Week in Review: Hot streak continues
Garcia sets world record in women's 35-kilometer walk after winning two gold medals in World Championships last year
A roll that started with a pair of gold medals in the World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon last July continued for Kimberley Garcia of Peru on Saturday when she set a world record of 2 hours 37 minutes 44 seconds in the women’s 35-kilometer walk.
Competing in the Dudinska 50 meeting in Dudince, Slovakia, Garcia trimmed two seconds off the previous best set by Margarita Nikiforova of Russia last year and lopped more than a minute and a half off her previous best of 2:39:16 which she had set in winning the World Championships.
“I knew I was in good shape and that I could challenge the world record," Garcia said in a post on the World Athletics site. “The first [20K] was OK and at a good pace, then I started to tire and the wind got stronger. Thankfully I found some extra energy for the final five kilometers.”
While I applaud the 29-year-old Garcia for her record effort and think it’s very cool that a member of the Inca nation currently sits atop the world of women’s race walking, I would not be surprised if she — as well as some of the other elite walkers from around the globe — post marks in the years ahead that are substantially faster than her effort on Saturday.
That’s because the 35-kilometer walk — for both women and men — is in its infancy as an event contested at the global title level.
Women have been competing in a walking event at the global championship level since 1987 when the second World Championships were held in Rome. However, the World Championships in Eugene marked the first time that women — as well as men — had contested the 35-kilometer walk in addition to the standard 20-kilometer event in the same global title meet.
Women and men had each contested a 20- and 50-kilometer race in the 2017 and ’19 World Championships, but the women’s schedule had been limited to a 20-kilometer walk at the World Championship or Olympic level from 1999-2016, as well as in the postponed Olympic Games that were held in Tokyo in 2021.
Prior to 1999, women had contested a 10-kilometer race in the 1987, ’91, ’93, ’95, and ’97 World Championships and in the 1992 and ’96 Olympic Games.
Although the first race walking events to be held for men in the modern Olympic Games occurred in the 1908 Games in London, the 20- and 50-kilometer races did not become the two standard distances until the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne.
Aside from the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal, when only the 20-kilometer walk was held, the 20- and 50-kilometer events have been mainstays of the men’s athletics program for both the World Championships and Games through the Olympics in Tokyo. But the International Olympic Committee decided before those Games that the men’s 50-kilometer event would be replaced by a 35-kilometer mixed relay when the Olympics are held in Paris next year.
The IOC stated that it decided to eliminate the men’s 50-kilometer walk because there was no comparable event on the women’s program and it did not want to add another event to the athletics program. Not surprisingly, the decision created an uproar in the race walking community for a variety of reasons, including the fact that the 50-kilometer walk was the longest endurance event on the athletics program, nearly eight kilometers longer than the marathon.
Elliott Denman, a sportswriter who placed 11th for the U.S. in the 50-kilometer walk in the 1956 Olympics, was quoted in a 2021 story in the New York Times saying he was angered about the removal of “the longest and toughest of all events.”
“Unless the situation takes a drastic U-turn somewhere down the road, and don’t get your hopes up about it — the [Tokyo] 50K champion will be the 20th and last in an amazing series,” Denman said.
The end result was that the 35-kilometer event replaced the 50-kilometer race in the World Championships last year and is expected to be the standard longer race-walking distance for global title meets for years to come.
If past history is any indication, that will mean that the top performances in the 35-kilometer event will improve substantially in the years ahead as it is consistently contested at all major international title competitions, not to mention national championships around the world.
But while Garcia’s 2:37:44 effort might not seem as outstanding in 10 years as it does today, there is no denying it was the third consecutive brilliant performance for a woman who was born in the city of Huancayo — which sits at an elevation of nearly 11,000 feet (3,353 meters) in central Peru — and began competing in race walking events when she was 5.
After winning the women’s 20-kilometer walk by 33 seconds in the first event of last year’s World Championships, Garcia won the 35-kilometer title by 47 seconds a week later. And she was even more dominant in the race in Dudince on Saturday.
She had a 16-second lead over her two closest pursuers — Liu Hong and Ma Li of China — after passing through the first five kilometers in 22:41.
Her lead had grown to more than a minute when she came through 15 kilometers in 1:07:29 and she had an 84-second advantage over second-place Liu with 10 kilometers left in the race. That margin was nearly two minutes when she passed 30 kilometers in 2:15:10 and it was close to two and a half minutes after she clocked 22:34 for her final five kilometers.
