Raise the Bar
  • Home
    • SEASON KICKOFF!!
    • New to Triathlon?
    • About >
      • Contact
      • Mission
      • History
      • Staff
    • Blog
    • Sponsors
    • Privacy Policy
  • Members Only
    • Log in
    • Team Directory >
      • Directory Guide
      • Manage your Directory Listing
    • RTB Member Login
    • Andy Potts Racing & Coaching >
      • AP Coaching Options
      • 70.3 Training Groups
      • More at AP
    • Discounts >
      • Andy Potts Benefits
      • Multisport & RTB Lite Members' Sponsor Benefits
      • Multisport Members' Event Discounts
      • Swim Member Sponsor Benefits
      • Swim Members' Event & Training Discounts
    • Forum
    • Team Calendar
    • Race Plans
    • Helping Teammates
  • Team
    • About the Team
    • Sign Up!
    • Andy Potts & RTB
    • Where we are >
      • RTB South
    • Benefits
    • Team Sponsors
    • Team FAQs
  • Training
    • Andy Potts Racing & Coaching >
      • AP Coaching Options >
        • Compare Plans
      • 70.3 Race Groups
      • More with Andy
    • Swim >
      • Winter Weather Swims
      • Coached Pool Workouts
      • Open Water Wednesdays
      • Swim Workout Library
    • Bike
    • Run >
      • Monday Night Track
    • Swim Clinic for Aspiring Triathletes
    • Bike and Run Safety
  • Events
    • Volunteer Here!
    • Event Services >
      • Pricing
  • Store

There's a Lot of Chatter about Cheating Lately....

4/20/2016

1 Comment

 
04/20/16

Have you noticed all the talk about cheating lately? 

We're hearing more and more about the cheating in professional (and amateur) cycling which apparently hasn't been limited to Performance Enhancing Drugs or blood doping.  Now we're finding out about all sorts of incidences of "Mechanical Doping" - motors hidden in bottom brackets or seat tubes.  Videos are surfacing of bikes doing some pretty miraculous things - here's a good 12-second example
of a wheel that keeps turning after it crashes.  Motors have likely been inside bikes since the 90's?  We've come to expect this of cycling.  I wasn't really surprised when I heard about it - just sad.
Getting a little bit closer to home, Did anyone catch the story on cheating at the Boston Marathon? A business analyst from Cleveland and a few buddies took it upon themselves to sniff how how many people cheated to get into Boston.  With the amazing availability and transparency of online race results, photos, garmin/strava uploads - they found at least 47 people and counting. One was a firefighter in his 50's who has a wife and a family.  "This is absolutely deflating,” the firefighter said after Runner’s World presented evidence of his course-cutting. “My life and my job are based on integrity. And I cheated.”  His wife doesn't know.
Picture
And even closer still to home, The New York Times recently re-surfaced the story of Julie Miller – the Ironman Canada age-grouper who was awarded 1st place in her age group but was subsequently disqualified and banned from racing in Canada for 2 years and indefinitely at Ironman events.  Something about losing her timing chip (Not the strap, by the way, just the chip. The strap remained).  The investigation looks as if she cut the run course, and it likely wasn't the first time. The article reports, "Miller, a mother of two young daughters, is a mental health counselor specializing in body-image disorders in Squamish."

In my triathlon years, I've seen cheating at local races a few times.  There was a Seattle woman who would hop around age groups finding the one she'd have the best chance at winning until somebody figured it out.    At the Danskin quite a few years ago there was a young woman who was running just ahead of me paced by her boyfriend.  He kept his eye on me and if I was closing on her, he'd tell her to speed up.  I told them at the turnaround to knock it off but he just laughed at me and she kept running...and beat me. It was troubling.  Drafting has always seemed a temptation and a nuisance to the sport.
Picture
I deeply hope cheating doesn't touch the team I'm on or the races I'm a part of.  Is it because I'm appalled by the injustice and lack of integrity? Not really. It's more because l'm a cheerleader for the sport and the people in it.  And cheering for people who have worked very hard and laid whatever they have on the line on race day is thrilling. Even when I'm a busy race director distracted by too many details, the athletes have my attention and my admiration. You are inspiring and exciting!

