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Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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Interesting that they are not considering have a tire tied around his feet as “foul play”. Are they thinking he committed suicide?
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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Either an error or they suspect he drowned himself. Very strange strory for sure.
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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Tire tied to his feet and no foul play?

Wtf?
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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So, he left a hotel room in the middle of the night and then showed up dead with a tire around his feet?
Not fishy at all

So, not actually at the IM?
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Rumpled] [ In reply to ]
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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Still, fishy as all hell.
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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Was the story edited after the post on Slowtwitch? I do not see anything that says “no foul play”
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [IntenseOne] [ In reply to ]
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IntenseOne wrote:
Was the story edited after the post on Slowtwitch? I do not see anything that says “no foul play”

Still there on the second to last sentence for me, "Police have opened an inquest docket and no foul play is suspected."
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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Maybe tyre is just a bike inner tube? Could have bound his feet together deliberately for training

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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [trail] [ In reply to ]
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trail wrote:
IntenseOne wrote:
Was the story edited after the post on Slowtwitch? I do not see anything that says “no foul play”

Still there on the second to last sentence for me, "Police have opened an inquest docket and no foul play is suspected."

Ok- I am officially too tired from a long day. Read that sentence 3 times before my brain acknowledged that!
Thanks for pointing it out.
This seems to be consistent with the police work chronicled in the “Blade Runner” murder trial. Not good
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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I'd say it's either a suicide, or cold play.

Why would he be up at 1am walking around the marina? Also the CCTV footage would've captured him with a tyre if it was suicide you would think. It's unlikely he'd go down to the marina with the intent of ending his own life and hoping to find something there to help. These things are usually planned, they are rarely 'chance' or 'opportunistic'. It's not like someone would go for a walk at 1am and say to themselves, 'oh there's a car tyre, I might use that to take my own life' if they hadn't gone down there with that purpose to begin with.

Alternatively, it is a marina. There may be a chance he was taking a walk and witnessed something he shouldn't have at that time in the morning?
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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Weird, I'd like to know more about this "tire around his feet" thing. The first thing that came to mind was maybe he was doing some sort of pulling exercise in the water, and "tire" was really an inner tube.

On a side note, I'm fascinated that a search dog picked up the scent of his body from a boat on the surface.

"They're made of latex, not nitroglycerin"
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [gary p] [ In reply to ]
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gary p wrote:
Weird, I'd like to know more about this "tire around his feet" thing. The first thing that came to mind was maybe he was doing some sort of pulling exercise in the water, and "tire" was really an inner tube.

On a side note, I'm fascinated that a search dog picked up the scent of his body from a boat on the surface.

I am wondering how you get a tire around your feet unless it is an inner tube. You do you wrap a car or bike tire around the ankles?
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [rock] [ In reply to ]
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rock wrote:
I'd say it's either a suicide, or cold play.

Also the CCTV footage would've captured him with a tyre if it was suicide you would think. It's unlikely he'd go down to the marina with the intent of ending his own life and hoping to find something there to help. These things are usually planned, they are rarely 'chance' or 'opportunistic'. It's not like someone would go for a walk at 1am and say to themselves, 'oh there's a car tyre, I might use that to take my own life' if they hadn't gone down there with that purpose to begin with.

I'm guessing he found the tire (tyre) on a boat in the marina and stole it. It's not in the article linked at the beginning of the thread, but, according to other articles I read, he was captured on CCTV at the marina going onto people's boats and moving from one boat to another - like he was looking for something.

The tire bit is odd, but my first question is: do many of you travel to a foreign city and decide to get up in the middle of the night and go for a walk or workout without letting your wife know where you're going? From the other articles I read, it doesn't sound like he left her any clue where he was going - no note, text on phone, didn't wake her up, etc. That's more suspicious to me than the tire. I can't imagine traveling anywhere in-state - much less out of the country - and leaving the hotel without giving my wife a heads-up or the means to find me if I don't come back on time. I've left hotel rooms before while she was still sleeping. I don't recall ever leaving without leaving her a note, or telling her ahead of time that I might go out before she got up.

The tire thing is odd, but his secretive departure from the room makes me think he was up to something he couldn't tell his wife about. And trespassing on people's boats is just odd if he was really just out for a walk or planning to go for a training swim.
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [notadistancegod] [ In reply to ]
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I believe he was a very experienced sailor, and he owned a boat. Maybe he was just looking at boats down there. I think he also swam a lot, so he was comfortable in the water. Very sad
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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Without any other information to suggest otherwise, it sadly, sounds like suicide. My condolences to his family regardless.

On a different note, to link his death with the FVL robbery from the previous year is unfair and paints South Africa unfairly.
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Sbernardi] [ In reply to ]
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Sbernardi wrote:
I believe he was a very experienced sailor, and he owned a boat. Maybe he was just looking at boats down there. I think he also swam a lot, so he was comfortable in the water. Very sad

I've never owned a boat, so I don't really know what the etiquette is. Is it more or less acceptable/expected that if you keep your boat parked at a marina, people are going to walk on it? I'm assuming that's trespassing. Someone coming on to your boat at 1 AM is the same in my mind as someone standing in your driveway at 1 AM because they want to admire your car.

