Mexico City Marathon organizers have disqualified 11,000 runners for cheating, after trackers revealed participants had been cutting out sections of the course.
Organizers of the marathon, which took place on Sunday 27 August and had 30,000 runners taking part, found over a third of participants had failed to complete the required distance.
The race organizers launched an investigation after receiving multiple complaints that participants had been using vehicles, public transport and bikes to cut out sections of the course, according to sports publication Marca.
Race tracking data subsequently revealed that the runners had not met the checkpoints placed every 5km, which ensure participants have completed the full 26.2-mile distance.
In a statement to Marca, organisers said: ‘The Mexico City Sports Institute informs that it will proceed to identify those cases in which participants of the XL Mexico City Marathon Telcel 2023 have demonstrated an unsportsmanlike attitude during the event and will invalidate their registration times.
‘This great event not only represents an outstanding celebration for all the inhabitants of the capital, but also an occasion to reaffirm the transcendental values of sport.’
Some runners have said that their trackers were faulty and they did not cheat – they say they had passed through the checkpoints but their trackers hadn’t recorded this accurately.
It’s not the first time there has been mass disqualification at the Mexico City Marathon, which race holds a World Athletics Gold Label Status – a status awarded by the governing body to road races which have met strict criteria for excellence in planning, organization, and delivery.
In 2017, 6,000 runners were denied their finishers medals after participants were found to have not completed the full course.
The same thing happened again the following year, when a further 3,090 participants were disqualified from the 2018 event.
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