A Scottish ultramarathoner set out to either cheat or prove running is dumb once and for all by using a car for part of a 50-mile footrace. Now, Joasia Zakrzewski is being hit with a 12-month ban for being resourceful during the GB Ultras Manchester to Liverpool race in April. She still somehow ended up only placing third.
UK Athletics independent disciplinary panel concluded that Zakrzewski didn’t tell race marshals that she was given a ride by a friend in a car, according to CNN. I mean, why would she? These people will never understand her genius. They also say she concealed “…that she had completed part of the race on a non-competitive basis” because she accepted – and didn’t return – her third-place trophy. She would later attribute that decision to fatigue and jet lag. Along with her race ban, she also isn’t allowed to participate in “coaching, officiating and managing” during the 12-month ban.
“I accept my actions on the day that I did travel in a car and then later completed the ran, crossing the finish line and inappropriately receiving a medal and trophy, which I did not return immediately as I should have done,” Zakrzewski said in a letter to UKA, according to CNN.
Apparently, she said she became lost around the halfway point of the race and her leg was sore. That’s when she got the ride from her buddy to the next checkpoint.
Zakrzewski told the BBC she was persuaded to keep going, and she agreed to run in a “non-competitive way,” and in the disciplinary panel’s report, she said she had never intended to cheat and denied acting without integrity.
Following the race, tracking data showed “irregularities” in Zakrzewski’s time, CNN says.
“The Respondent was an experienced athlete, competing successfully at the highest level,” the panel said in its verdict.
“She also acted as team manager for the international team. As such the Respondent had a responsibility to uphold the rules, and this made it even more serious that she breached them, and did not correct this either when finishing the race or thereafter.”
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“I would never purposefully cheat and this was not a target race, but I don’t want to make excuses,” she said.
Zakrzewski is a doctor – and bad liar – who has competed internationally for both Scotland and Great Britain. She’s able to appeal the decision, but there’s no word on if she actually will.
This whole saga really cements one thing for me, though: driving is better than running. The only goal of running is to no longer be running, and that’s a terrible indictment of a sport if I’ve ever heard one.