Crazy battle for second place in Toronto Women's Marathon - did race organizers get it wrong?

Torontooo wrote:

Yes, this is the document I looked at. Rule 240 does not have a section that the race organizers are quoting on their website:

http://www.torontowaterfrontmarathon.com/en/faq/faqtiming.htm

"

Sounds like what you really want them to reference is 165.24 e) (where 165 does reference 240).

Doesn't change the content of the quoted rule.

I mean that Note quoted above is not in the IAAF rule book. Either they took it from an older edition and have not updated their site, or somehow invented it.

Either way, awarding Cherop the second violates their own posted rule. There must be more to it than meets the eye.

I agree, it doesn't. The timing (chip vs gun) discussion is irrelevant. The rule they should be referencing is actually 164.2:

"The athletes shall be placed in the order in which any part of their

bodies (i.e. torso, as distinguished from the head, neck, arms, legs,

hands or feet) reaches the vertical plane of the nearer edge of the

finish line as defined above."

Sado's body clearly crossed the finish line before Cherop's. Why on earth did they let Cherop share second place?

It is very possible that the transponder system read the true third place finisher ahead of the true second place finisher.

Transponders could be read before the finish line with some being read several meters before. The systems software is designed to take many reads and uses the strongest read. With one system in particular, it starts reading about 5-10 meters out and could produce inaccurate times if the runner slows down as they approach the finish line (obviously that was not the case here).

As mentioned before, in the absence of any other system (video, photo finish or judges), it would not be unusual to use the order from the transponder times for the official place.

Wow - someone actually read the IAAF Road Running Manual!

D. Katz wrote:

It is very possible that the transponder system read the true third place finisher ahead of the true second place finisher.

Transponders could be read before the finish line with some being read several meters before. The systems software is designed to take many reads and uses the strongest read. With one system in particular, it starts reading about 5-10 meters out and could produce inaccurate times if the runner slows down as they approach the finish line (obviously that was not the case here).

As mentioned before, in the absence of any other system (video, photo finish or judges), it would not be unusual to use the order from the transponder times for the official place.

But the organizers website says they are NOT using transponders (chips) to determine the finishing order. It does not matter which one was read first; they may have exact identical time listed for all I know. What matters is who crossed the finish line first, and it was clearly Sado.

Thank you for the link to the event website. This is excellent information

Let's clear this up (hoping):

1.They are using the MYLAPs UHF bibchip to time everyone. This is a disposable transponder that has an accuracy of anywhere from being dead on to being up to a full second different when compared to a photo finish timing system that has been synchronized. So it's VERY, VERY possible that the times from the transponder did not get the correct order for a close finish. In fact it would be absolutely pure luck if it did get the right order for that close of a finish.

2. They are giving out the top overall awards based on gun times provide by the MYLAPs transponder system.

3. It appears that they may not have had a photo finish system or judges to confirm the order of finish and therefore had to use the only available information which was the times from the transponder system. And because rules for road timing state that the official times are rounded up to the next full second - they called it a tie.

Torontooo wrote:

I mean that Note quoted above is not in the IAAF rule book. Either they took it from an older edition and have not updated their site, or somehow invented it.

The note in the IAAF book does essentially say the same thing though:

Note: The official time shall be the time elapsed between the

firing of the starting gun (or the synchronised start signal) and

the athlete reaching the finish line. However, the time elapsed

between an athlete crossing the start line and the finish line can

be made known to him, but will not be considered an official

time.

165.25 e)

Um, yeah wrote:

Torontooo wrote:

I mean that Note quoted above is not in the IAAF rule book. Either they took it from an older edition and have not updated their site, or somehow invented it.

The note in the IAAF book does essentially say the same thing though:

Note: The official time shall be the time elapsed between the

firing of the starting gun (or the synchronised start signal) and

the athlete reaching the finish line. However, the time elapsed

between an athlete crossing the start line and the finish line can

be made known to him, but will not be considered an official

time.

165.25 e)

Yes - It's the same note, just in a different place/rule. They must have used an older rulebook when citing the note on the website.

Thank you for the explanation, Mr. Katz.

One thing I do not understand is your point #2, "They are giving out the top overall awards based on gun times provide by the MYLAPs transponder system." They way I read it the IAAF rulebook, times are not important - the order of crossing the finish line is. They only need to look at the finishing order. Unless runners cross the finish line side by side at exactly the same moment, there cannot be a tie.

They definitely did not have a photo finish set up, but they did have officials at the finish line watching the runners, and they had a live video feed - from behind the finish line facing the course, as is common.

From the video feed it seems obvious that Fado crossed the finish line in front of Cherop. It does not look like a tie to me. There definitely was some prior contact initiated by Cherop, and Fado pushed back at some point. Regardless of who started the contact, I can only speculate there could have been a protest launched by either side, and they wanted to deal with it quickly with the minimum PR damage. Hence a tie.

To answer your question about #2. Without officials or photo finish, the only way they can get the order of finish is by using the times provided by the transponders.

99% of the order of finish from nearly every road race (except the top finihsers is determined by the times from the transponders.

And yes, in my opinion she should have been DQ'd