Last Sunday morning saw the first of two elite 10.000m track walk at the George Knott Athletics Track in Clifton Hill, Melbourne, Australia.
Numbers were sadly down a bit from the usual ones, as a number of interstate walkers were unable to attend due to COVID restrictions.
10,000m track walk men
The start of the races at 9:00 meant that the walkers avoided the worst of the day's heat. Despite that even at that time the conditions were already warm. Rhydian Cowley and Declan Tingay quickly took the lead and stayed together for the first 7000 meters before Rhydian made his break to go to victory.
He won with a good mark of 39:58.1, finishing 33 seconds ahead of Declan Tingay, whose time of 40:31.3 was the new personal best for 18 seconds (previous of 40:49.72 set in Tampere, FIN on 14.7.2018 and which still represents Australia's U20 record).
Third place to Kyle Swan in 42:17.2.
Good results also for the 4th place of Mitch Baker 42:54.8 and the 5th place of Will Thompson in 43:39.5.
10,000m track walk women
Jemima Montag walked with Will Thompson for most of the race, before breaking clear in the final stages to win the women's event with a fine mark of 43:45.2 (this result improves on her previous personal best of 43:50.84 set at Townsville, AUS on 25.6.2019).
The athlete's new performance is also Victoria's new state distance record.
Second place to Rebecca Henderson in 46:25.4 new personal best for 78 seconds (previous of 47:43.6 set on the university track of Parckville in Melbourne on 27.1.2020.
Third place to Katie Hayward in 47:17.2.