42point2 wrote:
adnama wrote:
From the Ironman tracker, it looks like the first female across the line at Ironman Ireland (Svenja Thoes) was DQd shortly after crossing the line for outside assistance. Anyone know the story? That's huge - has a professional winner ever been disqualified before for a non-doping offense?
There's been some DQ's for accidental course cutting in the recent past. There was a woman (can't remember who) missed one of the buoys on the swim and Ditlev was DQ'd for going the wrong way on the run.
Can't remember anyone being DQ'd for outside assistance though. I imagine it would have to be pretty blatant to get more than a warning/penalty
Although outside assistance isn't associated with a time penalty, it's an auto-DSQ in the rules, hence the DSQ. They won't disclose any details on the incident until any appeals/protests are resolved. I'm sure that many have gotten away with it before, but with so many camera phones on course these days, it's harder and harder to not get caught with any of these types of rules infringements.
In terms of process. Athletes are usually informed if they have a penalty, or a DSQ on course, but they may choose to finish, in order to be able to protest the infraction later. Similarly, they may choose not to serve a time penalty, finish, get DSQ'd and protest that after as well. There could also be a DSQ after the finish based on protest by other athletes or sufficient evidence being available to the officials to do so. Again, the athlete has the right to protest the decision, but would need to provide evidence to counter whatever basis the officials had to make the decision to DSQ in the first place.
This is not a guilty until proven innocent situation. This is a situation where the officials had evidence, based on which they pressed charges (in this case the DSQ). The athlete can either except those charges (plead guilty) or could contest them in court (in this case a protest/appeal), that could either result in the DSQ being dropped, or confirmed. Based on what I've read about this, I suspect that the call was made on the basis of video of her accepting outside assistance, in which case it's going to be much moire difficult to get overturned (unless they had clear evidence, e.g. video that she didn't in fact get the assistance from outside). It's crappy, because if the results remain as is, the actual winner will be robbed of the experience of breaking the tape first, but in order for the due process to be followed, unless it's because someone is dangerous to themselves or others, they generally won't yank them from the course, so that they could finish, and then challenge the call, if they want to.