*Letsrun debates the morality of what they have just done-- does an occasional course cutting justify ruining a person's life?
Maybe cut out your "occasional course cutting".
Also, if getting outed as a cheater in races would ruin your entire life, maybe don't put so much stake in running. It's like a snake eating its tail: the only people who would care enough to cheat in relatively casual races, are the people who care more about their image in such a toxic way that they would rather fake an accomplishment than actually achieve it. Of course this type of person bursts like a balloon when called out - there was never a real life to ruin, just a pathetic person faking race results.
Yes, agreed, should just be 'did their actions justify'
Final thought, and only somewhat related-- I am reminded of the legendary Coach Joe Vigil reckoning no one cheats in ultras, because nothing is on the line. As if ultra runners are just fundamentally better humans than the rest of mankind. Of course the truth is that as long as competition has existed, so has rule breaking.
You see the same argument here in doping threads. The idea that without financial incentive people wouldn’t dope. That is certainly not the case. It is a failure to understand human nature.
This is the same bloke who purportedly ran a 4:19 road mile at a virtual race on strava two years ago. It is no longer on strava and the race removed him from its final results but it is still on the race's instagram. The comments are ,,,,, illuminating.
After this controversy in 2020, I decided to do some digging into his races. I found a lot of suspicious stuff that shows he was probably cutting courses (not just this 50 miler) starting in 2017. I made a document summarizing my notes and thoughts. He has since deleted all of the Strava posts I reference (which is suspicious) but a lot of my points still stand.
Here is a summary:
-He consistently doesn't upload Strava races for his "incredible" results. In those posts he owuld say that his watch broke that day even though he would upload runs the day before and the day after. This happened at EVERY race
-His pacing for the Bethel Boogie 50 milers are all over the pace (up and down), which you wouldn't expect in record runs. You could chalk this up to pit stops or some segments being harder, but I think it is suspicious. Especially if you look pack at the results from 2016. In 2016, he gradually and consistently slows down like you would expect in a normal ultra
-In one of his marathons, I found that his photo was missing from the race photos during a section that could be cut
-Back when he was in Raleigh he would post daily runs from 10-30 miles all at 5:40-6:15/mi. I even remember him posting a solo run that would have broken the Masters 50k WR. This seems to indicate data manipulation.
LRC note. A visitor reporter this post as being factually incorrect. We don't know if it's true or not but will share their message, "That's absurd. I don't know about any of the other races, but the Boogie had course marshals both on the ground and on bikes and as somebody in the lead he would have been under the microscope"
Very interesting.
They are no longer on Strava, but there were also at least two odd DNFs. He DNFed the City of Oaks marathon one year after running the first half in the lead group because he claimed the shoelace on his brand new Next%s snapped. He DNFed the Jacksonville Bank marathon after a similar first half because he claimed he got hypothermia … in Florida.
The weirdest thing about these cheater threads is the users defending the accused always talk in exactly the same way and aggressively accuse any naysayers as being a specific person they have a problem with that no-one had ever heard of prior to them being brought up by the person doing the defending. It's very odd.
For 15 years now Every. Single. One. of these threads has gone the same way.
*Miraculous result posted.
*Letsrunners express their doubt
*Unflattering stories come to light from those in the know.
*Swarms of new accounts appear to support the person in question and go after anyone questioning the results.
*More iffy data comes to light. (We are here right now, with his questionable strata road mile (4:19) and track two mile (9:35), and not releasing race data).
*Race directors become aware of the accusations, runner starts getting DQ'd retroactively from races.
*Bigger media sources start covering it.
*Family/career implodes
*Those new accounts disappear, except for one or two which stick around to fight to the bitter end (which is likely a family member or the person themself).
*Letsrun debates the morality of what they have just done-- does an occasional course cutting justify ruining a person's life?
-----
I will watch from the sideline as we progress through the steps.
The extent to which the person in question get ruined largely depends on how much they fight back and are still wrong. The more they dig in the more they bury themselves.
The extent to which the person in question get ruined largely depends on how much they fight back and are still wrong. The more they dig in the more they bury themselves.
Ah, yes, good to see LRC using the age old policeman vs a driving while black argument.
For 15 years now Every. Single. One. of these threads has gone the same way.
*Miraculous result posted.
*Letsrunners express their doubt
*Unflattering stories come to light from those in the know.
*Swarms of new accounts appear to support the person in question and go after anyone questioning the results.
*More iffy data comes to light. (We are here right now, with his questionable strata road mile (4:19) and track two mile (9:35), and not releasing race data).
