BEIJING -- For 36 men, the Olympic modern pentathlon yesterday was a test of skill and endurance, five events over 12 hours in three venues.

For Sam Sacksen, 22, of Somerset, it was also his first time at the Games, a chance to measure himself against the best in the world in the most pressure-packed setting.

5:30 a.m.: Sacksen gets up three hours before his first event.

8:20 a.m.: Sacksen begins shooting practice with the others at the Fencing Hall, but his routine is broken. His parents weren't there when he looked into the stands.

8:25 a.m.: Jock and Jennifer Sacksen, along with daughters Rachael and Sophia, arrive. Usually careful about being early, they are late because a bus promised by the International Modern Pentathlon Union didn't arrive and their cab driver started to head to the wrong venue.

"I know that threw him off," Jennifer Sacksen says about her son.

8:30 a.m.: Sacksen begins his first official event of the Olympic modern pentathlon. He scores a perfect 10 in the first of 20 rounds of the 10-meter air rifle. At the end, though, he scores 178 of 200 for a 21st-place tie.

"He was too nervous," Jock Sacksen says. "He hasn't shot below 180 in a competition in two years."

9:30 a.m.: Lorraine Dupre, of Seven Springs, is looking for her friends, the Sacksens. She's waving an American flag as a lure. They finally meet up and sit together.

9:40 a.m.: Rachael and Sophia Sacksen do a little shopping at the souvenir store with a Swiss friend. Rachael also competes in modern pentathlon and is headed to the Swiss Open in the fall.

9:58 a.m.: The athletes, in the second of five very different outfits for the day, take the floor for a round-robin, one-touch epee fencing tournament. In easily his weakest of the five events Sacksen goes 14-21 over three hours.

12:57 p.m.: "I had some good moments and some bad moments and some really idiotic moments," Sacksen says.

1 p.m.: While Sacksen gets a shuttle to the Yingdong Natatorium more than a mile away, his relatives are directed to the subway, which itself is a hike. The train slows but doesn't stop at the next exit, and the Sacksens get off one stop farther and out of the Olympic Green security zone. Backtracking, they make a long trek to a gate, only to be told it's for VIPs. It's a long walk to the correct gate, then to the pool. They arrive at the pool at 2:15, 15 minutes before the start of the 200-meter freestyle races.

2:37 p.m.: Sacksen swims a slow time for him, 2:08.99, leaving him 30th overall with 3,064 points with horse show jumping and a 3-kilometer run left.

4:14 p.m.: At the horse draw at the nearby Olympic Sports Center Stadium, Sacksen gets Zhaozhao, a black gelding who bucks so hard he nearly gets away from his handler.

6:49 p.m.: Sacksen, in a red riding blazer, follows 29 others in the show jumping, an event that has been marred by spills, horses who have balked at jumping and struggled in the deep, wet dirt after an all-day rain.

Except for one abrupt stop at Gate 4, Sacksen and Zhaozhao get through the course well, needing 81 seconds. Sacksen collects 1,104 points to catapult from 30th to 15th place.

"That ride was how Sam can be in the pentathlon," Jennifer Sacksen said. "I don't know how he calmed [Zhaozhao], but that was a fabulous ride."

8:02 p.m.: It's Sacksen's turn to start the 3K on a snaking course with U-turns set up on the track to emulate a cross country path. The race is handicapped by time so that the top three finishers are the medalists. Sacksen runs a 9:32.90 with a 1:44 handicap.

He drops a little overall, finishing 18th in his first Olympic modern pentathlon, while Russia's Andrey Moiseev becomes just the second pentathlete to win back-to-back titles at the Games. Lithuania's Edvinas Krungolcas and Andrejus Zadneprovskis win the silver and bronze.

8:18 p.m.: Sacksen makes an interview stop on the way off the field.

"At the end of the day, I felt strong enough in the run but not to quite close it out like I wanted, but to finish top 20 in my first Olympics is pretty good," he says.

"I'm definitely tired. It was a good day, though."