If I'm wrong about this, feel free to correct me. I'm not a sailor.

Assuming this is not some sort of accepted etiquette I'm unaware of, I'd say it's even more suspicious. If I'm a boat owner, I probably know walking onto other people's craft in the wee hours is a no-no.
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [notadistancegod] [ In reply to ]
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Yes I don’t know it either. Just saying it sounds like boats were a huge part of his life, so not odd he’s walking around them. Now on them? I don’t know what his intentions were. I’m guessing he was not hoping for a random tire to be there so he could kill himself tho
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [devashish_paul] [ In reply to ]
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My first thoughts from reading the article was that it appeared to be a suicide, but I could be wrong, and as a local I know how potentially dangerous it can be almost anywhere in SA, but the whole story sounds strange from the start.
Surely before an IM you want to stay in? and if nerves were that hectic walking around early hours of the morning would seem like a bad idea for any number of reasons.

Anyhow re the tyre around his legs, I assume there was a rope tied around the tyre and around his legs as well.
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Paolo55] [ In reply to ]
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https://www.news24.com/...eth-harbour-20180419

By tyre, maybe they mean a steel wheel?

"...the body had been kept below the surface of the water by a tyre tied with a rope to his feet."

"Police have been concentrating their search around the harbour, after CCTV from Transnet surfaced on Monday, that showed Bellet-Brissaud entering the harbour.
Naidu said accompanying CCTV footage of a man leaping between the chokka boats had been mistakenly identified as Bellet-Brissaud.
"Additional CCTV footage was obtained and reviewed by police, which showed David walking along another jetty, which is close to where the body has been recovered," she said."
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Spandexboy] [ In reply to ]
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Spandexboy wrote:
Without any other information to suggest otherwise, it sadly, sounds like suicide. My condolences to his family regardless.


On a different note, to link his death with the FVL robbery from the previous year is unfair and paints South Africa unfairly.


Truth be told that is why I used the words "suspicious death". I don't know what happened but frankly I don't hear a lot of people committing suicide in the day before an Ironman. In regards to FVL, I also don't know of another high-profile attack that was done at a race venue. Maybe there is another one or two and I never heard of it, but I wouldn't see these two incidents as giving me that warm and fuzzy feeling regardless if this does turn out to be suicide. The following article already clarifies that the CCTV footage by saying "Naidu said accompanying CCTV footage of a man leaping between the chokka boats had been mistakenly identified as Bellet-Brissaud."


This all sounds fishy to me. Maybe time will tell but I can say as someone who has had a hard time sleeping the night(s) before an Ironman I have done the the exact same thing... left there accommodations unannounced. In my case, I was just taking a walk to calm the mind which is often excited and ready to race.


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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [gary p] [ In reply to ]
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gary p wrote:
On a side note, I'm fascinated that a search dog picked up the scent of his body from a boat on the surface.

Yeah, it's really interesting how they do this. They are called "cadaver dogs" and they are trained to alert when they smell a dead human. When a person dies and is underwater, (sorry for the upcoming grossness...) they start bloating and offgassing and that scent bubbles to the surface. The dog can smell that just leaning over the side of the boat and sniffing the water.

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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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OK, read the article, and see there was basically a wheel tied by a rope to his feet. If this was a suicide, it seems like a really miserable way to go (tie your feet together then hang a deflate car wheel off your feet, sit on the edge of a pier with the wheel hanging down between legs dangling over edge and contemplate life and push yourself over the edge with your arms?).

On the other hand, if you're going to kill someone you don't like, there seem like easier ways than old 1930's NYC gangster style minus cement block. So it almost sound like the former is more likely????
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Re: Suspicious Death at Ironman South Africa [Thomas Gerlach] [ In reply to ]
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Truth be told that is why I used the words "suspicious death". I don't know what happened but frankly I don't hear a lot of people committing suicide in the day before an Ironman. In regards to FVL, I also don't know of another high-profile attack that was done at a race venue. Maybe there is another one or two and I never heard of it, but I wouldn't see these two incidents as giving me that warm and fuzzy feeling regardless if this does turn out to be suicide. The following article already clarifies that the CCTV footage by saying "Naidu said accompanying CCTV footage of a man leaping between the chokka boats had been mistakenly identified as Bellet-Brissaud."


This all sounds fishy to me. Maybe time will tell but I can say as someone who has had a hard time sleeping the night(s) before an Ironman I have done the the exact same thing... left there accommodations unannounced. In my case, I was just taking a walk to calm the mind which is often excited and ready to race. [/quote]

When I did IM Brazil in 2010, there was talk of suspicious activity before the race, including a story/rumor that an athlete had been kidnapped and held overnight and forced to withdraw money from an ATM and also a story about a pro being robbed at gunpoint while walking on the beach near the race site.
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