Karel Tilga

Tilga was born in Valga^[2] and grew up in Puka until the eight grade, when the family moved to Tartu.^[3] He attended school at Tartu Kristjan Jaak Petersoni Gymnasium before enrolling at the University of Georgia, graduating in 2022.^[2]

Competing for Georgia Bulldogs (men), he won their fifth ever NCAA individual title (second in the heptathlon) by scoring a school record 6,264 to win the heptathlon at the 2021 NCAA Division I Indoor Track and Field Championships in March 2021, in Fayetteville, Arkansas. with the No. 2 all-time collegiate performance.^[4] He scored a near 400 point-improvement on his decathlon lifetime best at the Specs Town Invitational in Athens, Georgia in April 2021 besting Garrett Scantling by just 8 points. Tilga's score reached the Olympic qualifying standard of 8350 points.^[5] He then won the 2021 Outdoor NCAA Championships in the decathlon in Eugene, Oregon.^[6] At the delayed 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan in 2021, he received 0 in pole vault and eventually finished 20th overall.^[7] He did not finish the 2022 European Championships after also receiving 0 in pole vault.

Tilga finished fourth in the decathlon at the 2023 World Championships in Budapest, Hungary.^[8] Tilga was selected as the best male athlete of April 2021 of the European Athletics Association (EAA) and the best male athlete of Estonia in 2023.^[2]

He competed in Paris at the 2024 Summer Olympics in the decathlon, finishing in eleventh place overall.^[9]

In September 2025, he competed in the decathlon at the 2025 World Athletics Championships in Tokyo, Japan.^[10]