Race walking at the Olympics Race walking at the Olympics Race walking events at the Summer Olympics have been contested over a variety of distances at the multi-sport event. There are three race walking events in the current Olympic athletics programme: a men's and a women's 20 kilometres walk, and a men's 50 kilometres walk. The races are held in a final-only format. The first men's events came at the 1908 London Olympics, which featured 3500 m and 10-mile distances. A 10-kilometre version was introduced at the 1912 Summer Olympics and it continued until 1952 (skipping three editions from 1928–1936). There was also a one-off
Athletics at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Men's 20 kilometres walk Athletics at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Men's 20 kilometres walk The men's 20 kilometres race walk at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London took place on 4 August on a route along The Mall and Constitution Hill in central London. Robert Heffernan and Grzegorz Sudol took the early lead, soon joined by Yusuke Suzuki. Like a bicycle race, the unheralded Suzuki steadily broke away from the peloton. Suzuki led past the 8k mark but was eventually swallowed by a group led by Wang Zhen, followed by his teammate Chen Ding and Valeriy Borchin. By the half way mark the