There is a reoccurring problem in the running community that I have no idea how should be addressed… People who run a race in another person’s race number and are scored in the wrong category..
Like Men who get scored in a women’s category, or a 20 year old who gets scored in a Masters age group category. Now, I am NOT talking about people who WANT to be woman nor am I talking about men who have a “woman’s” name and then accidentally get scored in the wrong division.. I am talking about people, specifically men, who race in a registered women's bib and then get scored in the women's division.
For those that don’t know the racing scene, let me bring you up to speed. There is a common occurrence that happens, people share race numbers (bibs), sometimes it is by accident (a wife and husband wearing each other’s race bibs in error), or sometimes a person is injured and can't run and gives their number/bib to a friend, or perhaps sells their number/bib to someone who couldn’t get in a race. BRAVO to them for finding a good use for a paid race number/bib… BUT… do me a favor, before you race ....take off the timing chip.
See, what people who run races as someone else fails to remember is that they are skewing the race results... because the person who is taking the bib may NOT be that same age nor even the same gender as the original race number's owner. Thus all of a sudden you have a MAN placing in the top 10 of a race in the WOMENS 45-49 age group category.
So you say why should I care? I don’t ….unless it AFFECTS ME, and my race results,AND THEN trust me...I care and take issue with it.
IN some races, the rules specifically state no transfer of bibs and they make you sign a waiver (something about legality issues). But besides that, the point is people need to remember that there is more than THEM in the world and that what they are doing may affect someone else; a man should NOT be scoring in a women’s age group category. PERIOD.
The way I see it is, if you are going to run in another person’s number/bib, remove the timing chip…DO NOT GET OFFICIALLY TIMED. You don’t need the official times anyhow because it's not your name that will appear in the final results. I had stumbled upon this issue again this am, it's not the first time I have seen it and I am sure it will not be the last.
I always check the top 10-25 gals in my age group to see what they look like, to see I guess who my competition is or how really SKINNY they really are…HA! And what I found was 3 men running in registered women’s bib for the women 45-49 age group..SHAZAM… and one guy went to the effort to tape off part of the girls name, and the other crossed off the girls name which you can still read if you look closely enough.
This GUY ran for Christine Hetzler of NJ and placed 8th in the 45-49 year old womens age group… totally skewing up results for people who like poor Gwyneth who is 9th but actually should be 8th… picture below is the guy who ran in Christines bib.. you can see he even covered part of her name so it looks like he is Chris
So here is another one…he was running for Deb Foster placing #23 in the 45-49 age group… he went to the effort of crossing off her name but you can still read it..
And then there is this man who is #27th in the WOMENS 45-49 year age group.
So could all these “women” Christine, Deb, and Hye use their winning scores to qualify for Boston? Absolutely, and the REAL women didn’t even have to run the times to do so.
Would they do that? I hope not, but they could. What irks me the most is that races try their best to prevent this from happening, even checking drivers licenses when you pick up your race packet. But, if someone wants to hand off their number to someone else, there is nothing anyone can do. I didn’t even research any further… if there were this many people skewing up the results in just the top people in one age group, I can’t even fathom how many overall there were. What is truly sad is I can’t honestly know where I placed in my age group. SIGH.
I guess for the future I can do one of two things,( 1) win the damn races so there is no question on where I place, and/ or (2) tackle any man trying to be a woman.
