Õiglane finished the day with a superb personal best of 48.80 seconds in the 400 meters, cutting 0.34 seconds off his previous fastest time and leaving the Estonian just 16 points behind Norway's Sander Skotheim in third place.

Simon Ehammer of Switzerland is the current leader on 4661 points, followed by Italy's Dario Dester with 4,327 points.

"The weather conditions were not really the best for the 400 meters, there was a strong headwind at the back," Õiglane told ERR at the end of the day. "I stuck with it to the end, I knew that the speed was there and I just had to make my run. I had a better run than at the World Championships. It was a really good finish, I was aiming for under 49," he added.

With five events left to complete, Õiglane played down talk of getting amongst the medals, adding that he was determined to enjoy the experience of competing in Munich.

"I'm not going to think about the medal. I'm just going to go at it the same way, one step at a time and enjoy what's going on here," he said.

The men's decathlon at the European Athletics Championships in Munich continues on Tuesday morning, with Janek Õiglane alongside fellow Estonians Maicel Uibo and Karel Tilga kicking off the day in the 100 meter hurdles from 10:05 Estonian time.

The action from Munich can be seen live on ETV 2 here from 10:00.