Davies Battles Through Delays And Red Cards In Berlin

By Owen Morgan

Cardiff AAC’s Bethan Davies overcame difficult circumstances to finish 22nd in the Women’s 20K Race Walk at the European Championships.

The women’s race around the streets of Berlin on Saturday morning had to be delayed due to a suspected gas leak on the course.

After almost two hours of waiting Davies and fellow Welsh athlete Heather Lewis finally got underway.

Unusually, the organisers decided to start the women’s and men’s races at the same time, rather than also delay the start of the men’s event, which had been due to follow the women’s race.

This meant there were twice as many athletes on the streets which were narrow and difficult to negotiate in places as both sets of athletes traversed the 1km course.

The situation also provided an extra headache for the judges keeping an eye out for athletes contravening the strict race walking rules.

But they were vigilant enough to disqualify Pembrokeshire’s Lewis, who was pulled from the race after just seven kilometres, receiving three red card warnings.

Davies also received two red card warnings during the first third of the race, which meant she had to be particularly cautious for the remainder of the event.

The Commonwealth Games bronze medallist was well in touch with the leading group up until the around the 5km mark.

But the leading women increased the gap as the race continued and Davies crossed the line in 22nd place in at time of 1:36.50.

The British Champion, who has now competed in three major championships in the past 12 months, said afterwards: “I got two red cards early on, so then I just dropped back and slowly got slower.

“I felt tired in the approach to this but felt I ought to go for it in the beginning and see what happened. But I died!

“I think in the past I’ve had a few DQs and if I got a red that early on I normally would have panicked so definitely a positive going forward is that I managed to cope with that and keep my technique even when I was slowing down.

“Because that’s when I can look worst when I slow. So I am proud I managed to get through it.”

The race was eventually won by Spain’s Maria Perez in a championship record time of 1:26.36 from the Czech Republic’s Anezka Drahotova and Antonella Palmisano, of Italy.