Super Fans always argue as to what is the best performance ever in an event. Race Walking is no different than any other event in Track & Field. Two things that makes it a little harder to determine the winner of that debate. First, athletes in the event generally compete across most of the distances and they might not be equally talented from the 1500m to the 10000m. Second, how do you compare athletes of different genders and across those distances?
World Athletics uses Performance Tables to rank athletes against the World Record in their events. This (pretty) fairly allows comparisons of performances by gender and race distance to be made. The one problem is that they do not have Tables for the Mile or 1500m in the Race Walk, so those events are sadly not able to be fairly included in this article.
*Update* I’ve created tables to account for performances in the 1500m & Mile. Those scores have been added below and the list increased to be a Top 10.
What I’ve done is to use the WA Performance Tables to rank all of the US HS Race Walking Records against one another to determine the Best Performance Ever.
In reverse order, here are the top 10.
| 10 | Taylor Ewert | 2019 | 3000m | 13:28.00 | 995 |
| 9 | Tristan Ruoss | 1999 | 3000m | 12:19.57 | 1001 |
| 8 | Taylor Ewert | 2019 | Mile | 6:28.21i | 1035 |
| 7 | Tyler Sorensen | 2011 | 3000m | 12.03.2i | 1036 |
| 6 | Taylor Ewert | 2019 | 5000m | 22:28.61 | 1041 |
| 5 | Taylor Ewert | 2018 | 1500m | 6:17.30i | 1043 |
| 4 | Taylor Ewert | 2020 | 3000m | 13:00.56i | 1046 |
| 3 | Trevor Barron | 2010 | 5000m | 20:06.0 | 1052 |
| 2 | Taylor Ewert | 2018 | 10000m | 45:57.81 | 1054 |
| 1 | Tyler Sorensen | 2011 | 10000m | 41:23.14 | 1071 |
So, this does answer the question of the Best Performance ever, but it is incomplete and needs to be clarified. Taylor Ewert has largely competed by herself in races, often lapping the field even in shorter events. She also missed her entire senior outdoor season because of Covid-19. It’s reasonable that she would have had one or two performances above the #1 of Sorensen. Without it, we’ll just have to continue to debate the issue until someone else comes along and bests the best of the best.