*Race directors become aware of the accusations, runner starts getting DQ'd retroactively from races.
*Bigger media sources start covering it.
*Family/career implodes
*Those new accounts disappear, except for one or two which stick around to fight to the bitter end (which is likely a family member or the person themself).
*Letsrun debates the morality of what they have just done-- does an occasional course cutting justify ruining a person's life?
-----
I will watch from the sideline as we progress through the steps.
I'll bet someone could do an analysis of past threads and predict how many pages to reach each of the stages.
Also, if getting outed as a cheater in races would ruin your entire life, maybe don't put so much stake in running. It's like a snake eating its tail: the only people who would care enough to cheat in relatively casual races, are the people who care more about their image in such a toxic way that they would rather fake an accomplishment than actually achieve it. Of course this type of person bursts like a balloon when called out - there was never a real life to ruin, just a pathetic person faking race results.
I mean - one of the reasons to not cheat is the fear of getting caught and being found out to be a fraud. If we're afraid to point out that someone is cheating for fear of it "ruining their life" - then the cheater might as well cheat. I haven't cheated partly because most of my friends and relationships have come from meeting people in the sport - I would lose the respect of most of the people I know if I was caught cheating (or doping) so I don't do it.
These cheater threads really are great drama. I think we all like to see a degree of comeuppance but let's just hope this one doesn't end the same way as the last one.
You mean the guy becomes a drunk and beats his wife? That only happened one time, what are the odds it happens again? I say low.
There are a lot of cheaters. Vast majority get on with their lives. The serial cheaters would make an interesting psychological study though. What’s going on and do they all have the same condition or combination of conditions? Definitely some narcissistic personality disorder in there.
Yes, agreed, should just be 'did their actions justify'
Final thought, and only somewhat related-- I am reminded of the legendary Coach Joe Vigil reckoning no one cheats in ultras, because nothing is on the line. As if ultra runners are just fundamentally better humans than the rest of mankind. Of course the truth is that as long as competition has existed, so has rule breaking.
You see the same argument here in doping threads. The idea that without financial incentive people wouldn’t dope. That is certainly not the case. It is a failure to understand human nature.
I'm sure Vigil said this well before the advent of social media. Before that, only your friends/family and maybe your co-workers would be vaguely interested in whatever weird ultra you ran, even most participants in ultras weren't there to compete against the other runners. That plus no financial incentive, people really did have minimal reason to cheat. But now, the sport has both become more popular and you can plaster your results all over the internet to thousands of eyes who know nothing about you, and 99% will take your claims at face value and give you a dopamine high by interacting with/spreading your content. So there is incentive.
It works until you go too far. In this case it took until he pushed the envelope too far and claimed an AG world record before he was called out. Based on the preponderance of evidence against this being real, I doubt the 5:16 and 5:14 results from the past couple years are legitimate either but he seemingly got away with them without issue.
These cheater threads really are great drama. I think we all like to see a degree of comeuppance but let's just hope this one doesn't end the same way as the last one.
You mean the guy becomes a drunk and beats his wife? That only happened one time, what are the odds it happens again? I say low.
There are a lot of cheaters. Vast majority get on with their lives. The serial cheaters would make an interesting psychological study though. What’s going on and do they all have the same condition or combination of conditions? Definitely some narcissistic personality disorder in there.
The last one was Frank Meza who threw himself off a bridge.
Another peculiarity - the person that finished second place overall was a lady, not a "guy". Take Ivaylo Benov out of the results and a lady wins outright.
You mean the guy becomes a drunk and beats his wife? That only happened one time, what are the odds it happens again? I say low.
There are a lot of cheaters. Vast majority get on with their lives. The serial cheaters would make an interesting psychological study though. What’s going on and do they all have the same condition or combination of conditions? Definitely some narcissistic personality disorder in there.
The last one was Frank Meza who threw himself off a bridge.
He wasn't the last person to ever cheat, or had his cheating discovered.
Pretty amazing that even in the face of photographic evidence he refused to admit it. Worse, can you imagine having a family who rather than taking him aside and saying "dad, time to let it go", giving him some actual good advice, instead they attacked people for telling the truth? I guess Lance did that too. Deny deny deny and then attack anyone who won't believe your lie. Shaggy wrote a song about guys like him.
To be a true player you have to know how to play If she stay a night, convince her stay a day Never admit to a word when she say And if she claim, ah, you tell her, "Baby, no way"
He still has not updated his Strava with a race report or gps but he has logged 10-12 mile recovery runs at 6,20 pace every day this week. That is saying something.