Your forum, your rules. I deleted the paragraph but it was true nonetheless.

Right, I figured.

#1 When you said a couple of posts up that only Oswaldo has ever recorded a faster split than her ,that's from Derek about the last 3.9 miles. But I think he and you mean Jorge Pacheco. Paulson was 3 minutes faster than Lopez' best time over that section. Derek's article was sloppy, this is just one example.

#2 The bigger issue (which I've flagged a few times in this thread and which Derek has belatedly acknowledged in a clean up edit to his post), is that this data is not a complete list of the fastest splits over this section. It's a list of splits from the fastest overall finishers (at least, I that's what I think it is - Camille Herron put them together and I don't know for sure what her metrics were). So, for example, the data doesn't include a 50(!) minute split recorded by Jen Vogel in 2011 - another female pro triathlete Badwater debutant who just did astonishingly well at the end. No-one's disputing Paulson's splits were incredible and for most people it would make sense that stronger runners finish stronger but I can see many reasons why there might be exceptions to that rule, especially at a race like Badwater and especially when some of these splits are recorded at night and some during the day (Paulson's was at night).

Weird stuff happens for sure, just be careful putting any faith in Derek's ability to assess the weirdness in this case.

Strike alleged, that's fine. I do buy 95% she ran the wrong way at that event. I can't really wrap my head around the psychology of doing so deliberately when she's already running at a pretty high level and bound to be caught, but my only point was that she has the chops that 1:14 is possible. Very very fast but possible.

but if i was her and my finish was legit id sign up for an ultra with a truly competitive womens field and validate the Badwater result.

I think the process of proving your supplements are contaminated is flawed and an athlete is capable of cheating the system. I don't have enough info though.

That letter was posted up here on the thread a few pages ago, and has been discussed. I'm pulling for her, hope all of this shakes out her way. But it feels like more shoes are going to drop here, and MI has batted a 100% on these types of stories. But someone has to be the first, crossing fingers that she could be the one....

This is the approach I might have taken if I were Derek. Mark her down as a "person of interest" Maybe privately ask her for GPS data. And then keep an eye on her in future events, maybe getting some insider contacts to put some extra game-day scrutiny on her.

Build up a body of work. Play the long game.

Instead he went immediately public.

It has been mentioned before but here it goes, Derek may have intentionally jumped the gun trying to flush out more evidence. A calculated risk of eating crow to try and protect the integrity of the event.

I equate those of you that blame Derek for the suicide to a patient that blames the doctor for diagnosing him with cancer. Let’s not forget that there was free will and premeditation to act deviant to society. A choice to avoid the consequences and end ones life is the afflicted’s own alone.

About a year ago I saw an article about Yiannis Kouros which started out about his first major win and how most people thought he had cheated because the time was so unbelievable. So the next time he raced he was watched the entire race, and obliterated the field again. Of course, that explained everything, and the people who had been publicly doubting the loudest became his greatest admirers because they realized that he could actually do the times they felt were impossible. To elaborate, I felt that the articles questioned the validity of his (first) race, but were not accusatory.

My sense is that "MI" has done a presentation similar in spirit to what I saw in terms of the response to Kouros's first race. They (MI) made some mistakes at the beginning but seem to have corrected them at this time.

Perhaps we can withhold "permanent" judgment until we have seen Ashley Paulson run a (hopefully) corroborating race. In the meantime, please realize that inflammatory keyboard rhetoric is much more the villain here, as opposed to "MI" (in spite of the fact it is "IM" reversed).

Matt J wrote:

alculated risk of eating crow to try and protect the integrity of the event.[/quote[

The way to protect the integrity of the event is to conduct a thorough investigation with integrity. Not blather in public.

I'm suspicious too. I get it. But I have zero idea how any actual cheating may have occurred, nor any evidence that might point to it. E.g. handing the chip and GPS watch to a crewmember at times and jumping in a car. Something like that.


If I wanted to protect the integrity of the event I'd privately talk to the race directors and other athletes to put extra eyeballs on the suspected cheater, and eventually collect evidence that proves a case dead to rights. Or exonerates completely. If dead-to-rights, *then* you go public. If exonerated, then you don't drag the person through internet firestorms.

Not just be yet another dime-a-dozen internet commentor. (like us).

Is there anything in GPX files that a professional would not want released to the public?

I equate those of you that blame Derek for the suicide to a patient that blames the doctor for diagnosing him with cancer. Let’s not forget that there was free will and premeditation to act deviant to society. A choice to avoid the consequences and end ones life is the afflicted’s own alone.

Ya, I dont blame Derek one iota for his death, he was just doing his job and policing a running race. To me the lion share of the blame besides Frank himself, were his family and friends. They kept the whole charade going in the face of overwhelming evidence that he cheated, and no doubt pushed him to continue on with his denials. If they had at least accepted the plain facts, and then counseled and consoled Frank, there might of been a different outcome.

Derek only caught a guy who cheated to beat a world record, what came after was all on Frank and his family and how they handled the outing...

No, he chose to commit journalistic malpractice here for what I don't know. Kiss up to some pro athlete he's fond of. He willfully chose to invade someone's life without any evidence whatsoever, heck most of the people he goes after should have their results DQd but should never have to suffer him going after them. You spoke about choice, well Derek needs to shut down that facebook page and website. If you don't think him diving into Frank Meza's life had an impact on that man which pushed him to those choices, then you're not doing the math right. Frank still made a choice, but Derek directly contributed to that choice.

True. And if I remember correctly there weren't any real evidence against Frank to begin with.

An old person on a bike with a race bib and some similarities to Frank, sure, but nothing that would hold up in a court of law.

No, he chose to commit journalistic malpractice here for what I don't know. Kiss up to some pro athlete he's fond of. He willfully chose to invade someone's life without any evidence whatsoever, heck most of the people he goes after should have their results DQd but should never have to suffer him going after them. You spoke about choice, well Derek needs to shut down that facebook page and website. If you don't think him diving into Frank Meza's life had an impact on that man which pushed him to those choices, then you're not doing the math right. Frank still made a choice, but Derek directly contributed to that choice.

This is a fantastically terrible take. The job of a journalist is to investigate stories. Were Woodward and Bernstein in the wrong for exposing Nixon? Did the initial accusation of bin Salman killing Kashoggi warrant a shut down of those websites? What about this entire forum jumping onto Kaitlin Armstrong for the murder of Mo Wilson? Hasn't been proven yet, maybe we need to shut down this website too?

This is a fantastically terrible take. The job of a journalist is to investigate stories. Were Woodward and Bernstein in the wrong for exposing Nixon? Did the initial accusation of bin Salman killing Kashoggi warrant a shut down of those websites? What about this entire forum jumping onto Kaitlin Armstrong for the murder of Mo Wilson? Hasn't been proven yet, maybe we need to shut down this website too?

I've been following this thread and there are two things I can take away from it:

- MI (Derek) doesn't have a very convicing case, and as of now it seems Ashley did do the full race.
- TheStroBro really hates Derek and is very personally invested in this. Is there something more there?

Why are you comparing this to Watergate? This isn't close to Watergate and definitely not close to Kashoggi. In regards to Kaitlin Armstrong, that's an alleged murder, not comparable.



Hate is a bit too strong. Not even sure I dislike him. I just dislike his hobby, this is his hobby, not his job. He has a real job. Especially after the Frank Meza experience where we didn't see these threads on this forum I thought we as a community moved on a bit, but I guess not when you have one of the leaders in this community cheering on this nonsense.