Meet Tabatha Hamilton, a 31-year-old woman who won Sunday’s Chickamauga Battlefield Marathon in 2 hours, 55 minutes and 39 seconds. A damn good time but perhaps too good. You see, according to race officials, Hamilton ran the second half of the marathon in 49 minutes. The previous world record for the half was 58 minutes.
Not surprisingly, she was disqualified as a result.
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Hamilton says she finished the race and even told two reporters that she bested her personal record by several minutes. Turns out, she bested her personal record by an hour and a half.
WHAT?!
Hamilton ran four marathons in 2009 and 2011 in times ranging from 4:25:08 to 4:48:47, that latter one at Chickamauga, but running databases show none faster than that. In fact, her marathon times since 2011 have been above five hours, according to the databases.
I certainly don’t want to lead you down the wrong path, I’m no race expert and I often huff and puff on my way to the fridge. That being said, there’s something wrong here. Perhaps she took a wrong turn somewhere, perhaps the timer was wrong, perhaps someone at the finish line wasn’t paying attention.
I don’t know. Either way, I think we can all agree that there’s NO WAY she broke the world record by 9 MINUTES! NOPE, not possible. Unless, wait, did she take a cab like Geoffrey Butler?
[Deadspin]
