(from IAAF web-site by Zuzana Trojakova)

Windy and cold weather conditions in the Slovak spa city of Dudince welcomed the race walkers at the 35th edition of the Dudinska 50, an IAAF Race Walking Challenge meeting, on Saturday (19).

The honours in the blue riband 50km event went, for the third time, to Poland’s Rafal Augustyn, following his wins in 2010 and 2014.

Horacio Nava, of Mexico, took the front position from the first kilometre, initially working in cooperation with Serbia’s Vladimir Savanovic and the 34-year-old 2015 Pan American Games bronze medallist.

Nava forged ahead with the aim of improving his best 3:42:51, and was in front until the 42nd kilometre as Guatemala’s Erik Barrondo and the Polish duo of Augustyn and Grzegorz Sudol leading the chasers.

After passing 20km in 1:29:24, the gap between leading Nava, with Savanovic on his heels, and then the rest of the field was less than a minute.

Savanovic then soon started to lose the contact and shortly after 20km he threw in the towel, the same happening to the 2010 European silver medallist just after 30km.

Augustyn then passed and pulled away from Barrrondo – the latter later to drop out as well – the ole moving up to second in the 34th kilometre before he overhauled Nava eight kilometres from the line.

Having finished second behind Slovakia’s world champion Matej Toth 12 months ago in what was then a personal best of 3:43:55, Augustyn improved his best by 33 seconds to 3:43:22 for a record third win in this event.

Augustin acheives ambition

He also won the Polish title for the fourth time and secured his spot in their team going to the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

“I am very proud to win this event for the third time because it was very important due to the Olympic qualification today. It is a difficult track with so many curves,” said Augustyn.

“I know it is the same for everyone but I started to feel my knee after so many turns I feel respect because with this distance and with so many racers on the track you never know what is going on. I wish I come back next year because everyone loves it here.

Silver went surprisingly to Alexi Ojala, of Finland, who showed good tactical sense and came through strongly over the last 10 kilometres, although he was more than three minutes in arrears of Augustyn. He improved his best by more than 10 minutes to 3:46:25.

“It was better than I have ever dreamed,” said Ojala. “It was the best race of my life today. The weather was great for me, not too warm, 10 degrees, and I was happy. My main goal this season was to qualify for Rio, and I did it.”

Bronze went also to Poland as Adrian Blocki clocked 3:47:16. Exhausted, Nava finally came home fifth in 3:47:44. Brazilian 20km record holder Caio Bonfim, who was sixth over the shorter championship distance at the IAAF World Championships Beijing 2015, was a disappointing 35th with 4:10:04.

In a difficult windy weather conditions, the top eight finishers went faster than 3:50:00 with another 23 dipping below the four-hour barrier.

Matej Toth, the defending champion and the gold medallist from Beijing 2015 did not start for the first time since 2005 due to a slight leg injury but he was watching in the crowd and commentating.

“It is a strange feeling to just watch. I felt nervous before the start just like the competitors. But I hope I will come back next year in a great shape to fight for my third title,” said Toth.

Bosworth breaks the 28-years old British record

The men´s 20km race was kicked off with the Sweden’s Ato Ibanez leading the field in the first four kilometres before Great Britain’s Tom Bosworth took the lead.

Bosworth, attacking the British national record, went through halfway in 39:58 with Ibanez 12 seconds behind.

The 26-year-old Briton then proceeded to keep everyone else at arms’ length before setting a British record 1:20:41, beating the previous best of 1:22:03, set back in 1988 and two years before Bosworth was born.

Italy’s Matteo Giupponi achieved his lifetime best of 1:20:52 in second with Ibanez also going faster than ever before when coming home two seconds later.

Eleonora Giorgi, of Italy, retained her women’s 20km title from last year. However, she was almost two minutes slower than her personal best in 2015, clocking 1:28:05.

Fourth in last year’s race, Brazil’s Erica de Sena improved her South American record to 1:28:22 for the silver medal while Portugal’s Ana Cabecinha, fourth in Beijing, was third in 1:29:11.

Among the junior men, nine of 10 competitors improved their personal bests over the 10km distance with the winner Callum Wilkinson, of Great Britain, clocking 41:36.

The 17-year-old German race walker Teresa Zurek was the fastest among junior women, achieving a 10km personal best of 47:25. 

Zuzana Trojakova for the IAAF