Athletics at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Men's 20 kilometres walk

The men's 20 kilometres race walk at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London took place on 4 August on a route along The Mall and Constitution Hill in central London.[1][2]

Men's 20 kilometres walk
at the Games of the XXX Olympiad
VenueThe Mall
Date4 August 2012
Competitors56 from 34 nations
Winning time1:18:46 OR
Medalists
1st place, gold medalist(s) Chen Ding  China
2nd place, silver medalist(s) Erick Barrondo  Guatemala
3rd place, bronze medalist(s) Wang Zhen  China
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Official Video

Robert Heffernan and Grzegorz Sudol took the early lead, soon joined by Yusuke Suzuki. Like a bicycle race, the unheralded Suzuki steadily broke away from the peloton. Suzuki led past the 8k mark but was eventually swallowed by a group led by Wang Zhen, followed by his teammate Chen Ding and Valeriy Borchin. By the half way mark the lead pack was down to twelve. Around the 11K mark, leader Wang made an odd gesture, hand over head, to the pack behind him, moments later Bertrand Moulinet broke away from the pack as Wang slowed. After gaining as much as a seven-second lead, the chasers caught back up to Moulinet and left him to fall off the pace, while Chen took his turn to break off the front as the pack started to string out in chase. Wang, Borchin and Erick Barrondo were the strongest chasers, forming a pack of four. A few minutes later Vladimir Kanaykin, then Luis Fernando López managed to bridge back to the leaders. Moments after joining the lead group, Lopez was given the red paddle, signifying his disqualification. Kanaykin was also given the paddle a minute after that. For a moment they were four abreast, but again Chen put the hammer down, eventually dropping Wang. By the bell Chen had built an 8-second lead over Borchin, who was picking up warnings and cards from the judges. Chen signaled one finger to the crowd. As Borchin struggled, Wang zoomed past the two remaining chasers. Barrondo reacted and accelerated to put some distance ahead of Wang. An exhausted Borchin chased for only a few moments then collapsed into a fence alongside the course. The third Chinese Zelin Cai hovered off the back of the pack and steadily picked off all the stragglers to eventually finish fourth for a remarkable 1-3-4 team performance. A jubilant Chen celebrated all the way from the final turn. Even though he gave up significant time along the way, Chen set a new Olympic Record at 1:18:46. China's Chen Ding won the gold medal. Erick Barrondo from Guatemala won silver and Wang Zhen, also of China, took bronze. Barrondo's silver medal was the first Olympic medal for Guatemala.[3]

Schedule

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All times are British Summer Time (UTC+1)

Date Time Round
4 August 2012 17:00 Final

Records

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Prior to this event, the existing World and Olympic records stood as follows.

World record   Vladimir Kanaykin (RUS) 1:17:16 Saransk, Russia 29 September 2007
Olympic record   Robert Korzeniowski (POL) 1:18:59 Sydney, Australia 22 September 2000
2012 World leading   Alex Schwazer (ITA) 1:17:30 Lugano, Switzerland 18 March 2012

The following new Olympic record was set during this event:

Date Event Athlete Time Notes
4 August Final   Chen Ding (CHN) 1:18:46 OR

The following National records were set during this competition.

China national record   Chen Ding (CHN) 1:18:46
India national record   Irfan Kolothum Thodi (IND) 1:20:21
Canada national record   Inaki Gomez (CAN) 1:20:58
Greece national record   Alexandros Papamichail (GRE) 1:21:12
Argentina national record   Juan Manuel Cano (ARG) 1:22:10

Result

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Racers walk past the gates of Buckingham Palace
Rank Athlete Nationality Time Notes[4]
  Chen Ding   China 1:18:46 OR
  Érick Barrondo   Guatemala 1:18:57
  Wang Zhen   China 1:19:25
4 Cai Zelin   China 1:19:44
5 Miguel Ángel López   Spain 1:19:49 PB
6 Eder Sánchez   Mexico 1:19:52 SB
7 Jared Tallent   Australia 1:20:02 SB
8 Bertrand Moulinet   France 1:20:12 PB
9 Robert Heffernan   Ireland 1:20:18 SB
10 Irfan Kolothum Thodi   India 1:20:21 NR
11 João Vieira   Portugal 1:20:41 SB
12 Dzianis Simanovich   Belarus 1:20:42 PB
13 Inaki Gomez   Canada 1:20:58 NR
14 Erik Tysse   Norway 1:21:00 SB
15 Alexandros Papamichail   Greece 1:21:12 NR
16 Ivan Trotski   Belarus 1:21:23 SB
17 Kim Hyun-Sub   South Korea 1:21:36 SB
18 Isamu Fujisawa   Japan 1:21:48
19 Dawid Tomala   Poland 1:21:55
20 Éider Arévalo   Colombia 1:22:00
21 André Höhne   Germany 1:22:02
22 Juan Manuel Cano   Argentina 1:22:10 NR
23 Anton Kučmín   Slovakia 1:22:25 PB
24 Grzegorz Sudoł   Poland 1:22:40
25 Takumi Saito   Japan 1:22:43
26 Trevor Barron   United States 1:22:46
27 Nazar Kovalenko   Ukraine 1:22:54
28 James Rendon   Colombia 1:22:54 SB
29 Rafał Augustyn   Poland 1:23:17
30 Ruslan Dmytrenko   Ukraine 1:23:21
31 Byun Young-Jun   South Korea 1:23:26
32 Máté Helebrandt   Hungary 1:23:32 PB
33 Gurmeet Singh   India 1:23:34
34 Isaac Palma   Mexico 1:23:35
35 Georgiy Sheiko   Kazakhstan 1:23:52
36 Yusuke Suzuki   Japan 1:23:53 SB
37 Andrey Krivov   Russia 1:24:17
38 Chris Erickson   Australia 1:24:19
39 Caio Bonfim   Brazil 1:24:45
40 Marius Žiūkas   Lithuania 1:24:45
41 Yerko Araya   Chile 1:25:27 SB
42 Giorgio Rubino   Italy 1:25:28
43 Baljinder Singh   India 1:25:39
44 Mauricio Arteaga   Ecuador 1:25:51
45 Arnis Rumbenieks   Latvia 1:26:26
46 Ever Palma   Mexico 1:26:30
47 Ivan Losyev   Ukraine 1:26:50
48 Predrag Filipović   Serbia 1:27:22
Valeriy Borchin   Russia DNF, DQ
Álvaro Martín   Spain DNF
Park Chil-Sung   South Korea DNF
Ebrahim Rahimian   Iran DNF
Adam Rutter   Australia DNF
Hassanine Sebei   Tunisia DNF
Vladimir Kanaykin   Russia DQ
Luis Fernando López   Colombia DQ

References

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  1. ^ "Athletics at the 2012 Summer Olympics". Archived from the original on 2012-09-05. Retrieved 2012-05-11.
  2. ^ "Olympic Documents - Athletes, Olympic Games, IOC and More" (PDF). 29 July 2021. Archived from the original (PDF) on 7 November 2011. Retrieved 31 July 2012.
  3. ^ "Do track not war, says Guatemalan hero Barrondo - The West Australian". Au.news.yahoo.com. 2012-08-05. Retrieved 2012-08-11.
  4. ^ "London 2012 20km walk men Results - Olympic athletics". Archived from the original on 2012-12-04. Retrieved 2012-08-04.