When runners Cheat.... (Read 398 times)

I would assume these people don't limit their bullshittery to racing alone and those close to them already know exactly who they are.

I don't understand why people cheat, I'm the opposite, I would get disappointed if I PR'ed on a course that shows up short on the gps 

I think part of the temptation is that it's just so easy to cheat. My last marathon is pretty much based on an honor system, it has only 1 timing mat. The electronics wasn't fool-proof either, it failed to register and showed me as DNF when I checked with the timing guys right after the race. They asked me for my time on my watch, and somehow magically my finish time showed up on their print-outs a short while later (I did have several runners vouching for me about when I finished).

In another occasion, I cut a 5k race short due to poorly marked course, told the organizers about it, and their reaction was basically "nah, don't worry about it". They even marked the 1st place time as a course record (that kid ran in front of me and we both got lost and cut the course short).

I suppose most people don't really care unless you're winning something big or breaking world records...

here's a New Yorker story on a famous notorious marathon cheater, Kip Litton from Michigan:

 

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/08/06/marathon-man

 

Wow. That is a fascinating and bizarre story, I've never heard of it. Took up my whole lunchtime to read it, but worth it.

here's a New Yorker story on a famous notorious marathon cheater, Kip Litton from Michigan:

 

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/08/06/marathon-man

 

I see it happening all the time, but on a relatively small scale.  People cut the course to BQ.  Or they run with someone else's bib.  Or they take subway to the finish line to pose for pictures with their loved one, who did run the whole race (recent NYC Marathon example).

 

It's hard to say what motivates cheaters, but I think it's the desire for praise and appreciation, which is no different in running than in other pursuits.

I learned recently that the team cheated out of the win in the Detroit Marathon example mentioned in that article were a group of friends of mine running for my former racing team.  I did not learn about this until a few weeks ago.  Funny how he claims that he made a wrong turn...but it took them filing a formal complaint to get his team removed.  Seems if it was an honest mistake, an honest person would have removed themselves.

In that particular case the ones I feel really bad for were the other members of his relay team.  As I know from communications that he was recruiting fast runners for the early legs of his relay team, they got suckered into this cheating without knowing what he had planned for himself on the anchor leg.

It's cheating if the bib owner could later point to that result and claim it as theirs.

Quote from Toronto on 11/12/2014 at 12:07 PM:

Or they run with someone else's bib.

 

Not sure I equate this with cheating unless you take some hardware that belongs to others. More of a safety issue

It's cheating if the bib owner could later point to that result and claim it as theirs.

 

Quote from Toronto on 11/12/2014 at 12:07 PM:

 

Not sure I equate this with cheating unless you take some hardware that belongs to others. More of a safety issue

Ah the designated runner syndrome and a conspiracy starts.

A couple years at the University of Okoboji Marathon there was cheater.  The course is short out and back followed by a circle around  Lake Okoboji.  There was a woman who I passed as I was coming back on the out and back at about mile 3 .  Nobody passed me during the race and then I was quite surprised when I passed her again at mile 22 or 23.  I thought it was weird but didn't think much about  it.  However at the finish one of the guys who finished behind me mentioned that he passed her late in the race and she never passed him either.  He was pretty mad and went to the race director to complain about her.  The director then asked me about her and asked several others who passed her late in the race, and we all told him that we were ahead of her early in the race and she never passed us.  He checked the mid course chip times and she was missing at them.

She was the first woman to cross the finish line and I saw her with her family before the award ceremony. I  asked her what her daughter thought of how she got the finisher's medal.  She gave me a strange look but didn't say anything.  However when they announced the winner for the women's race she started to head to get the award until she heard someone else's name as the winner.  She got a real mad look on her face, gave me a nasty stare and her family left angrily.  I thought it kind of funny; she got what she deserved. It wasn't me who brought her to the attention of the race director but I am glad the other guy did, and I probably will if I see something similar in the future.