Fort Worth Do The Olympics: Modern Pentathlon

The original Olympic games featured a pentathlon that consisted of mostly track and field events. The 1912 Olympics first held the "Modern pentathlon", which still exists in a similar format and consists of a 200m freestyle swim, horse show jumping, fencing (epee), target shooting and a 3200m run. All events were based on things a modern cavalry soldier must be able to do to behind enemy lines - run, swim, shoot, sword fight and ride an unfamiliar horse.

The event is now held as a single day competition and in most cases, athletes do not compete directly against one another, but rather are awarded points for their performance in each event.

We knew it would be difficult to try and find a facility in which we could compete all of these events in one day, so we again took a little creative latitude and did our own version of a pentathlon. Plus, by the end of our adventure, we will have done each of these events "for real", just at different times!

We started inside a local YMCA to do our 200m swim. 8 laps of the pool and then we headed outside.

R, L1 and J in the pool

Even when some of us did our equestrian events, we were not able to do show jumping - it takes a lot more training than we planned time and money for - so we knew we wouldn't be able to do this portion in the traditional sense. Instead, R mapped out an obstacle course on the awesome playground outside the YMCA. We would be doing the obstacles instead of the horse! Typically, the path consists of 12-15 obstacles over a 350-450m stretch. Our path was shorter, but consisted of 14 obstacles. I must add that the few kids that were out that early were rather amused by our antics!

L1 on the obstacle course

After we ran the obstacle course (a couple of times because it was fun!), we set up our target shooting. In 2009, the shooting and running was actually combined into one event, similar to the Winter Games' biathlon. The distance of the run has changed over the years, but since 2013, it has been 3200m. As it is today, the women use a laser pistol that stays at the shooting station. They must hit 5 targets over a maximum of 50 seconds. After either 5 hits or 50 seconds, they run their first lap of 800m. Then they do 5 more shots/50 seconds, then run, etc. They will do four rounds of this to equal 20 targets and 3200m.

Again, laser pistols and appropriate targets weren't available at the Y, so R suggested using her Nerf N-Strike Jolt Blaster pistol and foam darts. They actually did a great job of replicating the "must load after each shot" format and flew pretty well, even with the cross wind we were dealing with, although we did have to move in a little closer than planned. We set up water bottles (with a bit of water to keep the wind from knocking them over) to target, with a sheet and towel behind to keep our darts from flying too far. There was a 1/3 mile track right there as well, so we set up to do our 50 seconds of shooting, then ran a lap, then shot again. My best round was hitting 3 bottles in 50 seconds.

R and J take aim

Finally, we wrapped up with our fencing. We used foam swords instead of the real foils - we figured we had done real epee before, so this would be sufficient! This is the only event in the pentathlon where the athletes compete directly against one another - and it's round-robin format where they all compete against each other. It is very fast paced and each match lasts up to one minute. The first woman to score a touch wins the point. If no one scores in that one minute, both lose.