20,000 m walk (track), women, indoor

What to remember

Brisbane, September 6, 2001, Goodwill Games: Russia's Olimpiada Ivanova race-walked 20,000 m on the track in 1 h 26 min 52.30 s, an average of 13.814 km/h (8.583 mph).

Lap after lap without ever running: race walking requires athletes to keep in contact with the ground and to keep the supporting leg straight until the raised leg passes it. The distance comes to 12.4274 miles.

Ivanova also shone at major championships. In 2001 she won her first world title in Edmonton. She then became European champion in Munich in 2002, took silver at the 2004 Athens Olympics, four seconds behind Greece's Athanasia Tsoumeleka, and won the 20 km walk world title in Helsinki in 2005, beating the world record.