Medal winner at age group Worlds admits cheating

Hamburg, Germany, September 24: A 70 year old German man apparently has to return his silver medal from the 2007 World Championships after he admitted to short cutting both the bike and the run course.

Juergen Broders from Petersdorf, Germany finished the race in 2:40:37 and crossed the finish line in the second fastest time of his age group. That meant the silver medal and quite a bit of fanfare at home for the 70 year old.

But all was not as good as it seemed and several fellow age group apparently raised questions about the finish of Broders. The issue then surfaced in various heated triathlon discussions and the pressure started to build. Today Broders admitted to www.tri-mag.de that he indeed shortcut the course. “I realized on the first lap of two that my time would not come close to the desired 1:06 for the 40K, so I decided to come back after the first lap and start the run, “ admitted Broders. He then apparently also decided to turn around at the 2.5k mark of the run, which happened to be the turn around of the parallel running sprint triathlon.

There also seem to be some questionable times in Broders past leading experts to believe that this may not be an isolated incidence. The 2004 results of the Hamburg City Man triathlon show an extremely fast 2:25 finish time with splits for the then 67 year old would be impressive at any age. 1:02:40 for the 40k bike and 38:46 for the 10k run.

The German Triathlon Union (DTU) will now most likely seek to ban Broders from racing for several years, plus of course he’ll have to return the medal.

Here is a link to a pic and a story when he had just returned home from the Worlds.

Via: www.tri-mag.de