Yang Jiayu on her way to 20km race walk victory at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games (© Dan Vernon)
China’s Yang Jiayu dominated the women’s 20km race walk on the first day of athletics action at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games on Thursday (1), clocking 1:25:54 to add an Olympic title to the world gold she won in 2017.
The 28-year-old world record-holder broke away after the 5km mark and couldn’t be caught, eventually winning by 25 seconds ahead of Spain’s double world champion Maria Perez. Australia’s world silver medallist Jemima Montag was third in 1:26:25, improving her own Oceanian record.
The women’s 20km race walk has been held seven times at the Olympic Games and Yang’s performance secured a fourth title in the event for China, as she regained a crown that was last claimed for her nation by Liu Hong in Rio in 2016.
Always to the fore, Yang formed part of an early leading pack that featured many of the favourites, including Peru’s 2022 double world champion Kimberly Garcia, Italy’s defending champion Antonella Palmisano, Perez, Montag and Yang’s compatriots Ma Zhenxia and Liu Hong.
Racing on the Pont d’lena, where the one-kilometre loop course took athletes underneath the Eiffel Tower, those athletes all formed part of a group of nine that had created a gap of a few seconds on the rest of the field by the 5km point – passed in 21:34.
But then Yang made an early break and had built a lead of six seconds by 6km. The eight-strong chase group at that stage included Garcia, Montag and Ma, followed by Perez, Palmisano, Mexico’s Alegna Gonzalez, Spain’s Laura Garcia-Caro and Colombia’s Olympic silver medallist Lorena Arenas.
That turned out to be a winning move by Yang, who increased her advantage to 12 seconds by 7km, 16 seconds by 8km and 33 seconds by 10km, which she reached in 43:06.
The chase group had expanded to include 11 athletes by then, with Peru’s Evelyn Inga moving up to join her teammate Garcia, and Ecuador’s Glenda Morejon and Ukraine’s Lyudmila Olyanovska also giving chase.
Yang’s lead grew to 44 seconds by 13km and as she hit 15km in 1:04:47, the field behind her was strung out. Perez followed, 30 seconds back, with Ma a couple of seconds behind her and Arenas, Montag and Gonzalez all following.
While Tokyo fourth-place finisher Perez worked hard to close the gap, reducing it to 15 seconds with two loops of the course to go, Yang’s victory never looked in doubt and a final charge took her to the finish line with 1:25:54 on the clock, 25 seconds ahead of Perez in 1:26:19 – the second-fastest time of her career.
Montag, who had set an Oceanian record of 1:27:09 in Adelaide in February, improved on that mark with her 1:26:25 to secure the bronze, while Arenas set a national record of 1:27:03 in fourth.
Gonzalez finished fifth, Morejon sixth and Garcia-Caro seventh. Inga was the top finisher for Peru, claiming eighth place, while Palmisano dropped out after 13km and did not finish.
"Tokyo was very tricky for me, so I worked very hard to come back and get the best results in Paris,” said Yang, who placed 12th at the Olympics three years ago.
Her win delivered on a promise she made to her father, who died in 2015. "I never mentioned this before, but I promised him I would win gold,” she added. “Now I have finally done it, I am very proud of myself."
Securing silver was an impressive return to form for Perez, who was injured a short while after her double world title win last year and underwent surgery in November. Clearly exhausted, she was helped away from the finish line by Montag before their medal celebrations. They both secured second Olympic medals in this event for their respective nations.
Jess Whittington for World Athletics
| WOMEN'S 20km RACE WALK MEDALLISTS | ||
| 🥇 | Yang Jiayu (CHN) | 1:25:54 |
| 🥈 | Maria Perez (ESP) | 1:26:19 |
| 🥉 | Jemima Montag (AUS) | 1:26:25 AR |
| Full results | ||
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