What an insensitive thing to do to somebody! I am looking forward to seeing the video. This jogger woman should be reprimanded by the race director with a 1-2 year ban. It is inexcusable to break the tape before somebody else's win. Even if there are no volunteers or clear "sides of a road" marked per running length, it is just common sense and common decency to avoid breaking the tape when you are clearly not a winner of anything at that event.
Why should only the fastest runners get to break the tape?
Everyone's a winner!
entitlement runner wrote:
Why should only the fastest runners get to break the tape?
Everyone's a winner!
Yea!^^^
That's quite Shitaye of the half marathon runner to do something like that.
There should be a finishers tape-breaking moment for every finisher in races! Everyone's a winner if they just get off the couch and run!
Post a video please...I'll make it into a gif for the ages!
Yea... it's all fun-n-games until someone else breaks your tape...
...then it's freakin' hilarious!
Honestly, she was just trying to help, those fast runners are so light she may have bounced off the tape and been thrown backwards.
Let's check out the video, or at least a photo!
We can then compare it to this one, from 2013 Berlin Marathon:
You people think a 2:46 half marathoner has any clue about what is going on?
I see people in the back sprint like mad the last 50 meters all the time.
I have ended up around the womens winner a couple times right near the finish and I don't try to sprint around her but I have been running races for years.
I ran the race today and finished a bit ahead of this. It's really, really obvious that the left side (an empty road with 1 runner every 20 seconds) is meant for the marathoners, and the right side (with 20 runners every second) is meant for the half marathoners. The courses rejoined at mile 9.5 of the half and there would have been a bike leading the woman.
"Ethiopia's Olympian marathon runner Shetaye Gemechu has received a two-year ban from the Ethiopian Athletics Federation (EAF) after testing positive for the banned substance EPO."
You think an Ethiopian cares about breaking the tape? It's about the money anyway.No difference that Kipsang and the tape breaker in Berlin.Africans do not care about trivialities like medals, tape, etc.
TheNavidsonRecord wrote:
I was watching this on live tv. Dallas Marathon is delaying posting the video. If they get around to it I'll post it here. If they don't post it for whatever reason, I've got it narrowed down to 4 people and will be able to confirm once pictures are posted.
At the Dallas Marathon, like many other marathons, they have different colored bibs for all the events. Like every race out there you can see the course beforehand. There are plenty of signs and people directing the way.
The women's leader, Shitaye Gemeshu, had a huge lead for a majority of the race. There wasn't another woman in sight for most of the race after mile 8. As Shitaye is coming into the finish chute there is this lady in a half-marathon bib breaking out into a fullsprint. It takes Shitaye by surprise so she doesn't speed in time. This hobby-jogger is frantically trying to get ahead of the full marathon finisher and barely does by a half second or so. She breaks the tape, stealing the banner moment from Shitaye. Unbelievable.
I've run this course before. It's very unlikey this was just a confused half marathoner who found herself in the full marathon. For the last 2 miles or so, the half and the full are on the same street but on opposite sides of a street that's divided by a median. Furthermore, how could she possibly think a 2:46:46 half marathon is a winning time?
To end up in the Full chute this half-marathon hobby-jogger would have had to step up on the median at some point in the last 2 miles and go to the other side of the street to be able to get into the full chute.
No I wasn't saying that at all. The race organizers sure do care about this. They want good photos of the finishers. They want everything to look good. Marketing, that sort of thing.
who cares bro wrote:
You think an Ethiopian cares about breaking the tape? It's about the money anyway.
No difference that Kipsang and the tape breaker in Berlin.
Africans do not care about trivialities like medals, tape, etc.
The runner may not directly care, but the runner's PR people certainly do! To help market a runner and receive larger appearance fees, the runner needs to be in the spotlight more. A tape breaking photo is fantastic PR.
The tape breaking by the winner photo also has tremendous PR possibilities by the race organizers!
It is not a victimless crime (even if the victim may not be the winning runner!)
UPDATE
It's come to light that it was one of the relay runners which would make sense. I guess she just got confused though and thought the tape was for her.
The 1st place relay team got to break their own tape but they had finished a good 30 minutes or so before her. I guess she thought she was the first relay team. With the big crowds it would be tough to keep track of who is relay and who is full.
2:46? She must be off the juice.
That wasn't malicious.
Just a completely clueless woman who knows nothing about running, but thinks she does.
I bet she's the fastest over 40 runner at the women's workout world in her suburb.
TheNavidsonRecord wrote:
UPDATE
It's come to light that it was one of the relay runners which would make sense. I guess she just got confused though and thought the tape was for her.
The 1st place relay team got to break their own tape but they had finished a good 30 minutes or so before her. I guess she thought she was the first relay team. With the big crowds it would be tough to keep track of who is relay and who is full.
This seemed like the perfect Letsrun forum story: a chance to ridicule someone for being both slow and stupid. But if you read the articles, her explanation makes sense. She just got caught up in it and thought she was outsprinting another relay runner.