Did Mike Rossi (viral marathon dad) cheat his way into Boston?

rojo wrote:

hart crane wrote:

We should make Mike Rossi an offer. If he apologizes, we offer to coach him once he gets healthy from his butt pain or whatever he has now.

I think Rojo and the other great coaching minds here can bring him down to 3:20 or whatever he needs to actually qualify for Boston. I don't think he should run Boston again, obviously, as he already got to enjoy that experience.

It would be cathartic for all involved and would be a good ending to a really bizarre story.

Can I dope him?

I keep saying I'm going to write my story. And I will do it tomorrow.

In it, I think I'll offer a gurantee he'll never break 3:20. Of course, then I got worried and thought, "What if he gets on EPO and steroids and bumps his mileage from 20 to 100 mpw."

Sorry Rojo, but I think that's a risky bet.

Ignoring the fact that you can take a significant chunk of time off at those sorts of levels, this guy has some things going for him:

1) He's only averaged like 15mpw. On his blog he said something about 1,000 miles in a little over a year. A big jump in mileage and better training can do some damage

2) Weight. This one is way more significant, this guy can easily stand to lose 20-30lbs just looking at his pictures. That gets him at least 20 mins, which has him right down there at the 3:20 low range and approaching or betting 20 for 5k.

Couple points (sorry if they have been touched on before but i can't keep up with close to 2000 replies:

In his finisher pics at Lehigh Valley Marathon his hat is completely drenched in water, even the brim, as you can see some shine from the reflection in the sun and the entire front of his shirt and shorts are wet. For some reason it doesn't look like a normal sweat pattern to me. Looks like he poured water over himself to look like sweat.

Check out the race photos for bib #2544. Some kid in basketball shoes, cargo shorts and a hat is finishing with a guy at 3:27:11. Maybe it's that runner's kid and he's obviously not in the results, but it looks pretty easy for someone to jump in and cross the finish line.

http://www.racephotonetwork.com/QPPlus/SearchBibNumber.aspx?EventID=1557975&_AccountNumber=2770

GregTR wrote:

Just because I feel compassion for him on a human level doesn't mean I don't think he should be punished for this. Quite the contrary. But on some level I can almost feel his pain. Maybe it's for naught as he might not even feel such pain. I don't know.

Now I'm confused.

You want him dq'ed like he should be, but that's not a punishment?

You feel his pain? What pain? He's still denying. How about the "pain" he caused at his kid's school? Was he hurt then too?

There is no defending this guy's nonsense.

Just so it's clear the right thing for this guy to do is to admit, apologize, volunteer at his kid's school for 250 hours for being a d!ck. The dq's should follow any way he chooses to handle himself. Thread would be done shortly thereafter.

Would you feel his pain if he stole a hypothtical podium from you with his cheating?

pop_pop! wrote:Now I'm confused.

You want him dq'ed like he should be, but that's not a punishment?

You feel his pain? What pain? He's still denying. How about the "pain" he caused at his kid's school? Was he hurt then too?

There is no defending this guy's nonsense.

Just so it's clear the right thing for this guy to do is to admit, apologize, volunteer at his kid's school for 250 hours for being a d!ck. The dq's should follow any way he chooses to handle himself. Thread would be done shortly thereafter.

Would you feel his pain if he stole a hypothtical podium from you with his cheating?

I think you have a comprehension problem with double negatives. I wrote: "Just because I feel compassion for him on a human level doesn't mean I don't think he should be punished for this." I could have written "Just because I feel compassion for him on a human level doesn't mean I think he shouldn't be punished for this" ie. I can feel compassion for him and I can also feel like he should be punished at the same time, which is precisely the opinion I'm on.

I never defended his actions. Trying to rationalize it by using his state of mind as the standard is not a defense, it's an explanation. Again, I'm not him, we're not him, it's impossible to understand the rationalization that went through his mind to come to the conclusion that cheating his way into Boston was somehow OK. It's the same thing with people who commit suicides or mass killings. We can't understand their actions because we're not suicidal nor mass murderers. But I have lost two friends to suicide and while a lot of people called it a selfish act, because it looks selfish to every outsider, to my friends it was probably the most selfless act they could think of because they felt that was the only solution to their problems that dragged down their entire families along with them. Again, none of us are in the same state of mind as Mike Rossi and that is a good thing! But this is why I said that on some level I feel his pain even if that pain is not apparent to you or maybe not even apparent to him.

We all agree on what the right thing at this point would be for him. I was just stating that looking at his track record (no pun) it is highly unlikely that he would choose that path. It took Lance Armstrong years and extreme pressure to succumb to the mounting evidence and admit that he was a cheat. Armstrong and Rossi are not unlike in that aspect. And Rossi has far less riding on this that Armstrong did and the pressure he's under is far less than Armstrong's. But then again, what do I know? I'm not a psychologist.

No, but you do appear to be an adult. As such, you should recognize that many folks on here lack the maturity and human perspective that you are bringing to the table.

