by Alfonz Juck
50 km walk added for women
MONACO (MON): IAAF has decided to create a new 50km race walk competition for women at the IAAF World Championships London 2017. Scheduled to start at the same time as the men’s event, the women’s 50km race walk in London will have separate results and prize money. The entry standard is 4:30:00 to be achieved by Tuesday 25 July midnight Monaco time. In order for athletes to be allowed to finish the race in London, they shall be required to start the last two-kilometre lap within the time limit of 4:17:00. That means now men and women will have the same number of events for first time at the World Championships.
RunBlogRun opines: We applaud that there is equality in the number of events for men and women at the IAAF World Championships. We surmise that perhaps a handful of women can walk with the said requirement, although we may be wrong. We hope this means that one of the oldest events in our sport continues to have support from the IAAF. Truth is, we believe, that race walk community itself needs to police itself much closer for the event to recieve continued global support.