Liu timed an Asian record of 2:40:06 to finish second in her debut race at the 35-kilometer distance, followed by Magaly Bonilla, who set an Ecuadorean record of 2:46:32 in third. Wu, the World 20-kilometer champion in 2015 and ’19, placed fourth in 2:47:34.
“It's a big thing for me to achieve this record," said Garcia, who first took up race walking because her brothers and cousins had formed a club in Huancayo. “I still think I can go faster, maybe at the World Championships. I'm not planning any more 35-kilometer races before Budapest."
Add Garcia: Although men from Latin America have excelled in the walks internationally over the years, Garcia became only the second woman race walker from Latin America and the first from South America to have won a medal of any kind in the World Championships when she swept the gold medals in Eugene last summer.
When it comes to the Olympic Games, Maria Guadalupe Hernandez of Mexico (silver in 2016) and Sandra Arenas of Colombia (silver in 2021) are the only Latin American women to have won a medal in a race walking event.
Garcia started the 20-kilometer race in the Games of Tokyo, but she dropped out about 15 kilometers into the contest.
Bouncing back: Maria Perez, who had been disqualified from both the World and European championships last year, set a national record in winning the women’s race of the Spanish 20 Kilometer Race Walking Championships in Cordoba on Sunday.
The 26-year-old, who finished fourth in the Olympic Games in Tokyo, clocked 1:25:30 to slash a minute and six seconds off her previous national record of 1:26:36 that she had set in winning the 2018 European Championships in Berlin.
In a post on the European Athletics site, Garcia said she was “very satisfied and grateful” when asked about her performance. However, her primary goal entering the race was to meet the qualifying standard of 1:29:20 for the Olympic Games in Paris next year.
Garcia covered the first 10 kilometers of the race in 42:29 before recording a split of 43:01 for her second 10K. She won the race by more than four and a half minutes as Raquel Gonzalez finished second in 1:30:13.
Welcome to the club: Sean Bailey of Jamaica broke 45 seconds in the 400 meters for the first time in his career on Saturday when he ran 44.70 to win the event in the Masked Rider Open at the Terry and Linda Fuller Track & Field Complex at Texas Tech University.
The 25-year-old Bailey, who ran his previous best of 45.04 in 2021, was followed across the line by American Elijah Mosley, who clocked 45.61 while finishing in second place for Barton Community College (Kansas).
Hossam Hatib of South Plains College (Texas) finished second in the overall standings as his winning time of 45.58 in the second heat moved him to second on the all-time Moroccan performer list.
Close century: Mouhamadou Fall of France won a hotly contested men’s 100-meter race in the Masked Rider Open at Texas Tech on Saturday.
The 31-year-old Fall ran 10.06 seconds to finished a hundredth of a second in front of Tapiwa Makarawu of New Mexico Junior College and three hundredths ahead of James Dadzie of West Texas College.
While Fall’s time was the second fastest in the world this year through the end of last week, Makarawu moved to third on the all-time Zimbabwean performer list and Dadzie became the seventh-fastest Ghanaian in history.
Career year?: We’re less than three months into the year, but pole vaulter Kurtis Marschall of Australia is off to a great start.
First, he raised his indoor best to 5.91 meters (19 feet 4¾ inches) in February to move to second on the all-time Australian performer list. Then he improved his outdoor best to 5.85 (19-2¼) in winning the Brisbane Track Classic on Saturday to solidify his hold on fourth on the country’s all-time outdoor list.
The 25-year-old Marschall passed the first five heights of the competition before winning the event with a first-time clearance of 5.45 (17-10½). He then cleared 5.70 (18-8½) on his opening attempt before getting over 5.85 on his third try. He ended the competition with three misses at 5.90 (19-4¼).
Michelle Jenneke had one of the top performances in the women’s meet as she led a trio of Australians under 13 seconds in the 100-meter hurdles.
Jenneke clocked 12.80 seconds to finish ahead of Celeste Mucci (12.92) and Hannah Jones (12.98).
The 29-year-old Jenneke has run a world-leading 12.69 this year.
