India's Priyanka Goswami wins silver in race walk, shatters national record

Birmingham, Aug 6 (IANS) India's Priyanka Goswami shattered a three-year-old national record to clinch the silver medal in the women's 10,000m race walk at the 2022 Commonwealth Games at the Alexander Stadium, here on Saturday.Tokyo Olympian Priyanka clocked 43:38.82, a new Indian national record, to claim her podium place. Khushbir Kaur, with 44:33.5, had held the NR since 2017. The Indian improved her previous personal best of 48:30.35 by almost five minutes to win the medal.Priyanka's medal is India's third in the athletics event of CWG 2022 after Tejaswin Shankar (bronze in high jump) and M Sreeshankar (silver in long jump).With this, Priyanka also became the first Indian woman to win a medal in race walk at the Commonwealth Games. Prior to this, Harminder Singh was the first Indian to have won a medal in race walk -- bronze -- in the 20km event in 2010 CWG in Delhi.Meanwhile, Australia's Jemima Montag, the 20km race walk champion from Gold Coast 2018, won the gold with a Games record time of 42:34.00. Kenya's Emily Wamusyi Ngii clinched bronze with 43:50.00, a new African record. The 26-year-old Priyanka, who holds the national record in both the women's 20km and 35 km race walk, set the pace of the race early on and led the eight-woman group for the opening 4kms before being overtaken by Jemima Montag and Ngii.With Montag moving up a gear and building up a seemingly unsurpassable lead, it seemed like a two-way race between Ngii and Priyanka for the silver and bronze.After exchanging positions multiple times, the Indian finally broke away around the 9km mark but also had a warning to contend with for the final stretch. However, Priyanka held out to cross the finish line.On the other hand, Priyanka's compatriot Bhawna Jat also clocked a personal best of 47:14.13 but could only finish eighth in an eight-woman field.

--IANS
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