Nov. 10, 2026
Santa Barbara Police Investigating Mystery Illness That Sent 27 Half Marathoners To The Hospital
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RSS Feed It was a warmer than usual day for Santa Barbara’s half marathon over the weekend, but that doesn’t explain why 30 runners received medical treatment, 27 of them rushed to the emergency room with two ending up in the ICU. There are serious questions surrounding the mass mystery illness, where several runners fainted, lost consciousness or described feeling foggy with no memory of running portions of the race. Santa Barbara police are asking for the public’s help, even setting up a tip line for answers after unverified rumors on social media suggested a water station along the course may have been spiked. While there is no proof of any type of contamination, there is a search underway to figure out what went so wrong for more than two dozen runners.
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00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey there folks, it is Tuesday, November 10th, and we just heard a little over a week ago about a death during the New York City Marathon. Well now, there's been another health issue during another major race, this time a half marathon, and we are talking dozens of people ended up in the emergency room. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ, where this is still a mystery- But Robes, all signs point to, okay, something is up. This wasn't just people being exhausted running a race.
00:00:38
Speaker 2: Yes. And to that point, Santa Barbara police have officially opened an investigation into what they're calling the suspicious circumstances of that occurred during this half marathon. Yes, 30 runners received medical treatment. 27 of them went to the emergency room and two of them ended up in the ICU. That is not normal.
00:01:06
Speaker 1: Okay, the context there we were trying to, that we need to give here as runners. Marathons, awful, very difficult to do. People have all kinds of issues, understandably so If you're a runner, a half marathon is 13 miles. I'm not poo-pooing it. But, Robes, we don't see the type of same physical issues, medical emergencies you do in a full marathon. Robes, it's half the distance, but it's more than half easier. I say that in that, don't just say, oh, just double the effort. No, no, no. Robes, a half marathon is a different strain on the body to where hearing that 30 people went to the hospital, you would think, this was an attack of some kind.
00:01:52
Speaker 2: Yes, no, and even if you had 30 people going to the hospital in a marathon, that would still raise some eyebrows, but certainly in a half marathon where you had 7,500 runners. Think about the New York City Marathon had 61,000 marathoners. They didn't even have numbers like this. So yes, they described this as a larger than expected number of emergency visits, a number of them with similar symptoms of an undetermined cause. That is how they describe it. And look, we should point out that this race took place again, on Sunday in Santa Barbara, and the temperatures were higher than normal. So the temperatures were at about 80 degrees when a lot of these medical issues were taking place. I will even say I crossed the finish line in Berlin at 77 degrees. I was hot. And I was more winded than I would have been. I was more uncomfortable than I would have been. But it wouldn't have explained people who literally lost consciousness and passed out, fainted, were foggy. Runners describing not remembering large portions of the race.
00:03:06
Speaker 1: That is bizarre.
00:03:08
Speaker 2: Hallucinating? People were describing hallucinations. Now, some people say, yes, those are all signs of heat stroke. Those are all signs of dehydration. But in this large of a number, and by the way, this is so interesting, it all took place pretty much, the majority of the runners fell ill between 9.40 a.m., and 10.45 a.m. So there was about an hour stretch where all these people just started dropping right around mile 10.
00:03:33
Speaker 1: Okay, that was my question. Where around? So roads, if that's the case, it would suggest, look, I was doing some detective work. They must have ingested something in what, the mile or two or previous, right?
00:03:46
Speaker 2: That is what some people are pointing to. And that is why police are involved now. Because yes, if it's mother nature, if it's the weather, if it's, If it's heat related, weather related, okay, I guess that would make sense. But this is bizarre. When you start to actually look at what we do know, they say this all began with one runner feeling faint about an hour and 40 minutes into the race. And then after that, they said shortly later, runner after runner after runner began requesting medical assistance. I just feel like that is such a strange coincidence. And it's not just me or you. or anyone who runs marathons or half marathons who thinks this, like we said, the police have officially opened an investigation. They wouldn't do that if they didn't think there was something potentially fishy going on.
00:04:44
Speaker 1: Robes, it's fishy just by the circumstances. Robes, was this an intentional act?
00:04:52
Speaker 2: That's the concern.
