British triathletes (铁人三项运动员) Jess Learn month and Georgia Taylor-Brown were disqualified from an Olympics qualification race in Tokyo on August 9, 2019 because they crossed the finish line while holding hands. The pair had a huge lead on the rest of their competitors in the event, and surviving extreme temperatures during the race in the 2020 Olympics host city, they held hands as they finished. At first, Learn month was considered the champion and Taylor-Brown the second place, but they technically broke competition rules and were punished for it.
As the BBC explained, International Triathlon Union (ITU) competition rule 2. 11 states that "athletes who finish in an abnormal tie situation, where no effort to separate their finish times has been made, will be disqualified".
Looking at the video, they don' t appear to be purposefully attempting to tie, and since Learn month was the original winner, what does it matter? It looks like they' re both simply trying to support each other after finishing a race during which the temperature was so pretty high that the running section was cut from 10 kilometers to five. Safety during a heat wave has been a serious concern, as 57 people in Japan have died since late July, according to Reuters, because of the extreme temperatures.
An appeal against the result was refused, the BBC reported, so Bermuda' s Flora Duffy was declared the champion with Italy' s Alice Betto promoted to second and Britain' s Vicky Holland to third.
