The Wicked Marathon took place this past Sunday, October 30th. This is a small marathon took place in Peoria, Arizona. Formally it was known as the NYC in AZ Marathon. There were 44 finishers for the marathon
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| www.marathonguide.com race results |
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| Wicked Marathon 2016 Results |
You will notice that the 8th place finisher was disqualified. According to a race official, the runner registered as Howard Goldman did not hit any intermediate mats, raising suspicions. A photo below shows this runner with no bib visible and his hat pulled down low.
When questioned, the runner could not provide evidence that he ran the entire distance. When the race official dug deeper, it was determined that “Howard Goldman” was an alias. The contact information was bogus. The emergency contact listed on Howard’s registration did not know Howard.
The race officials went an additional step and made a discovery – the race entry was paid for by Jeffrey Donnelly.
If you’ve read my blog in the past, that name may ring a bell. Click on either of the below headlines to go to the previous articles.
Couple Cuts Courses and Forges Bib to Run Boston Marathon
Marathon Cheating Couple Disqualified from Surfer’s Point Marathon – Will be Removed From the 2017 Boston Marathon Entry List
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| Photo of Jeffrey and Sheri Donnelly from a prior race |
As you can read in the above linked articles, Jeff and Sheri Donnelly have cheated in multiple marathons, and disqualified from many of those. They also have run Boston based on bogus times at qualifiers, and Sheri Donnelly even forged a bib to run one year.
This is a new method of cheating, and I don’t know how far he would have gone to actually register and succesfully pick up a bib under the name of “Howard Goldman”, but I wouldn’t put much past the Donnelly’s as to how far they will go to run Boston.
I do not know for certain whether they have been permanently banned from Boston, but I would suspect that they have since he resorted to running under an alias. I will be reaching out to the B.A.A. for a statement.
The hat pulled down ploy almost worked. LOL
Thanks for the article…I become suspicious of the Donnelly's when they both completed a marathon in 2014 at the exact same time, but I never saw them ahead of me on the course. It was a small 1st year marathon with no timing mats. I was 3rd woman through the turnaround at mile 18, but I slowed in the final miles & 2 other women passed me. She was not one of them, but she bumped me out of my AG got her BQ. I had no evidence of cheating, though. Do a google search of race times & you'll see her half marathon times are far slower than a 3:29 marathoner's should be.
Same jowls… Now if he pulled down his hat AND for a face lift he'd have got away with it.
Wouldn't buying or forging a bib for Boston be easier? Charity entry? If you're not even going to use your own name… What's the point? As baffling as it is shameful.
I ran that race and finished 2nd. Still beat the cheater lol
I realize that you didn't expose this cheater – you're just reporting it. But thank you for this site. I've done Boston, but it might never have happened if enough people like this were allowed to slide through.
Next he will have plastic surgery or register as a woman and run in a dress to cheat his was in. This person is just sad.
Awesome. Taking cheating up a level. Rookie mistakes though – the marathon was too sparsely attended to pull that off, and he won an age group award. Both non-no's if you are cheating just to get a BQ.
An idea for a story. Athlinks/Marathon Guide copy results almost immediately and these usually include runners later disqualified (and exclude runners whose chip for example failed on race day). Athlinks flatly refuse to review or update results. A story based on most people looking for results on Athlinks and not the official results, which works to the cheats advantage and Athlinks may even be one of drivers why the cheats percentage is increasing.
Oh, and don't be too suspicious if someone entered with an alias. I've run many a marathon, honestly completing the whole distance, entered with different names. The reason is simply I run for me and it's no one else's business when, where and how many races I've completed.
This is why races should require identification when picking up the bib. Yes it can be given to someone else but fake names because you run for yourself? Ok, whatever.
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