00:04:52
Speaker 1: This could be an accident, I guess, Robes. But we know this as well. Well, I'm not sure if you thought about this at all. Those cups, those water cups sitting on those tables are just sitting out. And the people that are handing them out have their backs to them as they're handing them out to runners. Now, who's keeping an eye on those cups? I'm thinking about it now. It's just, oh, my goodness. You could easily just go by there and... Throw some stuff in a bunch of cups if you want to.
00:05:21
Speaker 2: It's freaky because now, honestly, look, even if... They're somehow able to point to something other than a deliberate act of an individual contaminating water cups, electrolytes, some sort of nutritional supplement that was being handed out. I've already was leaning towards having my own. You know, I've had this conversation with my own water bottle. This has now just solidified it for me. Even the thought or the suggestion that somebody could put something in those cups or in the main source. And you've worked so hard. And look, I don't want to poo-poo training for a half marathon. It's just relative to a marathon. Yes, we have that perspective. But for a lot of folks, this is a bucket list once in a lifetime. For me, for a long time, I ran my first half marathon in my 40s. I actually, that was a lifetime goal that I didn't even know that my body would be able to achieve at one point. So it is a big deal. And a lot of people train for a long time for this. But Some of the runners who run this race every year, who are very well conditioned for half marathons, have all described what happened as out of the ordinary. One runner said it wasn't even that hot. It doesn't make sense to me how many people were all having heat stroke at the same time. I wouldn't be surprised if someone put something in the water.
00:06:41
Speaker 1: Well, he said, or whoever that was, said heat stroke, but the authorities aren't using that language right now.
00:06:45
Speaker 2: They're just saying that would be the only thing that would make sense, but how would all those people... That many people in a short period of time all suffer the same kind of heat-related illness. Unless, look, if this were a race where it was a crazy hot temperature and people were dropping like flies, fine. But that's not how it's being described.
00:07:06
Speaker 1: How hot did you say it was?
00:07:07
Speaker 2: 80 degrees at 10 a.m. when this started happening? That's hot. But it's not.
00:07:12
Speaker 1: In Santa Barbara? Excuse me, I'm saying, is it humid?
00:07:15
Speaker 2: Hot? No, it's not humid. And they're running along the water. So there's a breeze. This is like an ocean side. In fact, this is a half marathon that I have absolutely considered doing and wanted to put on our radar because it's gorgeous in Santa Barbara. And it's a half marathon. Like, check, check, and check. But I thought it was... Like, I was listening to some of the folks who were either impacted by this and experienced. One woman who actually spoke... was still in the hospital. And she's the one who said she lost consciousness for nearly an hour and cannot remember portions of the race. Um, she said I was unconscious for almost an hour and she was talking to other people who were in the hospital with her. None of us remember running a portion of the race. And the mom of one of the rummer runners said this, you can see on her Garmin watch, she went from a really decent pace to a sudden crawl. She has no memory of the finish line. She said she just saw it and felt like she was running through jello. There are common stories of runners, and a lot of these folks made it to the finish line. And it was after they crossed over, they started to deteriorate, have to seek medical attention. Some people actually drove straight to the emergency room. Some people were taken away on stretchers, in ambulances, went to medical tents.
00:08:34
Speaker 1: Is that a heat stroke, a memory loss from heat stroke? No.
00:08:38
Speaker 2: Look, I have had a heat-related impairment when running, and it's always been just dehydration, nausea. It's not been losing consciousness or not remembering parts of the race or feeling like I was running through jello. No, those sound like something very, very different than a heat-related illness from running.
00:09:05
Speaker 1: No, just what could it... They're going to figure this out, I guess. Are they going to catch the culprit? Robes, this sounds criminal. I mean, I guess something accidentally, something could have gotten mixed up, but to have whatever substance it was, to have this type of impact, it almost feels like it had the impact you were expecting it to have or somebody might have wanted it to have to get people sick.
00:09:28
Speaker 2: That is so concerning and disturbing on a number of levels. And look, look, I even wondered, but this isn't possible. This isn't mass hysteria because I was even in my head thinking, okay, people are worried and concerned because of the death on the marathon here in New York City with this young woman who, Rachel Appa, who had this very, I mean, a little known sort of disorder happened to her. maybe people were in their heads and worried and that doesn't make sense. So because their symptoms were nothing like what we heard described in New York City's marathon.
