Modern pentathlon at the 1956 Summer Olympics – Men's team explained

Event:	Men's team modern pentathlon
Games:	1956 Summer
Dates:	November 23–28
Competitors:	36
Nations:	12
Goldnoc:	URS
Silvernoc:	USA
Bronzenoc:	FIN
Prev:	1952
Next:	1960

The men's team modern pentathlon was an event contested at the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne.^[1] It was the second appearance of the team modern pentathlon event. The team event used scores from the individual event except that fencing scores were recomputed to account for only team event competitors.

Competition format

The modern pentathlon consisted of five events. The competition dropped the point-for-place system used in previous Games. The 1956 competition introduced a scoring system in which each the results of each event was converted to a score, with a par value of 1,000 in each event, and higher scores were desirable.^[2] For the team competition, the scores of the three individual team members were summed.

Riding: a show jumping competition. The course was 5000 m long, with a time limit of 10 minutes. Riders started with 1000 points; gaining or losing 2.5 points for every second under or over the time limit. They could also lose points through obstacle faults. Negative scores were not possible; the lowest score was 0.
Fencing: a round-robin, one-touch épée competition. The par score of 1000 points was awarded for winning 75% of the fencer's matches. Each victory above or below that number adjusted the score.
Shooting: a rapid fire pistol competition, with 20 shots (each scoring up to 10 points) per competitor. A target score of 195 would give 1000 points; every target point above or below that resulted in a 20-point adjustment.
Swimming: a 300 m freestyle swimming competition. The par time was 4 minutes, with every second above or below adjusting the score by 5 points.
Running: a 4 km race. The par time was 15 minutes, with every second above or below adjusting the score by 3 points.

Results

Rank	Nation	Athletes	Riding	Fencing	Shooting	Swimming	Running	Total
			802.5	752	920	985	1192	4651.5
		810.0	876	880	825	1186	4577.0
		845.0	566	780	1070	1201	4462.0
	Total	2457.5	2194	2580	2880	3579	13,690.5
			1070.0	814	900	975	1081	4840.0
		887.5	752	860	870	1123	4492.5
		1062.5	442	800	935	910	4149.5
	Total	3020.0	2008	2560	2780	3114	13,482.0
			997.5	752	880	920	1162	4711.5
		885.0	814	880	905	1117	4601.0
		630.0	442	760	930	1111	3873.0
	Total	2512.5	2008	2520	2755	3390	13,185.5
4			860.0	876	920	855	1126	4637.0
		772.5	752	820	795	1099	4238.5
		95.0	938	720	1010	916	3679.0
	Total	1727.5	2566	2460	2660	3141	12,554.5
5			937.5	690	800	940	712	4079.5
		395.0	814	960	935	622	3726.0
		367.5	504	800	765	739	3175.5
	Total	1700.0	2008	2560	2640	2073	10,981.0
6			442.5	1062	740	750	1030	4024.5
		717.5	380	780	815	718	3410.5
		0.0	752	640	630	1156	3178.0
	Total	1160.0	2194	2160	2195	2904	10,613.0
7			315.0	442	560	810	1255	3382.0
		20.0	504	440	990	1180	3134.0
		0.0	628	340	760	982	2710.0
	Total	335.0	1574	1340	2560	3417	9,226.0
8			925.0	442	820	540	1024	3751.0
		135.0	380	720	1015	751	3001.0
		0.0	442	500	665	466	2073.0
	Total	1060.0	1264	2040	2220	2241	8,825.0
–			1035.0	889*	720	1030	1159	4833.0*
		515.0	667*	700	830	1216	3928.0*
		0.0	Did not finish				0.0
	Total	1550.0	1556*	1420	1860	2375	8,761.0*
–			882.5	556*	620	740	1051	3849.5*
		585.0	704*	760	660	793	3502.0*
		Abandoned	Did not finish				0.0
	Total	1467.5	1260*	1380	1400	1844	7,351.5*
–			455.0	556*	760	785	730	3286.0*
		0.0	741*	760	755	877	3133.0*
		17.5	Did not finish				0.0
	Total	472.5	1297*	1520	1540	1607	6,419.0*
–			195.0	704*	780	780	943	3402.0*
		0.0	445*	0	460	661	1566.0*
		Abandoned	Did not finish				0.0
	Total	195.0	1149*	780	1240	1604	4,968.0*

Unadjusted scores from the individual competition are shown with a "*".

Notes and References

Web site: Modern pentathlon at 1956 Melbourne Summer Games: Men's Team . https://web.archive.org/web/20200417180600/https://www.sports-reference.com/olympics/summer/1956/MOP/mens-team.html . dead . 2020-04-17 . 2019-12-19 . sports-reference.com.
Official Report, p. 513.