Two-liners: David Kendziera of the U.S. posted the fastest time in the world this year in the men’s 400-meter hurdles when he ran 48.74 seconds in the Raleigh Relays in North Carolina on Saturday. Kendziera placed third in the U.S. Olympic Trials in 2021. . . . Margot Appleton of the University of Virginia won the women’s 1,500 in 4:08.96 in the Raleigh Relays. Her time was the fastest outdoor collegiate time in the nation this year and crushed her previous outdoor best of 4:17.17 set in the Raleigh Relays last year. . . . Alia Armstrong and Leah Phillips of LSU placed 1-2 in the women’s 100-meter hurdles in the Battle on the Bayou meet on Saturday. Defending NCAA champion Armstrong ran 12.82, with Phillips at 12.89. . . . Claudio Romero of LSU, the defending NCAA champion in the men’s discus, opened his outdoor season with a first-place effort of 61.30 (201-1) in the Battle on the Bayou meet. The Chilean record-holder at 67.02 (219-10), Romero upset Mykolas Alekna of UC Berkeley in winning the NCAA title for Virginia last June. . . . Amanal Petros won the Hannover Marathon in Germany on Sunday with a time of 2:07:02. The time was the second fastest in German history, trailing only the 2:06:27 clocking that Petros ran while finishing 11th in the Valencia Marathon in Spain in 2021.
When you’re hot, you’re hot: Xai (say Zai) Ricks of Long Beach Poly High School in southern California continued his sensational junior year by winning the boys’ 800 meters in a yearly national-leading time of 1:49.19 in the Azusa Pacific Meet of Champions Distance Classic on Saturday.
Senior Aaron Sahlman of Newbury Park, the fastest returning prep 800 runner in the U.S. with a best of 1:48.91, went through the opening 400 in a scorching 51.68 seconds on Saturday. He had widened his lead over Ricks, who came through the 400 in 53.04, as he started down the backstretch of the second lap. But Ricks began to gradually make up ground on Sahlman heading into the final turn and he started to quickly reel him in with 150 meters left in the race.
Sahlman, who won the boys’ title in the Nike Cross Nationals race in December, had slowed visibly at that point and he had no response when Ricks sped past him shortly after entering the home straightaway.
Ricks finished more than a second and a half in front of Sahlman (1:50.86), with Tarron Johnson of Vista Murrieta in Murrieta placing third in a personal best of 1:50.93.
“I was still trying to get around him and then go,” Ricks said by telephone on Monday when asked about his thoughts as he closed in on Sahlman. “I was thinking he’s probably going to still be there with me. But as I passed him, I looked down [the track] at the clock and I’m like, Oh yeah. I just got to go and finish the race. The [time on the] clock was still kind of low.”
Ricks’ school-record time moved him to 10th on the all-time Southern Section performer list and crushed his week-old personal best of 1:53.91.
That performance came a week after he had lowered his outdoor 400 best to 47.74. Prior to that, Ricks had run a sensational 1:16.13 to win the 600 in the California Track & Field Winter Championships meet at Arcadia High School on Feb. 4, and that came two weeks after he had run an indoor best of 47.27 in a qualifying heat of the 400 in the Texas Tech Under Armour High School Classic on Jan. 20.
Not a bad two-month stretch for someone who ended his sophomore season with bests of 48.16 in the 400, 1:19.92 in the 600, and 1:55.82 in the 800.
In spite of his performances in the 600 and 800 this year, Ricks still regarded himself as a 400 sprinter as of Monday. But he said then that he was definitely interested in running more 800-meter races next year as a senior.
Historic streak: For the third year in a row, Newbury Park High School in southern California has four runners who have broken 4:10 in the mile.
Brayden Seymour saw to that in the Azusa Pacific Meet of Champions Distance Classic last Saturday when the Panther senior ran a personal best of 4:08.67. Senior Ryan Thomas of Torrey Pines High in San Diego finished second in 4:09.36, followed by the Ventura High junior tandem of Anthony Fast Horse and Micah Grossman, who ran 4:10.16 and 4:10.80.
Twins Leo and Lex Young, and fellow senior Aaron Sahlman are the other Newbury Park runners to have run under 4:10 in the mile as they currently have personal bests of 4:00.77, 4:01.52, and 4:01.34, respectively.
Prior to the start of Newbury Park’s current streak, American Fork High in Utah — in 2017 — had been the only prep program in U.S. history that had ever had three boys, let alone four, break 4:10 in the mile in the same year.
Rolling on: While juniors Anthony Fast Horse and Micah Grossman of Ventura High registered huge personal bests while finishing third and fourth in the boys’ mile in the Azusa Pacific Meet of Champions Distance Classic last Saturday, sophomore classmate Sadie Englehardt won the girls’ mile in 4:41.06.
Although her time was slower than her personal best of 4:36.15 that she set in winning the Arcadia Invitational last year, Englehardt had a comfortable margin of victory over junior Payton Godsey of Oaks Christian in Westlake Village (4:44.13) and senior Allura Markow of Dana Hills High in Dana Point (4:44.56).
Engelhart’s victory came 13 days after she won the girls’ mile in 4:38.65 in the New Balance Nationals Indoor meet in Brighton, Massachusetts.