00:10:06
Speaker 1: And also their symptoms were confirmed at the hospital.
00:10:09
Speaker 2: Correct. Correct. So yes, when we come back, we're going to talk about some of these theories that are circulating on social media, what race officials have said and what police are saying about where this investigation goes next. Welcome back everyone to Amy and TJ. Something is up. Something went terribly wrong. in the Santa Barbara Half Marathon, and we don't know exactly what happened. There was a mystery illness that swept through 30 runners. That doesn't make any sense. All within about an hour's period of time, how do 27 people go to the emergency room?
00:11:01
Speaker 1: In a half marathon.
00:11:02
Speaker 2: After a half marathon in Santa Barbara, where it did get to about 82 degrees, they said.
00:11:09
Speaker 1: I mean, that's, yeah, babe, that's hot. I mean, it's not so bananas that you wouldn't start or you wouldn't run a 13 mile race.
00:11:20
Speaker 2: And most of these folks live in Santa Barbara, right? And yes, they say normally this time of year, this race runs in the 70s. So it's not that big of a difference. They said it was a little bit warmer than it typically was. But California has been experiencing some warmer weather, but you've been training for this. And by the way, the mom I described before the break who talked about her daughter having a great pace and then all of a sudden just went to a crawl and then has no memory of the finish line, she said her daughter trained. was like absolutely at the peak of her fitness level, knows Santa Barbara weather, lives in Santa Barbara. The weather doesn't explain what happened to her daughter. And that's what you're hearing from a lot of these runners. Like, yeah, this is our hometown. We know what it's like to run in warmer weather.
00:12:04
Speaker 1: How hot would it have had to be for you to go, oh, okay, I see why this many people had issues. Rose, you'd have to tell me it was 95 plus.
00:12:11
Speaker 2: Well, and the humidity would have to be high too. Like high humidity, like unbearable conditions. Or basically, I would say any departure from the norm where you're like, you have race officials saying, It was so much.
00:12:22
Speaker 1: Hotter than normal. They will warn you. They will.
00:12:24
Speaker 2: And we have been warned. We have run a couple of New York City marathons that did have heat warnings attached to them. This was not happening in Santa Barbara.
00:12:33
Speaker 1: Didn't we have a race that was canceled because of wind or something here that was scared that stuff was going to fly off? Thunderstorms.
00:12:37
Speaker 2: It was actually when we were in Memphis. We were running. We were about to run a Memorial Day race.
00:12:42
Speaker 1: But that and there was one here. We didn't run it. We felt bad for it. It might have been the Brooklyn half. that just the wind was high. The weather was fine, but the wind was high. What we're saying is they take runner safety pretty damn seriously. And if they think there's anything up, you'll start getting notices a day, a week ahead of time. Heads up, this is going on. Make sure you mind your water if it's going to be too hot. Yeah.
00:13:06
Speaker 2: So the race officials are just kind of like, yeah, I mean, it was a little warmer than normal, but obviously they would not want it to They wouldn't want to believe that one of their electrolyte water stations was compromised in any way. But look, they describe there were, and this happens in just about every race, there was a water slash electrolyte station every one and a half to two and a half miles along the course. For those who don't know, a half marathon is 13.1 miles long. So there are multiple water electrolyte stations along the way. And to have a very specific leg of this run, and yes, it was at the end where everyone fell ill. Look, that is a little alarming and there are, and there, if you go online, there are rumors going like crazy. circulating on social media suggesting that yes, a water station along the course must have been contaminated, must have been spiked. Something happened that these runners all somehow drank from this water. Now at the hospital, we don't know what kind of testing was being done, but the police are looking at what the hospital has found. And from what we, the last I checked, 28 went to the emergency room, 24 were treated and released. There were two in ICU. We know a couple people are still in the hospital. So this is serious. This is not just, oh, I got a little dehydrated and I need some IV fluids. So look, there is no confirmation at this point, obviously, that there was any known contamination. But that is what police are trying to find out. So they have set up a tip line. They are asking anyone with information to contact the Santa Barbara Police Department. And I don't think they would do this if there weren't enough information puzzling, mysterious issues with the situation that happened. They wouldn't just put out an investigation or conduct an investigation if they didn't feel like there was something that they might find.
