The bottles were lined up right next to each other, it was almost impossible NOT to knock them over.

Folks at the 30 km point, Amdouni was right there with the leaders of the race in contention for a medal. Then he started cracking and he ended up six minutes almost behind the winner, Kipchoge, which represents a loss of about 40 seconds per kilometer in the last 12 km. This would tend to indicate that he was really running in a fatigued state in which he had lost his lucidity and ability to think rationally.

Once again, I’m not excusing what he did but merely trying to show that this was not just typical of this runner.

Do you remember when he ran the world half marathon in Poland last fall,

- no incidents and absolutely exemplary behavior.

I know the haters will point out that there was suspicion about him a year or two ago with the saga about his attempt to buy EPO but nothing came of that.

It is disturbing that runners are held to so much of a higher order but time and time again in professional sports as diverse as soccer, ice hockey, basketball, rugby, and other contact sports replete with incidents of foul behavior and unsportsmanlike behavior, but the players are never called on it long term.

Ghost1 wrote:

Folks at the 30 km point, Amdouni was right there with the leaders of the race in contention for a medal. Then he started cracking and he ended up six minutes almost behind the winner, Kipchoge, which represents a loss of about 40 seconds per kilometer in the last 12 km. This would tend to indicate that he was really running in a fatigued state in which he had lost his lucidity and ability to think rationally.

Once again, I’m not excusing what he did but merely trying to show that this was not just typical of this runner.

This all seems true, and I wouldn’t argue he did it in purpose (especially after the slow motion replay showed multiple unsuccessful attempts) but the original post blamed it on the alignment of the bottles in a row creating an almost impossible situation to succeed, despite virtually everyone else doing the allegedly almost impossible with the same bottle alignments.

But I pity the guy right behind him who just kept grabbing for empty air as the bottles kept disappearing.

Poster puts up a video showing people getting a bottle successfully then this guy knocking them all over, and poster claims it's almost impossible not to knock them all over.

Must be a troll, right? His own video destroys his own claim.

hegbert4 wrote:

Poster puts up a video showing people getting a bottle successfully then this guy knocking them all over, and poster claims it's almost impossible not to knock them all over.

Must be a troll, right? His own video destroys his own claim.

Maybe you don't understand the point of the thread?

It was to show that he didn't do it deliberately as everyone believed. They were calling for him to be banned.

Also, from his position it was almost impossible.

But obviously you're just trolling.

Good post Ghost. Thank you.

I was following the Marathon thread here, but not watching live footage. Some of the runners got very distressed didn’t they? And this started happening much earlier in the race.

It took him 20 go's to successfully grab one bottle. A problem no one else had. Has his eyesight been tested? Is he a special Olympian?

so the dude knocks over a few bottles to get an advantage on the other runners? It's like going wide into lane 3 to keep someone from passing you or pushing someone from behind when they are too close to you, just competitive juices flowing. I'm gonna do the same at my next race and see what the response is, btw I get pretty tired when I run as well so....

No way is accidental

He faked it to look accidental and grabbed the last bottle like a pro magician