Yes, that is correct – there is at least one walking competition in the Olympics. I stumbled upon this unfortunate fact last night when I decided I would watch some late night Beijing Olympics. At first, I thought it was a normal race because the camera was only showing the top half of the athletes (from that view it looks like they are running). However, when I saw a full shot, it was clear that something was just not right. Instead of full strides, all of the womens’ legs were wiggling like wet noodles while making little baby steps. It looked ridiculous. It must be so frustrating having to power-walk 20 kilometers. By the way, what they were doing was on the very thin border between walking and running. To ensure that they were not running, referees stand on the side of the path (yes they walk on a path with little flowers on the edge, oh what a lovely merry day!) and can step in front of the walkers at any time with a little red paddle disqualifying them from the race.
Who thought this was an Olympic sport? If someone came up to me, and told me they won the gold medal for walking, I don’t think I could respond with a straight face. I also want to know why Olympic Softball is being removed from the next Olympic games but Walking is an acceptable ’sport’ to leave in. If Olympic walking is an acceptable competition, why don’t we add the 100 Meter Doggy Paddle into the swimming competition? Actually, in the spirit of swimming, there should be all different sorts of land based running and/or walking races. How about to 20k backwards walk? Maybe the 200M skipping competition.
I think the ultimate race would be the 1500 meter synchronized three-legged potato sack backward skipping hurdles.
