For the first time since the Championships started on Wednesday, competition was held in warm and sunny conditions ironically not the best for the 33 entrants of the Boys 10,000m Race Walk final.
16-year-old World Youth leader and pre-event favourite Stanislav Emelyanov didn’t leave anything to chance as he took control of the race from the very early stages and his outstanding supremacy was never challenged.
The Russian covered the 25-lap event in a new Championship record 41:49.91 a massive 82 seconds ahead of runner up Pedro Daniel Gomez of Mexico whose 43:11.87 was a new personal best.
Italy’s Vito Di Bari took bronze in a PB 43:36.13 maintaining his country’s long standing race walking tradition alive.
There were a total of 17 personal bests recorded in this morning final including China’s Lingfu Geng’s 44:03.52 for fourth and Italy’s Riccardo Macchia’s 44:11.43 for fifth.
Denis Strelkov’s eighth’s position was a huge disappointment as the Russians had been expected to secure the top two positions today.
With Emelyanov’s victory Russia remains undefeated in the Boys Race Walk after five editions of the World Youth Championships, previous winners Yevgeniy Demkov in 1999, Vladimir Kanaykin in 2001, Aleksandr Prokhorov in 2003 and Sergey Morozov in 2005.
LA
