Scottish Ultramarathon Runner Banned for Cheating
A Scottish ultramarathon runner has been banned for 12 months from competitive events after a disciplinary panel in the United Kingdom brought down a punitive decision in response to her cheating during a race earlier this year.
Joasia Zakrzewski admitted to using a car to gain mileage while running the 2023 GB Ultras Manchester to Liverpool race — a 50-mile-long ultramarathon that took place last April. Zakrzewski — who finished third — accepted a medal and a trophy from the marathon organizers, but eventually returned both and admitted after the fact to competing with an unfair edge, according to a written decision by the Independent Disciplinary Panel of UK Athletics in October.
"The claimant had collected the trophy at the end of the race, something which she should have not done if she was completing the race on a non-competitive basis," said the disciplinary panel, which noted that Zakrzewski "also did not seek to return the trophy in the week following the race."
By September, Zakrzewski had relinquished both prizes and admitted in a letter to the disciplinary panel that she completed part of the ultramarathon course by car and the rest on foot before accepting the third-place medal and trophy.
"In a letter, I acknowledge my actions on the day when I traveled in a car and later completed the run, crossing the finish line and receiving a medal and trophy, which I failed to return immediately as I should have," she stated, as reported by the panel.
A 47-year-old general practitioner originally from Dumfries, Scotland, Zakrzewski currently resides near Sydney, Australia, and made the journey from there to participate in the race from Manchester to Liverpool in the spring. According to BBC News, Zakrzewski had previously explained that she entered a car driven by her friend around the 25-mile mark of the ultramarathon in April. She had gotten lost and her leg was in pain. The friend transported Zakrzewski approximately 2 1/2 miles to the next race checkpoint, where she attempted to inform officials that she was quitting the ultramarathon. However, she ultimately decided to continue the race from that checkpoint.
"When I arrived at the checkpoint, I informed them that I was withdrawing and that I had been in the car, and they responded, 'you will hate yourself if you stop,'" Zakrzewski revealed to BBC News Scotland in the weeks following the ultramarathon. At that point, she had already confessed to using a car to participate and had been disqualified.
Zakrzewski claimed she did not breach the U.K. code of conduct for senior athletes because she "never intended to cheat, and had not concealed the fact that she had travelled in a car," wrote the disciplinary panel, which disagreed with those claims.
"Even if she was suffering from brain fog on the day of the race, she had a week following the race to realise her actions and return the trophy, which she did not do," the panel wrote in its decision. "Finally, she posted about the race on social media, and this did not disclose that she had completed the race on a non-competitive basis."
In addition to being banned from participating in competitive events for a year in the U.K., the disciplinary panel has also prohibited Zakrzewski from representing Great Britain in domestic and overseas events for the same period of time.
