Maybe they just had a good day? Did you ever think of that?

did they cut the buoys or run up the left side where the sand is until they were forced to swim? I wasn't there today, but that's a common strategy I've seen in the past, at least for the sprint distance.

international nearly hits other side of the bay where you cant run. they missed one buoy completely. the thing is also, this was multiple 5 year AG from 18-59, so maybe it would be fine if your entire AG did it.... but some ended up doing the full swim (getting stuck in a strong current in addition).

this is a USAT sanctioned race....

Assume you meant to put that in pink as 7 mins for 1,000m (as OP stated) is cutting the course, not a good day.

Seems pretty clear cut with the little information posted by the OP (maybe there is more to this story that will come out). Unless the course was laid out in a manner that made navigation on the swim impossible and there was no information available for anyone to reasonably know what the course was then I would guess athletes are responsible for following the course or it's a DQ. Period. That's the binary view. Now if there's substantial gray area due to information, etc. then it could get interesting.

I was not being serious. Agree they should all be dq unless somehow the error was on the race organizers in which case id say good luck with that.

how would it be done? sounds like the only way to stop this would be for USAT marshalls to be in boats and chase the pack down and DQ them on spot.

Not necessarily. They DQ people all the time with suspect fast splits after the race is over. For example, if someone did a 3 hr IM run, where the first 13.1 was done in 2 hr and the 2nd 13.1 was done in an hour. The T-3 girl from IMFL was dq after the fact when none of her 2nd loop splits registered.

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My marathon PR is "under three, high twos. I had a two hour and fifty-something."

I'd just make results for the whole wave "unofficial." Anyone who wants an official result has to submit a link to another race result that shows that their swim time is within their general ability. Garmin files (link to Strava) from the race should also count. We're looking at a 2:1 variance here, so it's not like people cut inside a buoy and save 25M.

To be fair this should apply to everyone. A 15min. 1K might be a good swimmer or a really poor one who cut 1/2 the course

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that's about all i can think of too, proof of that swim capability. if it were the full wave, it could be treated as a separate race i suppose. either way, not fun for the organizers. good luck you guys.

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I think this is the standard scenario of voiding the result of the whole class since a major unfairness has happened.

No one mentioned it to RD or USAT. It's a day after.. who should be contacted? With out some evidence is a DQ possible? Hearsay usually not applicable

I'd just make results for the whole wave "unofficial." Anyone who wants an official result has to submit a link to another race result that shows that their swim time is within their general ability. Garmin files (link to Strava) from the race should also count. We're looking at a 2:1 variance here, so it's not like people cut inside a buoy and save 25M. //


THIS^^^^

Treat it as a separate race, and if it was everyone pretty much in a particular wave, that is where you focus. If there are outliers in other waves, then lump them in there too. If the fastest real swimmer did like 12/13 minutes, then anything around that and under go into the pile. IT is a lot of work, but it is the fairest thing to do, provided it was a race course error of some sort. Or they could just score it as a separate unofficial race and be done with it, but they should allow folks to provide concrete proof they swam the course, or can swim that fast. I would imagine anyone around the fastest swimmers time, will have some pool credentials in meets to back that up..

The tricky part is if it's half a wave... I would mark them all as unofficial results, and list them separately, but exclude them from the official results. I had this happen this year in an elite race that I was officiating. The leader turned early, and the entire field followed him (swam 500m instead of 750m), in spite there being a swim familiarization the day before (there were earlier races using a shorter course, and buoys for that, but they knew their turnaround was the 3rd one... it was repeated to them before the start). Ultimately, because the whole field cut the course, we didn't DSQ anyone, just revised the distance on the result, and let the results stand, but if one person had swam the full course, we would have had to DSQ the rest of the field.

It's a tricky one for sure, and thankfully pretty rare.

I noticed a 10min swim time for a Intl racer but looks like they've been fixed due to a timing issue not anyone cutting the course.

I noticed a 10min swim time for a Intl racer //


This is what the race needs to figure out before anything. Was their course accurate, was their wetsuits, and what is the first and best time they "know" was legit?? On an accurate 1k swim course, a great swimmer in a wetsuit can swim 10 minutes. Of course that swimmer would have an extensive swim background, and could prove this time. But they have to answer the other questions first, before diving into folks swimming backgrounds.

Ok looks like things are fixed, but there were reports of course cutting . Yet times appear normal, I know some female D1 swimmers with 5 min slower than usual time as there was a bad current

It was a timing company issue. Results were corrected later yesterday afternoon. That is all. :-)

The result would have already been final then.