Major decisions: The World Athletics Council made decisions last Thursday in regards to the future participation of Russian and Belarussian member federations in international athletics competitions, as well as the eligibility of transgender athletes or athletes who have Differences of Sexual Development (DSD) to take part in women’s events.
In regard to Russian Athletics (RusAF), the council approved the Russian Taskforce’s recommendation that the federation be reinstated after a seven-year suspension for doping violations. The Russian Taskforce based its recommendations on RusAF meeting all the requirements of a reinstatement plan.
That plan will require RusAF to meet 35 “special conditions” over the next three years that are designed to make sure the federation’s anti-doping reforms remain in place and continue to operate effectively.
According to a World Athletics press release on March 23, the special conditions are designed to “enable the Athletics Integrity Unit to monitor, evaluate, communicate, mentor, oversee, and assist RusAF and its external stakeholders to ensure they maintain good governance practices and to protect RusAF from external pressures and attempts to influence or control its functioning.”
In regard to Russia’s invasion of and subsequent war against Ukraine, the World Athletics Council reaffirmed the decision it originally made in March of 2022 to exclude Russian and Belarussian athletes, support personnel, member federation officials, and officials who are citizens of those two countries from all World Athletics series events for the foreseeable future.
The various sanctions took effect immediately, with the council recommending to “organizers of the Diamond League, Continental Tour, Label Races, and the various other Tours that they take the same approach and exclude Athletes and Officials from RusAF and the Belarus Athletic Federation.”
Sebastian Coe, the president of World Athletics, said in a statement: “As I noted at the time these measures were introduced last year, the unprecedented sanctions imposed on Russia and Belarus by countries and industries all over the world appear to be the only peaceful way to disrupt and disable Russia’s current intentions and restore peace. The death and destruction we have seen in Ukraine over the past year, including the deaths of some 185 athletes, have only hardened my resolve on this matter. The integrity of our major international competitions has already been substantially damaged by the actions of the Russian and Belarusian governments, through the hardship inflicted on Ukrainian athletes and the destruction of Ukraine’s sports systems. Russian and Belarusian athletes, many of whom have military affiliations, should not be beneficiaries of these actions.”
In regard to the eligibility of transgender athletes or athletes who have Differences of Sexual Development (DSD), the World Athletics Council agreed to update the requirements for those athletes to compete in the female category.
The new regulations will require any DSD athletes “to reduce their testosterone levels below a limit of 2.5 nmol/L for a minimum of 24 months to compete internationally in the female category in any event, not just the events that were restricted [400 meters to one mile] under the previous regulations.”
The council further decided that interim provisions will be introduced for those DSD athletes who have been competing in the so-called unrestricted events that included races of less than 400 meters and greater than a mile, as well as all of the field events. These provisions will require those athletes to suppress their testosterone levels below 2.5nmol/L for a minimum of six months before they are eligible to compete.
Those regulations will go into effect tomorrow.
In regard to transgender athletes, the Council agreed to prohibit female transgender athletes who have been through male puberty from competing in competitions for women, starting tomorrow.
World Athletics stated in its press release that it had come to its decision after consulting with various stakeholders during the first two month of this year. Those stakeholders included member federations, the Global Athletics Coaching Academy , the International Olympic Committee, the IOC’s Athletes’ Commission, and various transgender and human rights groups.
According to the press release, there was little support for an option that would have allowed transgender athletes to compete in the women’s category if they maintained testosterone levels below 2.5nmol/L for 24 months before they were eligible.
The release also stated that there were currently no transgender athletes competing in women’s track and field events at the international level.
The Council stated that when it came to the possibility of DSD and transgender athletes taking part in women’s competition, it prioritized “fairness and the integrity of the female competition before inclusion.”
However, it agreed to set up a Working Group for 12 months to further consider the issue of transgender inclusion.
Coe made the following statement about the matter: “Decisions are always difficult when they involve conflicting needs and rights between different groups, but we continue to take the view that we must maintain fairness for female athletes above all other considerations. We will be guided in this by the science around physical performance and male advantage which will inevitably develop over the coming years. As more evidence becomes available, we will review our position, but we believe the integrity of the female category in athletics is paramount."
Not everyone agreed with the decision by World Athletics.
In a story on cnn.com, trans rights advocates warned that what they call “blanket bans” that prevent transgender women from competing in women’s categories risk “violating fundamental human rights principles.”
