UKC

I've been listening to this guy's podcast:

https://www.marathoninvestigation.com/

I don't know what's more surprising: That people cheat like this, or the lengths people will go to to expose them.

The double edged sword of this sort of thing was illustrated by this case:  https://www.marathoninvestigation.com/2018/07/disqualified-triathlete-anita...  where it turned out the extremely aggressive on line defence that sort of led to the whole debacle for this lady, was probably her boyfriend using her log in - as, if you can be bothered, you can listen to in this totally bizarre pod cast:  https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/disqualified-triathlete-anita-carcone...

That female triathlete clearly has issues. However, there's something unwholesome about the approach of the chap running the website. I can sort understand someone monitoring cheating in sport and alerting race organisers when there's evidence but he goes way beyond that.

I'm sure cheating and doping are more widespread in amateur sport than anybody realises. The triathlete certainly commits the written equivalent of a bad-tempered flounce.

I disagree. if people cheat and lie they deserve all they get.

more than that, there now seems to be a proliferation of narcissistic people who devote most of their time pointing out how great they are and what hurdles they have had to overcome - but are still better than everyone else. whatever happened to humility and understatement? Let other people point out your achievements - if indeed they are worthy of pointing out. live by the sword, die by the sword. this lady went to lengths to point out how brilliant she thinks she is and so should suffer the consequences when it is pointed out that she is not quite so brilliant

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7215525/Dr-Frank-Meza-ran-LA-Marat...

Assuming that it's suicide, the whole thing is rather sad and tragic

I read a piece a couple of months ago about doping in amateur cycling.  A quick google search throws up plenty of articles, e.g.

https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/latest-news/one-20-amateur-racers-admit-...

http://www.stickybottle.com/latest-news/vuelta-miami-masters-cyclists-dopin...

https://www.cyclist.co.uk/news/2541/why-are-amateur-cyclists-taking-perform...

And it seems the classic 40-something MAMILs are the worst offenders. Perhaps they can't bear spending all that money of bikes, and all that time out of the road, and then not win. Or perhaps they're just arrogant middle-aged blokes who need to win at everything! But, as you say, I'm sure its fairly widespread across many amateur sports, partly due to the easier availability of the drugs via the net, and the perception that there's little chance of being caught

The problem with the internet is the holier than thou brigade with ‘expert’ opinions on everything. It means that a fairly innocuous cheating incident turns into full scale pillorying online. It’s not just in sport, witness it here in a lot of threads from politics to road users.

Cheating in sport is nothing new. I’m not sure what he hopes to achieve. The only way to remove cheating is to change our perspective that we use sport to determine the best person. In reality the best person is going to be genetically predisposed and never be caught by mortals. 

How much do athletes benefit by cheating? Okay the extreme example is Lance who became a multi-millionaire but what about the young aspiring pro who cheats successfully and briefly prospers? They will have a short shelf life and plenty have demonstrated their inability to turn short-term wealth into a reliable source of retirement income.  

it's not just about the person who wins the race though. I do a lot of fell races. very much middle of the pack so am never going to win, but I train very hard and judge my achievement based on how I compare to other runners who compete in a lot of the same races - have I inched closer to them. I admire people of comparable age to me who are better than me because I assume that they have put in a lot of hard work. they may also have better genetics etc than me, but that alone will do nothing if they do not train.

so if we just accept that some people will cheat, then that entirely undermines the whole ethos. running is or should be  a sport that rewards hard work. I do accept that no-one outside of these races cares at all, but I do not think we should turn a blind eye to it or simply accept that some people cheat

I don’t think it “entirely undermines the ethos” and I’m not saying accept people cheat. 

There’s a finite amount of money in the system, you have to determine whether proportioning some towards proving people are cheating is a good use of resources?

The fallout is bad enough when I DQ someone from one of my races for wearing ‘headphones’.

The plot thickens... https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-48885416

Edit: Ah I see already posted. Thought it was new

It's good that there are a few people crazy enough to spend time catching marathon cheats.

There's too many posers that want to put a marathon as a tick-box on their CV but aren't willing to do the work to actually run one and the only deterrent is if a few get caught and humiliated. 

I think it’s good they catch them

but many obviously have issues, some do it for greed, others ego. Some mental health.

this guy had quite a reputation. There’s been the LEJoG cheats too, rob young in the states.

sadly though this has always happened but with social media these guys now get fame, so when exposed are boxed in.

If only we could return to these Halcyon days....

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-1904-olympic-marathon-may-have-b...

Think this can be safely filed in the "You couldn't make it up" section

Im a regular runner and could probably knock out a 20 mile run at a hard push with my current fitness. Does cheating mean that I could do a marathon or just make my 20 miler a bit quicker. 

I have asked my cycling buddy who is a physician if he could get me some EPO from the hospital pharmacy (it's a JOKE, okay?) but of course it's not that simple. There was an article floating around a couple of years ago by an amateur athlete in the USA who decided to take EPO and went to see a doctor about it, explaining that it was for interest only. The Dr agreed and the article is mostly about the preparations they had to make for the EPO - you don't just inject the stuff, you have to go through a carefully managed programme of other drugs and training in order to prepare the body. It was fascinating and in the end when the writer began beating his buddies, who began asking awkward questions, he stopped.