Colombia's Arevalo claims men's 20km world race walk title

Eider Arevalo of Colombia has claimed the men's 20 km race walk title at the IAAF World Championships here.

It was the first gold medal for Colombia at this edition of the World Championships, reports Xinhua news agency.

Arevalo, the former world junior champion, recorded a new national record of 1 hour, 18 minutes and 53 seconds on Sunday night, also improving his previous best by 52 seconds.

Authorised neutral athlete Sergei Shirobokov finished runner-up at two seconds adrift. Brazil's Caio Bonfim ranked third in 1:19:04.

The final stretch saw a fierce struggle for the bronze with Lebogang Shange of South Africa narrowly missing out on a spot on the podium with a time of 1:19:18.

Christopher Linke of Germany (1:19:21) and Australia's Dane Bird-Smith (1:19:28) took the next two positions.

China's Wang Kaihua finished seventh at 1:19:30 beating Alvaro Martin (1:19:41) of Spain by a narrow margin.

--IANS

ajb/mr