After his British record in Dudince, Dominic King hopes he has done enough to earn a ticket to Tokyo
Dominic King says it was his life goal to break Chris Maddocks’ long-standing British record for 50km race walk and he hopes his performance will win him a spot in the British Olympic team despite his time being outside the qualifying standard for Tokyo.
The 37-year-old from Colchester clocked 3:51:13 in the Dudince 50km in Slovakia last Saturday (March 20) to take 24 seconds off a national record that Maddocks has held since 1990. It missed the Olympic qualifying
standard of 3:50:00 but he still hopes he will get an invitation from World Athletics via its rankings system.
“I’ve done everything possible to demonstrate that I should be seriously considered to be selected,” says King, who is aiming for his third Olympics after having raced in London and Rio.
“I think it was the only GB Olympic trial to be held overseas and I won it in a new British record and took more than four-and-a-half minutes off my personal best.
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I think a lot of countries because of the pandemic will select athletes who have been invited by World Athletics (due to their position on the world rankings) and I’m very hopeful that British Athletics will take everything into consideration and be selecting athletes who are invited, particularly athletes who have broken British records and won the official trial.”
