Rojo says he might start a Kip Litton thread but only 1 and only 1 thread

@ActuallyThisIsTheWayItIs

Sorry, you can't simply say that you have no interest in the running related claims, this is a running forum and some of us have kept our observations to the realm of the allegations about cheating during races and the motivations behind this.

As I have said repeatedly, in life I have found that the apologists for behaviour such as these allegations are worse than the perpetrator.

If he is so great, then why does he have this huge character flaw that makes him cheat in races? Or make up results for races that didn't actually happen? Kip ain't right.

Regards,

What would Khalid Sheik Mohammed do

You've convinced me. Kip isn't a cheat after all. He is just generous to a fault to himself with his finishing times.

I don't know the guy, nor do I care to. But, for the record, the trashing posts have not "gone unchecked." I'm one of several posters to this thread who have contacted the moderators of this forum any time posts have strayed away from his running...um...exploits and into his personal and professional life. We have done our best to ensure that this thread remains a discussion of his running results and the means by which he achieved them.

ActuallyThisIsTheWayItIs wrote:

Since the trashing posts have gone unchecked, readers have only opinions from people who have never met Kip upon which to form their own opinion.

I have no reason to doubt you, although you provide no tangible evidence to back up your assertions. Tangible evidence of his cheating in races has been provided here and elsewhere. So, I can believe that outside of his running he's the fine human being you describe but I know he has cheated in races and on a running site that's what matters.

@ActuallyThisIsTheWayItIs

Here is a race director of the Delaware Marathon factually stating what happened in just one case, no character assassination from her or me. This on its own would require the person involved to put their hand up and come clean but this is just one instance. In sport, we expect fair play, that's not libel or attacking anyone's character, its just fact.

http://races2run.blogspot.com/2010/08/world-record-runkip-litton.html

The dog ate my D-tag.

"Since the trashing posts have gone unchecked"....which posts?

I suspect many of Kip's friends who defend him don't know much about running, so they can't understand from looking at this forum, other running forums, or the kiplitton blog why the evidence in many of the races amounts to cheating. They instead think we're a bunch of running enthusiast psychos who just decided to blindly attack this guy.

Kip might be a good guy outside of running but the evidence with the outfit changes, photos and lack of splits is amazing. That's not to say Kip isn't the only one. As Ouch1000 pointed out this is probably a lot more common in races than people think. In 2005 the Marine Corp Marathon there was a group called Jane's Marines who cheated. In 2001 there was a guy named Martin Franklin who cheated, whom LR posted an brief article about (http://www.letsrun.com/2001/franklincheat.html)

But to the people HERE who are serious runners themselves and are willing to look at the math (his splits, pace changes, the lack of photos at checkpoints, the outfit changes) we believe it's very obvious what's going on.

To people who merely know him from church, business, or some other bull___, they may continue to believe he couldn't have possibly have cheated in a race and they are ignorant blind to the numbers. I know if there were a KL-like site of a bikeracer cheating, I wouldn't understand i because I dont understand biking very well. But posters to letsrun know running.

categorically wrote:

Does anyone know why?

I think the why is pretty easy to understand, once you have seen these types of people before. First of all, they are sociopaths in the truest definition. The reason why they do it is for the notoriety. Now, you may say there is little notoriety in being an amateur age group competitor, but nevertheless he still had a following of admirers. In his circle of friends (as evidenced on facebook) he was known as the fast guy, and that stroke to his ego was enough to make him keep doing it. He simply loved the attention that came with winning a $50 prize and then seeing all of the "way to go" responses on facebook.

Usually people with this character flaw are braggers and boasters all around.

I knew another serial race cheater who always had some tale to tell, whether it was jumping out of airplanes in covert missions in Rwanda, to finding the next cure for cancer.

ouch1000 wrote:

Surely someone monitoring this thread knows someone who has the ear of a BAA official. The second (much more difficult, if not impossible) is to locate him at the start or one of the early chip mats and follow him.

Try contacting Barbara Sicuso, who works as registration director at BAA up on Ash Street in Hopkinton. Tell her about the discrepancy of Thunder Road for Kip Litton.

Email:

. phone: (508) 435-6905

Toward what end with the BAA? Plenty of people run much slower at Boston than in their qualifying time. If Kip slogs to an honest 3:30, it wouldn't raise any eyebrows.

lrcrealist wrote:

Toward what end with the BAA? Plenty of people run much slower at Boston than in their qualifying time. If Kip slogs to an honest 3:30, it wouldn't raise any eyebrows.

That his race time used for qualifying is "suspect", as are his past finishes at BAA events. People have been banned for life from BAA events for taking shortcuts.

