The women’s 20 kilometre race walk course at the Pan American Games was found to be several kilometres short after a world record had been set.
The results were subsequently annulled after Peru’s world champion Kimberly Garcia won in one hour 12 minutes 26 seconds in Santiago, Chile.
Officials realised the error after Garcia obliterated the world record of 1:23.49 set by China’s Jiayu Yang.
In addition to medals, athletes also missed out on Olympic ranking points.
After the completion of the women’s event, in which Ecuador’s Glenda Morejon took silver and Peru’s Evelyn Inga bronze, officials remeasured the course – believed to be about 3km short – and corrected the mistake before the men’s 50km event.
“I have never seen anything like that before,” said Canada’s Olympic 50km bronze medallist Evan Dunfee, whose race was delayed by more than an hour.
“For some of those women looking to qualify for Paris that’s just really disappointing because it is an opportunity lost so I feel gutted for them.”
The Santiago Organising Committee said the mistake was “the exclusive responsibility of the Pan American Athletics Association”.
“We deeply regret the inconvenience for the athletes, their coaches, the public and the attending press, but this situation cannot be attributed to the organising committee,” it added.
