The Spanish duo of Martin Alvaro and Maria Perez won the race walk mixed relay with a time of 2:50.31 in the first iteration of the event on the Olympic stage.
Ecuador's team of Brian Pintado and Glenda Morejon earned silver with a time of 2:51.22 and Australia's Rhydian Cowley and Jemima Montag claimed bronze, crossing the line in 2:51.38.
Twenty-five teams competed in the race and each team was made up of one male and one female athlete who completed the marathon distance in four stages of approximately 10km each, alternating throughout the race (man, woman, man, woman).
About 2.5km into the race, Evan Dunfee of Canada and Kawano Masator of Japan surged to a four-second lead over the pack.
But by the first exchange, the Ecuadorian team of Morejon and Pintado (who won gold in the men's 20km race walk earlier at these Games) took the lead.
A group of heavy hitters began to take shape at the front of the pack that included the women's 20km race walk Paris Olympic champion Yang Jiayu of China and the 2023 world champion Perez, who finished right behind Yang in the women's race earlier this week.
During the next exchange, Martin and Pintado began to separate themselves from the pack. China's Zhang Jun received a time penalty for not keeping contact with the ground that all but eliminated the team from medal contention.
By the final 10k of the race, Spain and Ecuador remained the top contenders as Perez and Morejon maintained the lead. But Morejon was on two red cards, putting her on thin ice because one more red card would have resulted in a time penalty that would essentially ruin Ecuador's chances at winning gold. Morejon was faced with the difficult task of balancing speed with efficiency. She executed perfectly to keep Ecuador within medal contention.
Spain became the only country to win a medal in each of the three race walk events in Paris as Perez won silver in the women’s 20km race walk and Martin won bronze in the men’s event. All three of Spain’s track and field medals in Paris have come in the race walk.
Ecuador has won two track and field medals in Paris, including Pintado’s victory earlier this week. He is the first Ecuadorian athlete to win more than one medal at a single Olympics.
Montag won bronze in the women's race earlier this week and now has two Olympic medals.
No Americans competed in this event.