THE UNDEFINED RULERS OF THE CURRENT WORLD WALKING ARE THE SPANISH - ÁLVÁRO MARTÍN and MARÍA PÉREZ, WHO WIN THE GOLDEN DOUBLE - AFTER WINNING THE 20KM WORLD CHAMPION TITLES, THEY WIN CLEARLY ON THE 35KM WALKING COURSE. CZECH REPRESENTATIVE TEREZA ĎURDIAKOVÁ FINISHED AN EXCELLENT 10TH PLACE IN THE NATIONAL RECORD - 2:49:06h.

RESULTS 35KM RACE WALK MEN

RESULTS 35KM RACE WALK WOMEN

Thursday morning belonged to pedestrians in Budapest. 35 women and 46 men took part in the 47 km race with a joint start. The weather was more than favorable to the competitors. It's summer and it's the 22ndº and the slowly appearing sun was a pleasant summer morning. The temperature did rise during the race, but what would we do on the 28thº at the end of the race, they faced more than 30 in hot Pragueº temperatureum.

The race circuit was extended by one kilometer for the 35 km distance, so a really long straight opened up for the athletes. An exemplary Hungarian crowd found their way to the track even on a weekday and even though the spectators were spread out around the two kilometer circuit, the competitors could enjoy the encouragement of a good crowd of fans.

The men's race was led by a pack of competitors for a long time, in which none of the favorites was missing. The best of the 20km race also took part in the 35km and were among the biggest favourites. It was just a question of whether and how he could recover after a super fast twenty. The complete TOP6 out of the twenty took part in a longer distance as well.

At 10km, the leading group numbered 13 men. After 13 km, the French representative Aurelion Quinion started the first real blockbuster of the day. At that moment he already had one proposal and it was a really brave move from him, because this competitor is quite famous for problems with technical execution. The Frenchman pushed the saw and built up a lead of more than half a minute. During his escape, the group of pursuers began to separate the wheat from the chaff, and the group gradually became smaller. Among the first, the Swedish competitor Karlström surprisingly dropped out and fell to 20th place around 16km. However, this is nothing that could satisfy this Swede, and even though the race after twenty years in the national record did not quite fit him, he fought back, returned to the race and finally won the eighth place.

The German Karl Junghann was going through a big crisis together with himß, but he too managed to recover and finished tenth.

At around 28km, the champion from the XNUMXs, the Spaniard Álvaro Martin, set out to chase the leader of the Frenchman, while the unobtrusive Japanese Kawano, the Ecuadorian Pintado,

German Linke and Canadian Dunfee. In the course of two kilometers, they were able to catch up with the French fighter and overtake him. At that moment, he had no idea that he would be pulled into the penalty area. There he stood 31/2 minutes and joined the race in 16th place behind his compatriot Campion. He soon ran out of it and tried to grab what he could, but the fourth card and disqualification came very quickly.

The chase chased down the Canadian and the best of the Germans, Linke, and the trio of Martin-Pintado-Kawano remained in front. Pintado pushed the pace the most and before the last lap he was able to shake off the Japanese by a few seconds. Martin, however, stepped up in the last kilometer and showed who is the king of world walking with a fantastic acceleration. He performed a national record 2:24:30 a won another gold medal for Spain. In the South American record, the great running Pintado was 5 seconds back for the world silver. The bronze this time belonged to the Japanese. Kawano achieved his best performance of the year and could rejoice at the finish line.

As in the 20km race, a smiling Evan Dunfee in the SB ran out for fourth place. Behind him, Christopher Linke raced to the finish line, who again improved the NR by 90 seconds against the race in Poděbrady to 2:25:35! Both men laughed heartily at their order in the finish, which mirrored the twenty.

33 men saw the finish of the race, 5 fighters were disqualified.

Unfortunately, no Czech competitor was able to qualify for the race. Although Vít Hlaváč was high enough in the WA rankings, he did not meet the association's nomination limit. During the race in Nové Paca, which was recognized as a qualifying event by our association, but not recognized by WA because it did not meet the World Athletics rules, Vítek did try for the limit after a spring injury, but he himself stated on Strava that he missed a few training sessions in the end and wanted to it would take a few more weeks of training to get in top shape. It's a shame that Vítek didn't gain trust, he had those weeks for training. In the same situation was Nikol Tabačková, javelin thrower, whose best performance this year, according to the Hungarian tables, is 73 points worse than Vítka's, but she surprisingly received the trust of the association. It is quite certain that he would definitely not represent worse than the javelin thrower, whose throws were between 49 - 55 m, rather he would fight for the best performance this year. Damage. Participation is not given on merit, but for his fighting performance in Poděbrady and with his growing form, he could easily have been at the start.

