16th September 2013 11:00
Melnychenko ended her summer with victory at the 37th Decastar meeting in Talence, a triumph which saw her win the IAAF Combined Challenge.
The men's overall champion is Andrei Krauchanka, of Belarus, though he did not compete in this last competition where France's pole vault star Renaud Lavillenie achieved his aim of completing his first decathlon as he finished 14th.
Melnychenko entered the challenge leading from Karolina Tyminska, of Poland, and Claudia Rath, of Germany, and she took the title with victory with a score of 6308.
But with a fast 800m of 2:08.61, Tyminska finished second at the weekend with 6288 with Canada's Brianne Theisen-Eaton, the silver medallist from Moscow, third in 6252. Rath was fourth with 6235 having won the long jump with 6.50m, just ahead of Eliska Klucinova, of the Czech Republic, with 6223.
Once more Melnychenko showed her consistency throughout, rather than her domination, to secure the win.
In Moscow, she did not finish first in any of the individual events and here she won just one of them, the 200m, in which she triumphed in 24.22.
She took the overall title with 19,310 points from Theisen-Eaton with 19,158.
Even with his absence, Krauchanka had enough points in the series to take the crown with 25,084 from three events with Canada's David Warner second with 24,980 after he won here in Talence.
Warner scored 8161 from Willem Coertzen, of South Africa, with 8118 and the Netherlands' Eelco Sintnicolaas, the European Athletics indoor champion, who was third with 8018.
Lavillenie ended with a total of 6676 and missed out in his bid to break the decathlon's pole vault world record of 5.76m, though he won the event with 5.47m.
His other performances were: 100m (11.38), Long jump (7.18m), Shot put (9.30m), High jump (1.87m), 400m (53.84), 110m hurdles (15.13), discus (30.02m), javelin (38.86m) and 1500m (5:14.19).
It was a good start for an athlete looking for a different challenge.