00:15:02
Speaker 1: Robes, they need help. It's obvious something happened. They need to find out what happened to these people, if it was intentional or not. We could leave space. Robes, it could have been an accident. But they have to figure this out. And the Santa Barbara Marathon, half-marathon folks, need them to figure this out. The community of Santa Barbara needs this to be figured out. Ropes, you might have somebody out there willing to do this. What else are they willing to do?
00:15:26
Speaker 2: And honestly, even just hearing the story, thinking that this might put an idea in someone's mind scares the heck out of me as well. Because honestly, this never even crossed my mind. I absolutely drink from those water stations. I try not to do it that much because it ends up making me feel a little sick sometimes, but yeah, you need water along the way. And I'm telling you, I am ending this episode and going on to Amazon and purchasing a band with a water bottle because yes, this is it, I'm done. I absolutely am not going to take any chances. The thought of that is now forever in my head. I don't think I can unhear the possibility that someone would have the access to do this. There are enough sick people in the world. Sorry, but it's just true.
00:16:15
Speaker 1: There's one other thing to consider. You know what? Maybe I'm just thinking about this because it's New York. Robes, there's people, a million folks lining the streets. You have seen me take a beer from a complete stranger. Yep. During a race. Yep.
00:16:29
Speaker 2: You get desperate when you're hungry, thirsty, need some sort of fuel.
00:16:33
Speaker 1: Was it possible somebody was handing out something else? Completely... aside from any water station.
00:16:39
Speaker 2: It might not be an established water station. It could have been someone, and maybe it was even unintentional. I don't know. Maybe someone didn't have the same kind of hygiene that other people do and they're handing out orange slices. They're handing out, you know, there are plenty of items that folks hand out with their bare hands to runners. And when you're running and you need a little extra boost, you're not thinking, hmm, did that person wash their hands? What's their hygiene in their kitchen like? No, you're just grabbing stuff and taking it. So there are all sorts of possibilities. It could have been criminal. It could be accidental. And who knows? We may never find out, but let's hope we get some answers out of Santa Barbara. And just wanted to put this on your radar. Runners have had a tough couple of weeks here, but we shall persevere. And with that, everyone, we always appreciate you listening to us. I'm Amy Robach, alongside TJ Holmes.
00:17:31
Speaker 1: We'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1: Hey there folks, it is Tuesday, November 10th, and we just heard a little over a week ago about a death during the New York City Marathon. Well now, there's been another health issue during another major race, this time a half marathon, and we are talking dozens of people ended up in the emergency room. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ, where this is still a mystery- But Robes, all signs point to, okay, something is up. This wasn't just people being exhausted running a race.
00:00:38
Speaker 2: Yes. And to that point, Santa Barbara police have officially opened an investigation into what they're calling the suspicious circumstances of that occurred during this half marathon. Yes, 30 runners received medical treatment. 27 of them went to the emergency room and two of them ended up in the ICU. That is not normal.
00:01:06
Speaker 1: Okay, the context there we were trying to, that we need to give here as runners. Marathons, awful, very difficult to do. People have all kinds of issues, understandably so If you're a runner, a half marathon is 13 miles. I'm not poo-pooing it. But, Robes, we don't see the type of same physical issues, medical emergencies you do in a full marathon. Robes, it's half the distance, but it's more than half easier. I say that in that, don't just say, oh, just double the effort. No, no, no. Robes, a half marathon is a different strain on the body to where hearing that 30 people went to the hospital, you would think, this was an attack of some kind.
00:01:52
Speaker 2: Yes, no, and even if you had 30 people going to the hospital in a marathon, that would still raise some eyebrows, but certainly in a half marathon where you had 7,500 runners. Think about the New York City Marathon had 61,000 marathoners. They didn't even have numbers like this. So yes, they described this as a larger than expected number of emergency visits, a number of them with similar symptoms of an undetermined cause. That is how they describe it. And look, we should point out that this race took place again, on Sunday in Santa Barbara, and the temperatures were higher than normal. So the temperatures were at about 80 degrees when a lot of these medical issues were taking place. I will even say I crossed the finish line in Berlin at 77 degrees. I was hot. And I was more winded than I would have been. I was more uncomfortable than I would have been. But it wouldn't have explained people who literally lost consciousness and passed out, fainted, were foggy. Runners describing not remembering large portions of the race.