Women also went to the race with the men. This time, the Czech flag was flying in the starting field and unlike the 20 km race, it was really visible. So see. The director had enough work to master both the men's and women's race, he mainly devoted himself to the leading group, and we were able to catch a glimpse of the Czech Tereza Ďurdiaková, especially in the moments when the men were ahead of her by a lap.

But gradually. Quite a few women combined both racing tracks and were definitely in a more difficult position than the men. They had one day less to regenerate.

Right from the start, a group of the biggest favorites took the lead. Kimberly García Leon dictated the pace, with last year's silver medalist Zdieblo from Poland, China's Qieyang, the winner of this year's best time, Peréz, the 11-year-old champion, Ntrismpioti from Greece and Sonoda from Japan. Together with the Chinese representative, she was the first to fall behind, but managed to finish the race in seventh place. The Chinese woman did not see the target. At the 27th kilometer, the walking Pole attacked with great joy, but both of them, like the Frenchman Quinion, had one proposal for exclusion. At the 30th kilometer, she was overtaken by rivals, she tried desperately to hold them back, and at XNUMXkm she ended up in the penalty zone. She, like the French, was unable to control the technique after returning to the race and was disqualified for XNUMX km. After last year, this season is a big disappointment for Polka.

The Spanish star attacked at the 21st km. The only one who could keep up with her at least for a while was García León. However, even she could not compete with the spirited Spaniard and soon began to lose significantly. The Spaniard ran her own race, gradually running out of some men as well. At the end of the race, the slightly confused competitor miscalculated by a lap and after 32,5 km she took the Spanish flag at the track and headed enthusiastically to the finish line. She waved the flag on the orange carpet, luckily the judges showed her one more lap in time, the Spaniard discussed with the team members in the stands as she walked whether it was really so, then she threw the flag and did the final lap one more time. The second time it was already correct and the Spaniard completed the Spanish dominance in this championship. The pedestrian races did not know any other winner than the competitors from Spain. Mária Peréz dominated the race in a championship record of 2:38:40.

García León crossed the finish line more than 2 minutes back, and the bronze medal was won by the champion of the 20 km course from Poděbrady, who is already 39 years old and works in the family restaurant between trainings, the Greek Ntrismpioti! Hats off to this lady.

The biggest surprise of the race was the appearance of Czech competitor Tereza Durďiaková. After last year's unsuccessful season, she started this year really badly. Terrible performance in Dudince 3:14, followed by an incomplete race in Poděbrady, for which she was also given a wild card because she did not meet the association's limit. Tereza then went on vacation and she and the coach figured out how to fight for the WC. Due to the position in the ranking, there was a chance to make a mini business. This took place in Nové Paca and rightly drew criticism. A few days ago, DenníkN published an interview with the athletics manager A. Juck, in which he advocated the creation of a ranking by, among other things, that only competitions that meet WA conditions were counted as qualifiers and that equal conditions were ensured. As he said, it doesn't happen in Central Europe, but in various athletically obscure countries they met the limits in races made for a single competitor. And it shouldn't be like that. Hell, Czech shoemaking doesn't even belong in Central Europe.

However, Tereza performed there under 3 hours, met the union limit and could look forward to another start at the WC. She didn't finish the race in Oregon, so there was a lot to fix.

Anyone who saw the lifted Tereza at the start saw a different competitor before we had the chance to watch the last season and a half. The drive for the goal, the absolute commitment and energy that she had when she first chased Anežka and then the OH limit, all of that miraculously returned to Tereza at the most needed time, when she literally played for everything.

Tereza went great from the start of the race. She stayed in the group fighting for 10th - 16th place and went like a machine. The group gradually disintegrated and Tereza was suddenly on the edge of the top ten in the world. During,

when she started to slow down a little, the Chinese woman stuck with her and made Tereza a guide. Terka was able to fight her way one and a half laps before the finish line and finished in the top ten in the world and a Czech record to boot! She improved the original one from 2021 to 2:49:06 on the streets of Budapest. She improved by 25 minutes against spring Dudinče! Tereza's tenth place will certainly be among the five best performances of the Czech team at the World Championships. Bravo.

A wonderful pedestrian race then ended with a pedestrian success in the diplomatic field. Diego Garcia Carrera was elected to the Athlete's Commission at World Athletics, and until 2027, the interests of pedestrians will be defended by 2 men. The Japanese Yamanishi already sits on the commission. Hopefully the gentlemen will do well, not only walking needs a voice of reason and athletes like salt.

WORLD WALKING CHAMPION at 20KM - 1:17:32h and at 35KM - 2:24:30h - ÁLVÁRO MARTÍN (SPAIN):

WORLD WALKING CHAMPIONS FOR 20KM - 1:26:51h and 35KM - 2:38:40h - MARÍA PERÉZ (SPAIN):