India, April 3 -- In the first month that Tejaswin Shankar went from being a full-time athlete to a full-time multitasker-as he has been for a majority of his career-his mind often spiralled into thoughts of, "what am I even doing?"

Training apart, he'd wake up for homework and prepare lectures. This was a decathlete pursuing a second Master's degree, in Exercise Science this time, and teaching students as a graduate assistantship. Too much on the plate?

But Shankar, as he said, "never thrived" on a sports-only appetite. Moving from India to the US and University of Kansas again therefore was like a staple diet, even if the start in January felt glutted.

The dash of confidence came when he jumped 2.26m in a Manhattan meet the same mont...