a demonstration competition in Toronto in 1993 with 6,476 points. At the championship premiere, Plaziat won with 6246 points ahead of the Czech Tomáš Dvořák . As in 1993, Plaziat was sixth at the 1995 World Championships in Gothenburg. With 8206 points, however, he was over 200 points behind a medal. Plaziat completed his last major decathlon at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta. With 8282 points he reached eleventh place. Plaziat said goodbye to his audience at the 1997 World Indoor Championships in Paris with a fifth place and 6106 points.

Appreciation

Until 2007, only the Czech world record holder Roman Šebrle had completed more decathlons with 8000 points than Plaziat, Tomáš Dvořák, like Plaziat, reached the 8000 point limit 34 times.

40 years after Ignace Heinrich , France once again presented a European decathlon champion with Plaziat. With Plaziat and Blondel, the decathlon became extremely popular in France. Since then, high-class all-around competitions have been held in Talence and Arles every year. Plaziat, who also won the Mösle all-around meeting in Götzis in 1989 , won the Décastar in Talence four times in a row from 1988 to 1991 and thus made a decisive contribution to the popularity of the meeting.

Top performances

• 100 meters: 10.55 seconds (1990)
• Long jump: 7.90 meters (1990)
• Shot put: 15.86 meters (1986)
• High jump: 2.20 meters (1983)
• 400 meters: 47.10 seconds (1990)
• 110 meter hurdles: 13.92 seconds (1992)
• Discus throw: 49.08 meters (1986)
• Pole vault: 5.10 meters (1988) in the hall 5.20 meters (1992)
• Javelin throw: 63.02 meters (1985), 58.22 meters with the new javelin (1987)
• 1500 meters: 4: 23.49 minutes (1988)
• Decathlon: 8574 points (1990)

literature

• Peter Matthews (Ed.): Athletics 1996. Surbiton 1996, ISBN 1-899807-01-2
• zurgams (editor): Time leaps . 35 years of the Mösle all-around meeting in Götzis. Bucher Verlag, Hohenems 2009, ISBN 978-3-902679-23-9

Web links

• Christian Plaziat in the database of World Athletics (English)