On March 22, Olympian and UBC alum Evan Dunfee broke the world record in the 35 km race walk competing in Dudince, Slovakia.
“Getting a world record in any of the distances has been a dream of mine since I was a teenager,” said Dunfee in an interview with The Ubyssey. “So to finally get one, it's incredible. It's such a great feeling.”
Dunfee has been on a record setting tear — this is his third in 2025. He shattered his own Canadian 10,000 metre race walk record and the North American 20 km race walk record in January. Those races helped him work up to the 35 km race, where Dunfee held a 4 minute per km pace to place first with a time of 2:21:40 and set a new world record by 7 seconds.
“As the days have gone on, it sets in the magnitude of what I achieved and how special and how cool it is for the whole team of support around me,” said Dunfee.
Feeling great after the previous races, Dunfee decided to enter the 35 km at the Dudinska 50 competition. Upon learning he would be going up against two Olympic defending champions, he and his coach decided to focus on keeping up with his opponents and aiming for the best time he could get, rather than the world record. However, on the morning of the race, Dunfee learned the two champions were no longer racing and he decided to just commit to trying for the world record.
Dunfee had an extremely commanding start showing his skill in this race and even went on to lap his 51 competitors. The real struggle began in the last few kilometres of the race as Dunfee started to feel the record slip out of his grasp. But he held on to it and crossed the finish line, feeling relieved to have done it.
“I had to buy another gear in those final two, three kilometres, and reset, refocus and dig really, really deep to get that time down,” said Dunfee. “[I'm] really proud of myself. I was able to turn things around and get back on a solid pace.”
This world record is another amazing goal Dunfee has reached in his athletic career, alongside such achievements as winning the bronze medal in the 50 km race walk at the Tokyo 2021 Olympics. In last year’s 20 km Olympic race, he placed fifth. Dunfee’s mindset, however, does not only focus on the success of his career through medals and records, something that has made him the athlete he is today.
“One of the really special things about sport is that sport is this really safe place for you to dream big, and the consequences of ‘failure’ are pretty meaningless,” he said. “You lose a game, you lose a race, whatever it is in the grand scheme of things, it's not that big of a deal. But the skills that you develop in chasing after that dream are so valuable everywhere in life.”
Dunfee is showing no signs of slowing down, instead focusing on the next goal of continuing to “take on the world” at the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo from September 13–21.
“After the disappointment last year at the Paris Olympics, everything's on track and the big goal still remains — standing on top of the podium in September.”
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