World champion Matej Toth of Slovakia beat London 2012 gold medallist Jared Tallent into second place to win the 50km walk in Rio. The Australian favourite established a lead after 39km of the much-anticipated race and stretched it to 24 seconds with only five minutes remaining but couldn’t hold off Slovakian Matej Toth.
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Nevertheless delighted with his efforts, the 31-year-old Tallent, who also won a 20km race walk bronze at Beijing 2008, said: “50km: three Olympics in a row, three Olympic medals, so I’m pretty stoked”.
Tallent again finished in second place, but at least this time it wasn’t behind a Russian dope cheat, as was the case at the 2012 London Olympics _ a stolen gold medal subsequently redistributed to Tallent almost four years late.
Tallent finished 18 seconds adrift of Toth, collapsing over the line in 3:41:16, and the silver is his fourth Olympic medal and follows the belated gold he was awarded earlier this year. He had to wait almost four years for his gold from those games, after it was stripped from Russian Federation doper Sergei Kirdyapkin.
Canada’s Evan Dunfee, who was leading the chasing pack, had made up 12 seconds on Diniz in the preceding 5km, and suddenly the Frenchman pulled up, allowing the Canadian to take the lead. I was patient throughout the race and just when I needed to be a little bit more patient I went for it and took off at 40 kilometres.
“We’re going to have a clean podium again and I’ll be proud to stand up there with those other blokes on the podium”.
Coming into the business end of the race, Tallent had built up a 30-second lead over Toth with 6km to walk. He elbowed Dunfee when overtaking him.
“I got beaten by a better man on the day. But I really paid for it with about 4km to go”.
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France’s world record holder Yohann Diniz went through 30km in 2:11.29. Getting the gold medal so late, and to be an Olympic champion for more than a few months. At the 40km mark I was feeling really good, so I thought I’d put in a big lap and try to make the break then. I was pushing as hard as I can, but every time I went around the turn he was closer. He only received his Olympic gold from 2012 this June _ 1,405 days late _ in a ceremony in drizzly rain in front of the Old Treasury Building in Melbourne _ a far cry from being on top of the podium in London.
