A grand triple celebration of British race walking past and future was held at Leamington Spa on Saturday.
Eleven British championship medallists plus 1980 Olympic 20km champion Maurizio Damilano of Italy were on hand to launch a fundraising campaign in support of the UK Athletics bid to host the EAA 2007 European Cup of Race Walking.
A proposal has been put forward to the European Athletics Association (EAA) for what it hoped will be the focus of the centenary celebrations of the Race Walking Association, which was started to formalize the rules of the event prior to the 1908 London Olympics.
Naturally for such gathering of greats including Tokyo 20km gold medallist Ken Matthews and silver medal winner in the 50km in the same games Paul Nihill and European, Commonwealth and IAAF World Cup medallists the night was a rare opportunity to reminisce on the 'golden age' for British race walking, but also to help inspire the younger talent of the event to follow their illustrious footsteps.
The result of all the schmoozing won't be known until October next year - but European Athletics Association delegates from Spain, Russia plus Maurizio Damilano expressed their support for British race walking.
"This bid provides the opportunity and momentum to stimulate and motivate British race walking. It is my wish that as soon as possible Britain will again have top level race walkers", said the Maurizio in his speech.
Earlier on, he outlined the type of training our athletes need to follow to get the top, based on the model followed by Italians such as the current Olympic 20km champ Ivano Brugnetti.
Bid Committee member Ian Richards call for all 160 present at the dinner to be "Ambassadors for the bid" - and had T-shirts advertising 'Leamington 2007' on sale...
8:20:01 PM 
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