Kimberly Garcia wins the first World 35 km race (Video)

A week after winning gold in the women’s 20km race walk, Kimberly Garcia of Peru won the first-ever 35km race walk at the World Athletics Championships.

Similar to the last race, Katarzyna Zdzieblo of Poland and Qieyang Shijie of China followed her home.

The 28-year-old from Huancayo imitated the legendary Polish race walker Robert Korzeniowski, who won the men’s 20km and 50km races at the Sydney 2000 Olympics, by winning both race walking gold medals in a world championships.

Garcia took the lead early and held it, just like in the 20-kilometer race walk, even though the Pole followed her for half the distance.

She finished in a South American record of 2:39:16 seconds, four minutes faster than her previous best, and tied for third place overall with Zdzieblo (2:40:03s) and Qieyang (2:40:02s), who finished nearly alone throughout the entire race.