00:03:06
Speaker 1: That is bizarre.
00:03:08
Speaker 2: Hallucinating? People were describing hallucinations. Now, some people say, yes, those are all signs of heat stroke. Those are all signs of dehydration. But in this large of a number, and by the way, this is so interesting, it all took place pretty much, the majority of the runners fell ill between 9.40 a.m., and 10.45 a.m. So there was about an hour stretch where all these people just started dropping right around mile 10.
00:03:33
Speaker 1: Okay, that was my question. Where around? So roads, if that's the case, it would suggest, look, I was doing some detective work. They must have ingested something in what, the mile or two or previous, right?
00:03:46
Speaker 2: That is what some people are pointing to. And that is why police are involved now. Because yes, if it's mother nature, if it's the weather, if it's, If it's heat related, weather related, okay, I guess that would make sense. But this is bizarre. When you start to actually look at what we do know, they say this all began with one runner feeling faint about an hour and 40 minutes into the race. And then after that, they said shortly later, runner after runner after runner began requesting medical assistance. I just feel like that is such a strange coincidence. And it's not just me or you. or anyone who runs marathons or half marathons who thinks this, like we said, the police have officially opened an investigation. They wouldn't do that if they didn't think there was something potentially fishy going on.
00:04:44
Speaker 1: Robes, it's fishy just by the circumstances. Robes, was this an intentional act?
00:04:52
Speaker 2: That's the concern.
00:04:52
Speaker 1: This could be an accident, I guess, Robes. But we know this as well. Well, I'm not sure if you thought about this at all. Those cups, those water cups sitting on those tables are just sitting out. And the people that are handing them out have their backs to them as they're handing them out to runners. Now, who's keeping an eye on those cups? I'm thinking about it now. It's just, oh, my goodness. You could easily just go by there and... Throw some stuff in a bunch of cups if you want to.
00:05:21
Speaker 2: It's freaky because now, honestly, look, even if... They're somehow able to point to something other than a deliberate act of an individual contaminating water cups, electrolytes, some sort of nutritional supplement that was being handed out. I've already was leaning towards having my own. You know, I've had this conversation with my own water bottle. This has now just solidified it for me. Even the thought or the suggestion that somebody could put something in those cups or in the main source. And you've worked so hard. And look, I don't want to poo-poo training for a half marathon. It's just relative to a marathon. Yes, we have that perspective. But for a lot of folks, this is a bucket list once in a lifetime. For me, for a long time, I ran my first half marathon in my 40s. I actually, that was a lifetime goal that I didn't even know that my body would be able to achieve at one point. So it is a big deal. And a lot of people train for a long time for this. But Some of the runners who run this race every year, who are very well conditioned for half marathons, have all described what happened as out of the ordinary. One runner said it wasn't even that hot. It doesn't make sense to me how many people were all having heat stroke at the same time. I wouldn't be surprised if someone put something in the water.
00:06:41
Speaker 1: Well, he said, or whoever that was, said heat stroke, but the authorities aren't using that language right now.
00:06:45
Speaker 2: They're just saying that would be the only thing that would make sense, but how would all those people... That many people in a short period of time all suffer the same kind of heat-related illness. Unless, look, if this were a race where it was a crazy hot temperature and people were dropping like flies, fine. But that's not how it's being described.
00:07:06
Speaker 1: How hot did you say it was?
00:07:07
Speaker 2: 80 degrees at 10 a.m. when this started happening? That's hot. But it's not.
00:07:12
Speaker 1: In Santa Barbara? Excuse me, I'm saying, is it humid?
