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I especially appreciate the posting of the director's statement, the position of Bambi, and the opposing position offered by Colleen. Reading all these posts has been enlightening.
I have done many things in my life that resulted in receiving a medal or badge of honor and I have never considered taking a medal for something I didn't honestly complete. It never even occurred to me that someone would take a ride or cut a course in order to get an "alternate finish".
Unfortunately, some things are falling into place in my mind about a person I have considered a "friend" who told me about their plan to run a marathon with a charity. They never really seemed to be training, and then they came up with a finishers medal from a race in Hawaii... hmmmmm. There's no way that person ran that whole marathon in Hawaii. I thought at the time they were so under trained that they might actually die, considering the environmental differences between our dry environment where we live and the humidity of Hawaii. Now I have a different picture of that person.
Interestingly, that person doesn't speak of their marathon experience in the same way that most people do. There isn't the same tone of accomplishment and success in their voice when they tell the story. I have actually thought, "You mean you barely trained...I know that for a fact... and then you barely suffered, in that humidity? Weird, I guess."
As the race director pointed out, the Marine Corps motto is "Semper Fidelis", which means always faithful. By running a marathon, I set a goal to myself. Charity Runners set a goal to even more than themselves. As a back of the pack runner who is truly concerned about making cut offs, I am there out of faithfulness to myself; the charity runner is faithful to themselves and many, many others who potentially benefit from their fund raising. Charity teams are undoubtedly pressured by those outside forces in some instances to get across the line. I can nearly understand how those pressures could cause course cutting. I cannot understand the JeansMarines, not at all.
Giving someone a medal for not making the cut off time seems like a Red Badge of Courage to me& you came and tried but failed. Too me it seems like a valid course of action for a race director to give them a modified medal. I dont think it would serve any point to crush their spirit. A one year suspension for Jeans Marines seems appropriate too me.
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