BRENDAN BOYCE CLAIMED a top 20 finish at the men’s 50k race walk at the Olympic Games in Rio this afternoon.
The Milford native finished the punishing, gruelling event in 3 hours, 53 minutes and 59 seconds.
The time was outside his personal best of 3:48:55, but finishing inside the top 20 in a race that saw many participants pull out and many of the finishers the picture of utter exhaustion, goes down as the best result of his career so far.
Conditions in Rio were very hot and humid and Boyce finished 19th, behind Ukraine’s Serhiy Budza and ahead of Jesus Garcia from Spain.
[adrotate group=”81″]The Letterkenny AC man was competing in the event for only the seventh time, finishing in his sixth.
Boyce had been disqualified in the event at last year’s World Championships in Beijing when he had been well positioned for a personal best time.
In March 2015, when he qualified for Rio, Boyce finished in 3:48:55 in Dudince, Slovakia.
This was Boyce’s second Olympic Games. In London 2012, Boyce finished in 3:55:01, finishing in 29th position with that result later upgraded to 26th following disqualifications.
Slovakian Matej Toth won the event in 3:40:58, with Australian Jared Tallent taking silver, 18 seconds behind, and Hirooki Arai from Japan collected the bronze, a further 26 seconds down.
[adrotate group=”37″]There was no fairytale ending for Rob Heffernan, the Cork man who had been retrospectively awarded a bronze medal from the 2012 Olympic Games. Heffernan – who is Boyce’s coach in Cork – finished in sixth position having been narrowly outside the medal placings for the most part in what was his fifth Olympic Games.
Heffernan turned in a strong performance, but the roasting conditions didn’t aid the Irish man, the 2013 World champion.
Ireland’s other participant, Alex Wright, withdrew after passing the 30k mark due to what was described by Athletics Ireland as ‘a stomach issue’.
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