Cheating bothers me because it robs an athlete of the purity of accomplishment - of the joy of an honest result.  Look at the people who typically cheat - they are working hard at their sport - they are training and sacrificing and usually performing at high levels anyway. Somewhere on that journey toward success
the result became their priority.   How does a fit, accomplished person like that, sitting alone in a quiet, hot, stinky porta potty during a race come to the decision to remove a timing chip? And then turn left instead of right when they open the door?  And what does that feel like inside? Joy isn't a likely part of that experience.

Are they tired? Desperate?  Are they feeling a founded or unfounded weight of expectations from family and friends waiting for their victorious finish or counting on a trip to Hawaii in October?  Maybe the elite need those results to keep sponsorships and to pay their bills...to keep racing at all. Maybe they just aren't ready to accept they aren't the best and they can't bear to face it - it's the only thing that they can hold onto that makes them feel worthwhile or unique.  Or maybe it doesn't really feel like anything - which is scarier still.  Is cheating just another tool in a toolbox toward success? 

Pursuing a sport like triathlon can expose the layers of a person - we learn how hard we're willing to push ourselves.  We learn about our levels of discipline or selfishness or pain tolerance and a host of other qualities.  Sometimes we see things in ourselves we didn't know were there that we're proud of. Sometimes we see things we're ashamed of.  But at least we have the ability to SEE and maybe a person who cheats has just lost that bit of vision. If that's the case, then I hope for them that they get it back, because seeing ourselves clearly is a great gift to an individual, their spouse, their children, their friends.  And I hope for all of us that we keep our vision and that the sport helps us grow and be who we're capable of being.

Happy Training and Racing in 2016!  

Patty Swedberg
patty@weraisethebar.com



1 Comment
Kevin Hockley
4/20/2016 07:52:07 pm

Well said, Patty...agree 100%.

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Raise the Bar

    Race reports, upcoming events, news, and more, from RTB.

    RSS Feed

    Picture
    Picture
    Picture

    Archives

    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    July 2020
    June 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014

Picture
Picture
Picture
Home
Calendar
Contact Us
​About
Team
   Join
   Sponsors
​   FAQ
RTB Events
   Lake Meridian Tri
   Black Diamond Tri
Training
   Swim Workouts
​   Classes & Clinics
  
​
Event Services
   Timing
​   Equipment Rental
Proudly powered by Weebly
  • Home
    • SEASON KICKOFF!!
    • New to Triathlon?
    • About >
      • Contact
      • Mission
      • History
      • Staff
    • Blog
    • Sponsors
    • Privacy Policy
  • Members Only
    • Log in
    • Team Directory >
      • Directory Guide
      • Manage your Directory Listing
    • RTB Member Login
    • Andy Potts Racing & Coaching >
      • AP Coaching Options
      • 70.3 Training Groups
      • More at AP
    • Discounts >
      • Andy Potts Benefits
      • Multisport & RTB Lite Members' Sponsor Benefits
      • Multisport Members' Event Discounts
      • Swim Member Sponsor Benefits
      • Swim Members' Event & Training Discounts
    • Forum
    • Team Calendar
    • Race Plans
    • Helping Teammates
  • Team
    • About the Team
    • Sign Up!
    • Andy Potts & RTB
    • Where we are >
      • RTB South
    • Benefits
    • Team Sponsors
    • Team FAQs
  • Training
    • Andy Potts Racing & Coaching >
      • AP Coaching Options >
        • Compare Plans
      • 70.3 Race Groups
      • More with Andy
    • Swim >
      • Winter Weather Swims
      • Coached Pool Workouts
      • Open Water Wednesdays
      • Swim Workout Library
    • Bike
    • Run >
      • Monday Night Track
    • Swim Clinic for Aspiring Triathletes
    • Bike and Run Safety
  • Events
    • Volunteer Here!
    • Event Services >
      • Pricing
  • Store