Man accused of cheating drops out of trans-America record attempt

Robert Young, known as Marathon Man UK, has dropped out of his attempt to cross the United States in record-breaking time.

Robert Young Marathon Man

Robert Young, the British runner who was attempting to set a new record for the fastest crossing of the United States, has dropped out thanks to an injury. His record run has been under scrutiny from the online forum, LetsRun.com, since the beginning of June after allegations of him cheating surfaced.

RELATED: LetsRun.com users play hardball and claim that man’s run across the U.S. is fake.

“Unfortunately it [Young dropping out] is true, due to injury,” spokesman Oliver Weingarten said in an email to Canadian Running.

Young, known as Marathon Man UK, posted on Facebook on June 17 that he suffered a fracture of his right toe and noted that “we are still going to battle on.” Young did not run again following his visit to the hospital.

Following allegations of cheating, Barkley Marathons organizer Gary Cantrell, known popularly as Lazarus Lake, met up with Young on his cross-country trip to verify the validity of the run. The 33-year-old began to slow down while under the eye of Cantrell relative to his record-setting pace that he was running in previous weeks.

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The source of the controversy came from a video posted to the online forum that showed Young and the group’s accompanying RV drive by, at running speed, a local gas station with Young believed to be in the van. Extended footage, not seen in the original clip, revealed that Young was in fact running behind the RV.

Alleged discrepancy between his GPS tracking data and daily mileage plus his mysterious backstory continued to fuel the controversy. Young and his crew denied all allegations of cheating. See the full backstory here.

Young first left Huntington Beach, California on May 14 and headed east towards New York City. He made it to day 34 and had covered more than 3,200 kilometres. He had approximately 1,500 kilometres remaining in the run.

RELATED: Runner banned from the Boston Marathon for falsifying her qualifying time.

The current record of 46 days, 8 hours, and 36 minutes, set by Frank Giannino Jr. in 1980 is no longer in jeopardy following Young’s abandonment of the attempt.

His full statement can be found below:

“It is with some regret that today I am announcing my decision to abandon this attempt to break Frank Giannini’s US Transcon World Record, based on medical reasons.

The run had gone pretty smoothly up until Indianapolis, Indiana, where I started to experience severe pain in my right big toe and the side of my foot. An X-Ray confirmed there was a small fracture and, more importantly, an infection which is not allowed me to walk on my foot properly since. It was decided I needed to follow an aggressive course of 24 hour treatment (several antibiotics and icing) to see if that would improve things. Unfortunately it didn’t so we made the decision not to continue and still on several antibiotics.

Of course it’s disappointing not to have succeeded in what I set out to do and not to have raised more awareness and funds for the 3 charities I was representing on this trip. That said we feel we touched many lives on our journey and had an incredible adventure into America, with many highs (and a few lows). I hope what we have done will have inspired some children to go for their grandest dreams and to believe that amazing things are possible for us all. Hopefully they will want to get out and run or exercise in some other way by hearing our story.

I’d like to thank my sponsors Skins for their incredible support and providing me with all the practical support I needed to be able to take on this challenge. Additionally I’d like to thank my crew, Dustin and Michael, and all the many, many people who came out to run with me and cheer me on along the way. Also included in that list is all the Americans who we met by chance along the way, many of whom offered their homes, food, supplies, encouragement, business expertise to help us achieve our goal and make our journey easier.

While we were running it became clear that what I was trying to do was being treated with skepticism by a small group of individuals in the running community. I can assure you that all accusations against us of cheating are entirely unfounded. In our record bid we felt we were taking all reasonable measure to verify the authenticity of the run, including everything to satisfy Guinness guidelines and more besides. We were transparent and out in the open, findable by a tracker, and therefore surprised by the furor. In order to clear up this matter, in the next few days all data from the trip, which should exonerate me from any suggestion of wrongdoing, will be made available for examination by all concerned parties.

I am resting right now with friends before heading back to the UK to spend time with my fiancee and kids. Going forward I will be back with other crazy challenges and am determined to try this Transcon again and get all the way to NYC. I am also planning to return to the USA soon to run a 6 day race somewhere.
I’d like to reiterate that while there is a little disappointment we didn’t hit New York with that record I really am taking all the positives from the experience. Records are incidental. It is about making connections, inspiring both kids and adults to reach high, to believe in their wildest dreams and to never give up. If my running on this trip has done some of this, and raised money for some of those most vulnerable and most in need of help too, then I’m sorry but I just can’t see it as a failure.

Finally I’d like to thank the American people again for being so generous to us on our trip. This is an incredible country in so many ways and it was a privilege to run through so much of it, see the awesome sights and meet so many inspirational people along the way.”

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