Besides Rosie Ruiz, there was John and Suzanne Murphy, a couple from California banned after the 1997 Boston marathon after shortcutting the course en route to age group wins.

The suggestion for the BAA contact was to try getting Kip removed from the official entrant list.

To for what it matters posting above: I would strongly recommend contacting the BAA official you listed above directly and simply posting that you were doing so, rather than listing someone's work e-mail and phone on this thread.

for what it matters wrote:

That his race time used for qualifying is "suspect", as are his past finishes at BAA events. People have been banned for life from BAA events for taking shortcuts.

Besides Rosie Ruiz, there was John and Suzanne Murphy, a couple from California banned after the 1997 Boston marathon after shortcutting the course en route to age group wins.

http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/1997-05-16/news/9705150534_1_local-runners-boston-marathon-cheating

hard to believe a 64 yr old in that article could pull off a 2:43 wow

Dear Actuallythewayitis,

Thank you for posting. I'm sure you have waited a long time. But just think of how long EVERYONE reading these posts - and everyone that researched all the cheating - has waited. And we are STILL waiting. WE are waiting for the day that Kip Litton himself comes here, or anywhere, and responds to all the allegations against him. He has had plenty of chances.

Why come on here and tell us how great Kip is when he refuses to face those in this community he associates so well with? After all, is there anything he attaches himself to MORE than running? Well, maybe now that he has been busted, he is clinging onto something else but before that? Please tell me what the FIRST thing was that he spoke about. Yes, running. So, save your diatribe for his 'friends' who know him so well. In my mind, his character flaw is too great to pass over with your magic wand.

Since you know him so well, please ask him to set the record straight. He clearly knows this message board is trampling his reputation. Please have him tell you in private what his excuses are. That would be a first step. You don't even have to share them. But if you came on here and wrote that you discussed this and got an answer to it, at least the respectable runners here would know that Kip is acknowledging his issues.

Try contacting Barbara Sicuso, who works as registration director at BAA up on Ash Street in Hopkinton. Tell her about the discrepancy of Thunder Road for Kip Litton.

Email:

bsicuso@baa.org

. phone: (508) 435-6905

That email address bounces.

It says at baa.org on contact page:

http://www.baa.org/utilities/contact-us.aspx

"For inquiries regarding registration or the status of your entry, please e-mail

registration@baa.org

.

All other inquiries regarding Boston Athletic Association events, including the B.A.A. Boston Marathon, may be e-mailed to

info@baa.org

. All e-mail will be read, and we will do our best to respond if necessary." -

http://www.baa.org/utilities/contact-us.aspx

im not sure if that's the best route though

Another note to Dearactuallythewayitis:

The very best way that Kip Litton could set the record straight is to talk with the writer of the article that will be coming out about him. Litton has the contact information for him. Given the current state of affairs, with his credibility as a runner on the line, he has nothing to lose and everything to gain by presenting explanations of his performances and behavior in person to the author. Doing it here in this forum will not really work, in my opinion, nor will lame defenses of his actions and distractions from the central fact of his cheating by his friends.

Just think of the good that could come out of this if Litton were to come clean (are you reading this, Kip?). If he were to reveal how he traveled around at Boston, Missoula or Vermont City while still hitting the mats, race directors could use that information to safeguard the integrity of future races. I see a nice rehabilitation possibility for Litton - kind of like Leonardo diCaprio's character (Frank Abagnale, Jr.) in Catch Me If You Can - if he were to reject his past and use his cunning to help nab cheaters. Perhaps there might even be some forgiveness...

Having said that, it makes me furious that he has cheated in his races and cheapened our sport. I support the right of all of those in the LR running community to dispute his performances, call for his disqualification and ban him from future races.

As a scientist, my approach to this issue is empirical; I and many other LR detectives made a wide range of connected observations that are not in dispute, and we looked for all possible explanations. The probability that he didn't show up in any mid-race photographs in any of his 2010 marathons by some accident is infinitessimal. The fact that he totally invented at least three races, lied about them in correspondence with ScottH and me and then admitted the fabrication is an established fact - we have the e-mails. The circumstantial evidence (see page 19 on this thread for some eye-popping examples) is outrageously stout. Taken together, all of the empirical observations leave no doubt about Kip Litton's dishonesty.

Unless he owns up to what he's done, the running community has every right to throw him under the bus over and over and over again.

Kevin52 wrote:

Try contacting Barbara Sicuso, who works as registration director at BAA up on Ash Street in Hopkinton. Tell her about the discrepancy of Thunder Road for Kip Litton.

Email:

bsicuso@baa.org

. phone: (508) 435-6905

That email address bounces.

Sorry, I mistyped. The correct address is:

I checked that in my inbox just now to be sure.