Apparently 14 runners have been disqualified for failing to complete the full distance at the 2012 and 2013 Comrades Marathons.
I’m not convinced.
Although 20 runners were charged with misconduct, six of them had a valid story. These runners had retired from the race but the bailers’ bus had dropped them back on the course and they were “forced” to cross the finish line. I find this story a hard to digest. My understanding is that race numbers are either confiscated, destroyed or permanently marked when entering the bus. If this story is true then it should have thus been immediately obvious to officials that the runners in question had dropped out of the race. Their times should never have been recorded and they certainly should not have received medals (which presumably at least some of them did, since they have been instructed to return them!).
So that leaves the 14 runners who were disqualified. Were any of them among the group of mysterious negative splits identified previously? Unless KZNA or the CMA releases the names or race numbers, I guess we’ll never know.