Clay wins decathlon gold

American Bryan Clay won the decathlon at the world championships on Wednesday to deny Roman Sebrle of the only major title he has never held.

Clay scored a total of 8,732 points over the 10-discipline, two-day competition, setting personal bests in the shot put, 400 metres and javelin.

Olympic champion and world record holder Sebrle of the Czech Republic trailed by 14 points overnight and faded on the second day to finish on 8,521.

Hungary's Attila Zsivoczky grabbed the bronze medal with his performance in the final event, the 1500 metres, for a total of 8,385.

Clay, who was second to Sebrle at last year's Olympics, sealed victory with a personal best of 72 metres in the penultimate event, the javelin. Sebrle was way down on the 25-year-old with a top throw of 63.21.

Although Sebrle was some 14 seconds quicker than Clay over 1,500 metres it was too little too late.

In the first of Wednesday's decathlon events, the 110 metres hurdles, Clay clocked 14.43 seconds to win the heat with Sebrle finishing fourth.

The American then launched the discus to 53.68 metres while Sebrle, 30, recorded two no-throws and could only muster a best effort of 46.85.

Clay also came out on top of Sebrle in the pole vault competition, clearing 4.90 metres in miserable conditions to his rival's 4.80.

Sebrle also won the silver at the 2003 world championships behind Tom Pappas of the U.S., who did not compete in Helsinki because of injury.