The 2-time Olympic gold medal-winning decathlete: ‘I don’t know what I want to do, but I know how to plan for the next step’
Ashton Eaton has a degree in psychology, so he is well aware of afflictions such as fear of success and post-Olympic depression.
He is not necessarily suffering from those, but they have crossed his mind as the two-time Olympic decathlon gold medalist and perhaps the greatest athlete of his generation enters a new phase of his life.
Since graduating from Mountain View High School in 2006 and entering the University of Oregon, he has lived and breathed track and field. For the past decade, he has spent most of his waking hours training for the 10-event decathlon, learning to run, jump, and throw better than anybody else in the world.
Now, at 28, Eaton has achieved all of his goals in the sport — five world championships, five world records in the decathlon and heptathlon, and, of course, two Olympic gold medals.
