When I got the link to "my" official photos from marathonfoto, I found pictures of four other people wearing my bib number! My guess is they used the bib photo that I posted on instragram or purchased the fake bibs from someone who did. In either case, this makes me so upset!! Thousands of people worked really hard to qualify for Boston or raised a ton of money for charity in order to earn a bib, and many who qualified by a minute or less were unable to register because the race was full, so to use a fake bib to bandit the race is just not right. Not to mention this poses a serious security threat. They even posed with finisher medals as though they deserved to be there. Obviously they got away with it insofar as they completed the race and took home finisher medals, but I hope they can at least be identified and disqualified from future races.
I also hope that this will serve as a cautionary tale... It never would have occurred to me that someone would do this, so I didn't think twice about posting a bib photo on social media in my excitement leading up to the race. In hindsight, that was probably naive of me, and I certainly won't be doing that again. Be careful what you post!
I hope they catch whomever the counterfeiter is, whether it be the runners themselves or someone who sold them the bibs!
ReplyDeleteI support your search Kara!
ReplyDeleteOOOOH! This makes me so angry!! I really hope those frauds are exposed! They are a disgrace to the running community and belittle the hard work and determination the true entrants to the race put it to truly qualify. Shame of them! I hope they are outed and reprimanded in some way for this.
ReplyDeleteThe one on the top left appears to be wearing a Big River Running Company shirt. They are located in St. Louis. Sorry this happened to you.
ReplyDeleteI've contacted the Big River Running Company about this... maybe they can help! I never even thought that anyone would ever do this. Kinda sad.
ReplyDeleteBlame the bandits for deciding to steal a race entry and finisher metal. Don't blame yourself for posting the bib online. They could have found a picture many other placea.
ReplyDelete