You know, the "NO WE CAN'T FEEL COMPASSION FOR THE GUY BECAUSE HE IS A PRICK AND SHOULD BE PUNISHED. WHAT PART OF THAT DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND. YOU CAN'T HAVE IT BOTH WAYS..." crowd.

Like I said, you appear to be an adult. Many cannot handle an adult perspective.

Let's not forget that Rossi is a public figure- FM radio deejay in Philly, former TV host of Dancin On Air, and an attention whore. So none of this "I feel sorry for this guy...". Rossi loves the spotlight.

This guy definitely doesn't have the work ethic to train a significant amount, period. Not somebody any coach should ever want to take on

If somebody really wants to create a shitstorm, contact the Howard Stern show. He is relentless whenever a radio deejay does something way out of bounds. I can see Robin Quivers now, talking this up in her news segment.

Not cool. Leave the kids out of it.

hart crane wrote:

We should make Mike Rossi an offer. If he apologizes, we offer to coach him once he gets healthy from his butt pain or whatever he has now.

I think Rojo and the other great coaching minds here can bring him down to 3:20 or whatever he needs to actually qualify for Boston. I don't think he should run Boston again, obviously, as he already got to enjoy that experience.

It would be cathartic for all involved and would be a good ending to a really bizarre story.

If he only needs to run 3:25 that is in the realm of possibility for him right? His best marks come out to 3:28-3:30 right?

Rojo please do not say you know he can't run under 3:20. The guy has been running a couple of years. With some proper training I'd like to think he might be able to knock off 10 minutes.

***

Forget about Rossi. Are all of those people running 3:11, really running 3:11 or are some of them in the half? I can't believe how slow 3:11 looks. I ran just under 3:00 last year and can't believe that is how slow I was going..

Simple, just don't read this thread then. There are hundreds of other topics for to choose from. Good luck on your next sub 14 5K;)

Who's torching whom? wrote:

What is your point? Do you have another page confirming the proper use of contractions?

Is that something people who don't have a life get or do?

wejo wrote:

If he only needs to run 3:25 that is in the realm of possibility for him right? His best marks come out to 3:28-3:30 right?

Rojo please do not say you know he can't run under 3:20. The guy has been running a couple of years. With some proper training I'd like to think he might be able to knock off 10 minutes.

Mike reckons his best mark is 3:11 so make that the mark.

I think because so many of you are faster runners, you may not realize that Rossi trained hard to get his undisputed 3:43 marathon. Remember his 22 min 5K and 1:40 half predict a 3:33 - 3:40ish time given optimal training. That's probably why he believed that cheating was the only way to get into The Marathon he told all his friends and family he was going to do.

What's sad is that given professional training and/or more patience (and a new BQ standard at 50) Rossi might have qualified honestly in a couple years. Guess some people want their gratification now.

Most likely Rossi's getting in did not affect one single person not getting in.I don't know what the cutoff was this year, but let's say it was 2:00 under BQ. With Rossi out, it's not like they would let one person in with a time of 1:59 under the BQ in, especially since there were probably dozens with a -1:59.I'm sure what the BAA does is have a target number of entries they want to accept. Let's say 25,000. If they have 25,015 with a BQ of -2:00, they will let all BQ -2:00 in, not just a fraction.Of course, there are probably more than enough people who cheated to get into Boston to affect the -1:59 group.

NowFindJimmyHoffa wrote:

iiagdtr wrote:

I doubt they'd provide a name but what a great idea.

Totally agree. The publicity will die down inside of 2 weeks. The forumites will move on to other stuff. And that other guy still didn't get to run.

[quote=GregTR]We all agree on what the right thing at this point would be for him. I was just stating that looking at his track record (no pun) it is highly unlikely that he would choose that path. It took Lance Armstrong years and extreme pressure to succumb to the mounting evidence and admit that he was a cheat. Armstrong and Rossi are not unlike in that aspect. And Rossi has far less riding on this that Armstrong did and the pressure he's under is far less than Armstrong's. But then again, what do I know? I'm not a psychologist.[/quote]

Don't try to compare this tool to Lance Armstrong. Sure Lance is a jerk but Pro cycling is a sport where doping is a way of life and has been for a hundred years. Every single rider who stood on the podium with Lance was also doping. Every one. There is a twenty year period in cycling when there is likely not one major win that was accomplished without blood vector doping. Doping was required. Everyone knew it, the riders, the team staffs, the national and international governing bodies, the race organizers, the cycling media, and the savvy fans. The only people who were unaware were the general public and naive recreational riders, who were shocked to find out there was gambling going on in a casino. Lying to outsiders about doping was also a required part of the sport.

There is no similarity between pro cyclists racing in Europe and an amateur marathoner cheating so he can be a big man in social media and brag to his friends.

Hopefully this should work. Mike has posted a lot in Dopey Challenge facebook group. I've tried to screen print everything and save it. I'm putting each post into an album because there'smultiple images. Can people see this http://imgur.com/a/tRkVv

Yup can see it perfectly Sara

This is the second FB post http://imgur.com/a/i5ZqU