Nick Christie, Miranda Melville of San Diego Await Fate on Paris Walk Relay

When El Cajon native Nick Christie took first in Saturday’s 20-kilometer race walk at the Olympic Trials, he knew he wasn’t going to the Paris Games in that event.

Neither did Chula Vista’s Miranda Melville, runner-up to Robyn Stevens in that 12.4-mile race in Springfield, Oregon.

Their best marks this year — both set on the loop course in downtown Springfield — are 1 hour, 24 minutes, 46 seconds, and 1:39:38, well off the Olympic qualifying standards of 1:20:10 (men) and 1:29:20 (women).

But Christie, 32, and Melville, 35, together still hold out hope they’ll be the first Team USA contingent in the inaugural marathon mixed race walking relay Aug. 7 in Paris.

World Athletics, track’s governing body, capped the field for the man-and-woman relay at 25 teams.

The Christie-Melville duo set the American record at a Santee race in January. They’re currently the 30th-ranked team in the world.

Michael Roth, a race walk expert and coach, says Team USA was short of being included in the field before a race in Ireland last week.

“The top four teams there were faster than the U.S., with Czechia getting an auto spot,” he said Saturday. “[The Americans are] now the No. 5 team on the outside looking in.”

Roth says five teams would need to decline a spot for the American pair to get in.

“Doubtful at best,” he added, “but five nations have two teams going so a few of them might drop out for various reasons.”

The mixed relay race walk, replacing the men’s and women’s 50K walks, will take place at the foot of the Eiffel Tower.

If they make the field, former Grossmont High School pole vaulter Christie would start the relay off with a 12.2K walk, followed by Melville’s 10K. Then Christie and Melville end with 10Ks each.

In rainy weather last January, Christie and Melville combined for a time of 3:13:27, more than 13 minutes ahead of runner-ups Emmanuel Corvera and Celina Lepe.

Tracy Sundlun, organizer of the Santee event, also helped put on the Olympic Trials race walk Saturday morning. He agrees that the chances of Christie-Melville competing in France are “very slim.”

“They are currently #30 on the Road to Paris, with 25 going,” he confirmed. “We will know soon, though!”

July 7 is the date set for World Athletics to announce the teams accepted for Paris.

USATF spokeswoman Natalie Uhl said: “We do not have a race walk relay team qualified at this time. The full roster will be announced the second week of July.”

Race walk historian and official Elliott Denman watched the Olympic Trials 20K races from his home in West Long Branch, New Jersey.

Denman, who took 11th in the 1956 Melbourne Games 50K walk, told me: “The 20K this morning was terrific event, well done and supported, great organizing job by Tracy Sunlund & Committee, and well supported by town of Springfield.”

He said it made for excellent TV on NBC/Peacock.

“Tom Feuer did great job as commentator — had all his facts, etc., lined up. So I watched every step of it.”

(He also witnessed 58-year-old three-time Olympian Michelle Rohl take third in the 17-entrant women’s race in 1:42:27. — two minutes off the 55-59 age group world record of 1:40:42 by Australia’s Lynette Ventris in 2012. Two-time Olympian Allen James, 60, took 14th in the men’s walk in 1:43:26.)

But Denman said that barring “some amazing late good luck,” this may be first Olympics since 1904 without a Team USA racewalker.