Athletics: Aarrett 29th in 50km walk

9.00pm

Craig Barrett couldn't improve on his efforts of four years ago as he ended more than four hours of hot toil with a 29th placing in the Olympic Games 50km walk here today.

New Zealand's only entrant in the field of 54, Barrett strode into the main Olympic Stadium to finish in a time of four hours six minutes 48 seconds.

He was 28min behind the winner, Robert Korzeniowski, of Poland, whose time of 3hr 38min 46sec was a little more than 3min off the world record held by Russian Denis Nizhegorodov, who finished second today, a tick over 4min adrift.

Having finished 18th at the Sydney Olympics in 2000, today's time was 18min outside Barrett's personal best.

The sensation of the race was the disqualification of Australian hotshot Nathan Deakes, Barrett's conqueror at the Commonwealth Games in Manchester two years ago.

Deakes was in the leading four for the first half of the contest before he was called for repeatedly lifting his feet.

- NZPA