Anna Brown, CEO of Equality Australia, said the following in a statement : “Such policies risk violating human rights principles of non-discrimination, which require such policies to start from a place of inclusion unless an exclusion can be justified as proportionate to any risks identified. World Athletics has failed to meet that standard.”
Ricki Coughlan, a retired Australian transgender athlete who competed in middle-distance track events, said in the same story that she was “disappointed” by what she feels is a “fundamentally discriminatory” decision.
“When leaders make decisions which divide and exclude us, we see this reflected in the community,” she wrote on Twitter. “The voices of hate are amplified on one side and fear on the other. Our communities become divided and we miss the opportunity to achieve what we can only achieve when we come together, each of us working in a spirit where we can all strive to reach our full potentials.”
Looking forward: The 2026 World Athletics Indoor Championships have been awarded to Torun, Poland.
Torun, which annually hosts the Copernicus Cup in February, had previously hosted the European Indoor Championships in 2021.
“Poland is a regular host of World Athletics Series events, having staged the World Athletics Relays in Silesia in 2021 and the World Athletics Half Marathon Championships in Gdynia in 2020, underlying their commitment to our sport on a global level,” said World Athletics President Sebastian Coe.
The 2024 World Indoor Championships are scheduled to be held in Glasgow, Scotland, from March 1-3, with the 2025 meet set for Nanjing, China.
Nanjing was originally scheduled to host the meet in 2020, but it was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The city was again scheduled to host the World Indoor Championships this year, but restrictions in China related to the pandemic again led to its cancellation.
Big withdrawal: Tigest Assefa of Ethiopia, winner of the women’s division of the Berlin Marathon last September, has pulled out of this year’s London Marathon on April 23 due to tendonitis.
The 26-year-old Assefa, who cut more than 18 minutes off her previous best when she ran 2:15:37 in Berlin, was one of three runners in the London Marathon’s elite women’s field who withdrew from the race last week.
The others were British competitors Jess Piasecki and Charlotte Purdue.
Piasecki, who has a best of 2:22:55, has a hamstring injury. Purdue, who has run 2:23:26, has been diagnosed with a pubic bone stress response.
The women’s race in London is still expected to be incredibly talented as it will be headlined by defending champion Yalemzerf Yehaulaw of Ethiopia, who has a best of 2:17:23, Brigid Kosgei of Kenya, who set the world record of 2:14:04 in Chicago in 2019, and Olympic champion Peres Jepchirchir of Kenya, who has run 2:17:16.
Other top-name entries are Almaz Ayana of Ethiopia, Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands, and Eilish McColgan of Great Britain.
Ayana, the 2016 Olympic and 2017 World champion in the 10,000, ran 2:17:20 to win the Amsterdam Marathon last October in her debut race at the 26-mile, 385-yard distance.
Hassan, who won the 5,000 and 10,000 and finished third in the 1,500 in the Olympic Games in Tokyo in 2021, will be making her marathon debut. So will McColgan, the Commonwealth Games champion in the 10,000.
On the performance-enhancing drug front: Zane Robertson, the New Zealand record-holder in the men’s marathon with a best of 2:08:19, has been banned for eight years after testing positive for a synthetic form of erythropoietin (EPO) last year and “providing false documentation” to back up his claim that he was inadvertently administered EPO while seeking a COVID-19 vaccination at a facility in Kenya, where he often trains.
Drug Free Sport New Zealand (DFSNZ) presented a statement from the Anti-Doping Agency of Kenya (ADAK) during a hearing about the 33-year-old Robertson’s case that refuted his claims about how he got synthetic EPO in his system.
The statement said that, among other things, “Mr. Robertson was not administered EPO at the facility” and that “he had not attended the facility on the alleged date.”
EPO is a naturally occurring hormone in the body that aids in the production of red blood cells. Taking a synthetic version of EPO can help the body produce more red blood cells — which carry oxygen in the bloodstream — and thus increase the endurance of the person taking it.
The start of Robertson’s eight-year ban was backdated until Sept. 20, 2022, when he was first provisionally suspended.
In memory: Kene Ndoye of Senegal, the bronze medalist in the women’s triple jump in the World Athletics Indoor Championships in 2003, passed away on Feb. 13 after a years-long battle with a degenerative disease. She was 44.
Ndoye became the first Senegalese athlete to medal in the World Indoor Championships when she bounded a national indoor record of 14.72 (48-3½) in the meet in Birmingham, England.
She also set the still-standing national outdoor record of 15.00 (49-2½) in 2004.
Ndoye was ranked among the top 10 women’s triple jumpers in the world by Track & Field News three times, topped by a No. 7 rating for the 2003 season.
