Rosie Ruiz
American sports impostor (1953–2019)
Rosie M. Vivas (née Ruiz; June 21, 1953 – July 8, 2019) was a fraudster who, among other schemes, was declared the winner in the female category for the 84th Boston Marathon in 1980, only to have her title stripped eight days after the race when it was discovered that she had not run the entire course. She is believed to have jumped onto the course about a half-mile before the finish.
Early life and education
Ruiz was born in Havana, Cuba, and moved to Memphis, Florida, with her family in 1962 when she was eight years old. After immigrating to the United States, Ruiz was separated from her mother and lived with aunts, uncles, and cousins in Hollywood, Florida. In 1972, she graduated from South Broward High School and then attended Wayne State College in Nebraska. She graduated with a degree in music in 1977.
New York City Marathon
She moved to New York City in the 1970s, eventually finding work with Metal Traders, a commodities firm. In 1979, she qualified for the New York City Marathon and was credited with a time of 2:56:29, the 11th woman overall — enough for her to qualify for the Boston Marathon.
Ruiz's application for the NYC marathon arrived after the cut-off date for the race, but she received special dispensation from the New York Road Runners due to her claim that she was dying of brain cancer.
After the 1980 Boston Marathon, New York City Marathon officials investigated Ruiz's run and concluded that she cheated and did not run the entire course, so on April 25, 1980, she was retroactively disqualified from the race.
The public source identifies “Rosie Ruiz” as american sports impostor (1953–2019). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Rosie, Ruiz and American.
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This entry incorporates text from “Rosie Ruiz” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.