A marathon personal best normally survives the journey home. This one barely survived the photographs.
Chinese fitness influencer Abeeeer crossed the finish line at the Berlin Marathon on Sunday September 27th in 4:53:46. She subsequently presented the performance to her substantial online following as a new personal best.
There was one rather important detail missing from those celebrations.
A photograph later emerged showing Abeeeer sitting on the back of a bicycle close to the 38km point of the course. Timing information from the race then placed her fastest 5km section within the same portion of the marathon.
What began as another social media post about completing one of the world’s largest races quickly became a controversy involving an apology, questions about her result and the end of her relationship with Brooks China.
A Finish That Initially Looked Unremarkable
A finishing time of 4:53:46 would not usually attract international attention at Berlin.
More than 50,000 people completed this year’s marathon, producing tens of thousands of personal stories across the same 42.195km course. Abeeeer’s following, reported to stand at around 530,000, gave her own result a far larger audience than most.
She shared the performance as a personal best without initially disclosing that she had travelled part of the course on a bicycle.
That omission eventually became more significant than the time itself.
The photograph was circulated by an Instagram account called the Official Marathon Time Integrity Unit. Despite its name, the account is not part of the Berlin Marathon organisation. It examines public race results and posts from influencers when performances appear misleading or incomplete.
Its attention turned towards Abeeeer after the image placed her on the bicycle near 38km.
The Split That Drew Further Attention
The photograph was supported by an unusual change in her recorded pace.
Abeeeer covered the section from 30km to 35km in 36:51. Her following 5km, from 35km to 40km, was completed in 30:49.
That represented an improvement of six minutes and two seconds from one 5km section to the next. The later split was also her fastest of the entire marathon.
A quicker closing section is not proof of wrongdoing by itself. Runners recover from difficult spells, respond to crowds and sometimes find energy they did not know they had.
In this case, however, the faster split contained the point where Abeeeer had been photographed sitting on the bicycle.
It is not possible to establish from those numbers alone how much distance she travelled while being carried. The photograph and her later admission do establish that bicycle assistance occurred during the race.
An Explanation Followed
Abeeeer initially said that she had become unwell during the marathon and got onto the bicycle while attempting to find a race official.
According to her account, she intended to withdraw before being told that approximately four kilometres remained and that a personal best was still possible. She claimed that she then returned to the location where she had boarded the bicycle and resumed running from there.
Even if that account is accepted in full, getting onto a bicycle during an active marathon interrupted the performance she later presented as a conventional personal best.
The issue was not simply how much ground she may have gained. It was also that the bicycle ride was absent from her original account of the race.
An Apology Changes The Tone
On Saturday October 3rd, Abeeeer published an apology acknowledging that she had broken the race rules.
She accepted that feeling unwell did not excuse her actions and admitted that her handling of the story after the race had been dishonest. She also apologised to fellow runners and to those who had supported her participation.
The apology removed any remaining argument over the basic event. Abeeeer had used a bicycle during the marathon, had not disclosed it while presenting the finish as a personal best and now accepted that this was wrong.
Her explanation that she returned to the same point may affect opinions about the distance covered. It does not restore the result as an uninterrupted marathon performance.
Brooks China Ends The Partnership
The consequences soon moved beyond online criticism.
Brooks China had supported Abeeeer’s Berlin Marathon attempt and supplied equipment for the race. After the photographs and timing information circulated, the company announced that it had ended its relationship with her.
The brand also apologised for its own handling of the situation.
Brooks China said its initial checks had concentrated on the finish result and the material supplied after the marathon. It accepted that it had not examined the full race closely enough, including the individual split data.
The company stated that it would not work with Abeeeer again and promised to review how future partnerships are selected and assessed.
That response turned an embarrassing race incident into a wider question about the relationship between running brands and online personalities.
More Than Six Minutes At Stake
The difference between Abeeeer’s 30km to 35km and 35km to 40km splits was just over six minutes. The real issue is considerably larger.
A personal best carries meaning because the runner is understood to have completed the full distance under the same basic conditions as everyone else. Pace can change, runners can stop and difficult moments can consume several minutes, but the course must still be completed on foot.
The majority of marathon runners will never receive sponsorship or share their result with hundreds of thousands of followers. Their times still represent months of training and every difficult kilometre covered on race day.
An influencer presenting a compromised performance as a personal best risks treating that trust as something flexible.
The photograph near 38km ensured that this particular story did not remain hidden. The apology confirmed the rule breach, while the loss of a sponsor gave it a consequence beyond an amended social media post.
Abeeeer reached the finish in 4:53:46, but that number can no longer carry the meaning she originally gave it.
Once a bicycle enters a marathon personal best, the clock is no longer the main problem.
