Athletics at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Women's 20 kilometres walk



The women's 20 kilometres walk at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, United Kingdom, was held on 11 August on a route along The Mall and Constitution Hill.

Summary
From the start of the race, defending champion Olga Kaniskina took the lead, and only Liu Hong would go with her. The two opened up a big gap with a chase pack of a Guatemalan, the other two Russians, and the other two Chinese. By the end of 8 km, the pack began to lose walkers, Mirna Ortíz and Johanna Jackson were disqualified, and Liu began to lose contact with Kaniskina, who was leading on her own. Shortly after the halfway mark, the pack was down to Elena Lashmanova and Anisya Kirdyapkina leading Xiuzhi Lu and Qieyang Shijie. An hour into the race Lu began to lose contact, allowing Lashmanova, Kirdyapkina and Qieyang to chase and pass Liu. By 14 km Kaniskina had a 33-second lead. Almost unnoticeably, the gap between Kaniskina and the chasers had come down to 24 seconds at 16 km, with Kirdyapkina and then Liu struggling to stay with the group. After another 2 km lap at 18 km, the gap was down to 17 seconds, still seemingly insurmountable with just one lap to go. With Kaniskina looking strong, the gap kept falling. Kaniskina started to show the strain, and as the pass became inevitable, she began the most pronounced arm swing trying to find a last bit of speed, but it wasn't enough. Less than 200 metres from the finish, Lashmanova went by Kaniskina and on to the gold carpet. Lashmanova finished with a 1:25:02 world record. A broken Kaniskina finished 7 seconds back, just a second slower than the previous world record. Qieyang happily finished another 7 seconds later for bronze. After the finish, Kaniskina was barely able to walk, while a fresh Lashmanova celebrated her victory.

Later, both the original top two athletes, Lashmanova and Kaniskina, and the original fifth place holder, who was also Russian, were disqualified for doping violations, and their results were annulled. After the medal reallocation, the Chinese gained a podium sweep, with the gold medal for Shenjie Qieyang, silver for Liu Hong, and bronze for Lü Xiuzhi. The medal reallocation ceremony was held at the Hangzhou Olympic Sports Centre Stadium on 4 October 2023 after all the events of the Asian Games ended on that day.

Records
, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.

The following records were established during the competition:

Elena Lashmanova's performance in the final was initially considered a world record, but was later rescinded retroactively due to a doping violation.

Schedule
All times are British Summer Time (UTC+1)

Results

 * On 24 March 2016, the Court of Arbitration for Sport has issued a decision that all competitive results obtained by Olga Kaniskina from 15 August 2009 to 15 October 2012 are disqualified for doping. The medals and places were reallocated. Anisya Kirdyapkina was also disqualified for doping.


 * On 21 March 2022, the Athletics Integrity Unit has issued a 2-year ban for Elena Lashmanova, starting from 9 March 2021, and also disqualified her results from 18 February 2012, to 3 January 2014.