The 1991

IAAF World Women's Road Race Championships The IAAF World Women's Road Race Championships was an annual international athletics championship in road running organised by the International Association of Athletics Federations (then known as the International Amateur Athletics Federation). It ...

was the ninth and final edition of the annual international

road running Road running is the sport of running on a measured course over an established road. This differs from track and field on a regular track and cross country running over natural terrain. These events are usually classified as long-distance ac ...

competition organised by the

International Amateur Athletics Federation World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation (from 1912 to 2001) and International Association of Athletics Federations (from 2001 to 2019, both abbreviated as the IAAF) is the international governing body for ...

(IAAF). The competition was hosted by the Netherlands on 13 October 1991 in

Nieuwegein Nieuwegein () is a municipality and city in the Netherlands, Dutch province of Utrecht (province), Utrecht. It is bordered on the north by the city of Utrecht (city), Utrecht, the provincial capital. It is separated from Vianen to the south by the ...

and featured one race only: a 15K run for women. There were individual and team awards available, with the national team rankings being decided by the combined finishing positions of a team's top three runners. Countries with fewer than three finishers were not ranked. Romania's

Iulia Olteanu Iulia Olteanu (née Negură; born 26 January 1967) is a Romanian former long-distance runner who competed in cross country, track and road running events. She made her breakthrough on the international scene with consecutive wins at th ...

defended her title from the 1990 race with a winning time of 48:42 minutes. In the tightest ever finish seen in the competition's history, four women finished within the space of three seconds. Andrea Wallace of Great Britain took the runner-up spot while Germany's

Uta Pippig Uta Pippig (born 7 September 1965) is a retired German long-distance runner, and the first woman to officially win the Boston Marathon three consecutive times (1994–1996). She also won the Berlin Marathon three times (1990, 1992 and 1995); the 1 ...

edged out Soviet athlete Nadezhda Ilyina for third place by a fraction of a second. Pippig led Germany to its first team title at the competition with the former East German being backed up by former West German teammates Kerstin Pressler and Iris Biba. The Romanian women, headed by Olteanu, were two points adrift in second, with Georgeta State in seventh and

Nuța Olaru Nuța Olaru (born August 28, 1970 in Orodel, Orodel, Dolj) is a female long-distance runner originally from Romania, who became a naturalized United States citizen in November 2012. She specializes in the marathon race. She set her personal best ( ...

in 16th place. In third, the Soviet Union took a sixth consecutive team medal (having reached the podium on every occasion it entered a team) through the performances of Ilyina, Marina Rodchenkova and Yelena Zhupiyeva.1991 IAAF World Women's Road Race Championships

Association of Road Racing Statisticians The Association of Road Racing Statisticians is an independent, non-profit organization that collects, analyzes, and publishes statistics regarding road running races. The primary purpose of the ARRS is to maintain a valid list of world road record ...

. Retrieved 2018-02-11. The ending of this championships series coincided with the IAAF launching the

1992 IAAF World Half Marathon Championships The 1st IAAF World Half Marathon Championships was held on September 19 and 20, 2001 in Tyneside, United Kingdom, UK, and was run simultaneously with that year's Great North Run. A total of 204 athletes, 96 men, 84 women and 24 juniors, from 36 cou ...

a year later, thus a women's road world championship remained in the form of the

half marathon A half marathon is a road running event of —half the distance of a marathon. It is common for a half marathon event to be held concurrently with a marathon or a 5K race, using almost the same course with a late start, an early finish or shortcu ...

distance.

Results

Individual

Team

References

{{IAAF Championships

1991 File:1991 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Boris Yeltsin, elected as Russia's first president, waves the new flag of Russia after the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, orchestrated by Soviet hardliners; Mount Pinatubo erupts in the Phil ...

International athletics competitions hosted by the Netherlands Sports competitions in Utrecht (province) Sport in Nieuwegein