Six juniors added to the World Race Walking team

Today, Athletics Australia have announced the addition of six junior race walkers to the Australian team for the IAAF World Race Walking Teams Championships to be held in Taicang China 5-6 May 2018.

The strong tradition of Australian race walking is in good hands with an impressive crop emerging, especially Declan Tingay and Katie Hayward.

Trials winner Declan Tingay (WA) has been in outstanding form over the last 12 months. In March 2017, he just missed the national under-18 5000m walk record by less than two seconds. Then in January 2018 in the senior Australian 10,000m walk championships, he again narrowly missed the national record, on this occasion the under-20 record held by Dane Bird-Smith. He clocked 41:07.88, just five seconds from Bird-Smith’s standard of 41:02.18. Tingay has a busy year ahead. Following the World Race Walking Teams Championships, he will travel to Europe in July to compete on the track at the IAAF world under-20 championships.

In the women’s, Katie Hayward (QLD) has been in record breaking form over the last few years. In 2016 she broke the national under-18 5000km walk record with a time of 21:39.03. In March 2018, she won the national under-20 title by a comfortable three minutes in a very quick time of 45:48.45.

The additional athletes named today are:

Men’s under-20 10km walk:

• Declan Tingay WA (Steven Tingay)
• Kyle Swan VIC (Brent Vallance)
• Mitchell Baker ACT (Mark Worrall)

Women’s under-20 10km walk:

• Katie Hayward QLD (Steve Langley)
• Rebecca Henderson VIC (Simon Baker)
• Phillipa Huse VIC (Simon Baker)

For more information on the IAAF World Race Walking Teams Championships please follow this link to iaaf.org.

The senior team members media release is here.

For more information please contact Athletics Australia’s GM Commercial
Belinda Symes, +61 419 293 401, belinda.symes@athletics.org.au