Olympics 2024 Paris: Race walkers Akshdeep Singh and Priyanka Goswami qualify for 20km events

Indian race walkers Akshdeep Singh and Priyanka Goswami have secured their places in the 20km race walk events at the Olympics 2024 Paris. The duo earned their spots after impressive performances in the men's and women's 20km race walk, respectively at the National Open Race Walking Championships 2023 in Morabadi, Jharkhand, on Tuesday.

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Akshdeep Singh, a 23-year-old athlete from Punjab, clocked a time of 1 hour 19 minutes 55 seconds. After that, he won the men's 20km race walk event at the National Championship. His performance not only secured his place in the Olympics 2024 Paris but also set a new national record. He beat the previous record of 1:20:16 held by Sandeep Kumar at the 2021 National Race Walking Championships at Ranchi. The timing also saw Akshdeep Singh breach the 1:20:10 mark. This is the men's 20km race walking qualifying standard for both Olympics 2024 Paris and the Budapest 2023 world championships. 

Priyanka Goswami, a 26-year-old from Muzaffarnagar, Uttar Pradesh, won the women's 20km race walk event at the same championship. She clocked a time of 1:28:50, five seconds slower than her own national record - to take the top spot. Priyanka's timing was better than 1:29:20, the qualifying standard for the women's 20km race walk event at both Olympics 2024 Paris and the 2023 world championships.

Meanwhile, silver medallist Suraj Panwar also dipped below the previous national record. He finished in 1:20:11 but narrowly missed both the qualifying standards. Men's bronze medallist Vikash Singh clocked 1:21:08. Tokyo Olympian Bhawna Jat clocked 1:29:44 to bag the silver medal but missed out on the quota places. Sonal Sukhwal won the bronze medal with a 1:31:03 time.

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The Olympics 2024 Paris will be the third consecutive Olympics where India will be represented in the men's 20km race walk event. At the Rio Olympics in 2016, Manish Singh Rawat finished 13th in the men's 20km race walk. While KT Irfan finished 10th in the same event at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021.

The Olympics 2024 Paris will be held from 26 July to 11 August 2024. This will feature more than 10,000 athletes from over 200 countries competing across 28 sports. India will be hoping to improve on their performance at the Tokyo Olympics, where they won a total of seven medals, including one silver and six bronze.