00:07:15
Speaker 2: Hot? No, it's not humid. And they're running along the water. So there's a breeze. This is like an ocean side. In fact, this is a half marathon that I have absolutely considered doing and wanted to put on our radar because it's gorgeous in Santa Barbara. And it's a half marathon. Like, check, check, and check. But I thought it was... Like, I was listening to some of the folks who were either impacted by this and experienced. One woman who actually spoke... was still in the hospital. And she's the one who said she lost consciousness for nearly an hour and cannot remember portions of the race. Um, she said I was unconscious for almost an hour and she was talking to other people who were in the hospital with her. None of us remember running a portion of the race. And the mom of one of the rummer runners said this, you can see on her Garmin watch, she went from a really decent pace to a sudden crawl. She has no memory of the finish line. She said she just saw it and felt like she was running through jello. There are common stories of runners, and a lot of these folks made it to the finish line. And it was after they crossed over, they started to deteriorate, have to seek medical attention. Some people actually drove straight to the emergency room. Some people were taken away on stretchers, in ambulances, went to medical tents.
00:08:34
Speaker 1: Is that a heat stroke, a memory loss from heat stroke? No.
00:08:38
Speaker 2: Look, I have had a heat-related impairment when running, and it's always been just dehydration, nausea. It's not been losing consciousness or not remembering parts of the race or feeling like I was running through jello. No, those sound like something very, very different than a heat-related illness from running.
00:09:05
Speaker 1: No, just what could it... They're going to figure this out, I guess. Are they going to catch the culprit? Robes, this sounds criminal. I mean, I guess something accidentally, something could have gotten mixed up, but to have whatever substance it was, to have this type of impact, it almost feels like it had the impact you were expecting it to have or somebody might have wanted it to have to get people sick.
00:09:28
Speaker 2: That is so concerning and disturbing on a number of levels. And look, look, I even wondered, but this isn't possible. This isn't mass hysteria because I was even in my head thinking, okay, people are worried and concerned because of the death on the marathon here in New York City with this young woman who, Rachel Appa, who had this very, I mean, a little known sort of disorder happened to her. maybe people were in their heads and worried and that doesn't make sense. So because their symptoms were nothing like what we heard described in New York City's marathon.
00:10:06
Speaker 1: And also their symptoms were confirmed at the hospital.
00:10:09
Speaker 2: Correct. Correct. So yes, when we come back, we're going to talk about some of these theories that are circulating on social media, what race officials have said and what police are saying about where this investigation goes next. Welcome back everyone to Amy and TJ. Something is up. Something went terribly wrong. in the Santa Barbara Half Marathon, and we don't know exactly what happened. There was a mystery illness that swept through 30 runners. That doesn't make any sense. All within about an hour's period of time, how do 27 people go to the emergency room?
00:11:01
Speaker 1: In a half marathon.
00:11:02
Speaker 2: After a half marathon in Santa Barbara, where it did get to about 82 degrees, they said.
00:11:09
Speaker 1: I mean, that's, yeah, babe, that's hot. I mean, it's not so bananas that you wouldn't start or you wouldn't run a 13 mile race.
00:11:20
Speaker 2: And most of these folks live in Santa Barbara, right? And yes, they say normally this time of year, this race runs in the 70s. So it's not that big of a difference. They said it was a little bit warmer than it typically was. But California has been experiencing some warmer weather, but you've been training for this. And by the way, the mom I described before the break who talked about her daughter having a great pace and then all of a sudden just went to a crawl and then has no memory of the finish line, she said her daughter trained. was like absolutely at the peak of her fitness level, knows Santa Barbara weather, lives in Santa Barbara. The weather doesn't explain what happened to her daughter. And that's what you're hearing from a lot of these runners. Like, yeah, this is our hometown. We know what it's like to run in warmer weather.
00:12:04
Speaker 1: How hot would it have had to be for you to go, oh, okay, I see why this many people had issues. Rose, you'd have to tell me it was 95 plus.
00:12:11
Speaker 2: Well, and the humidity would have to be high too. Like high humidity, like unbearable conditions. Or basically, I would say any departure from the norm where you're like, you have race officials saying, It was so much.
00:12:22
Speaker 1: Hotter than normal. They will warn you. They will.
00:12:24
Speaker 2: And we have been warned. We have run a couple of New York City marathons that did have heat warnings attached to them. This was not happening in Santa Barbara.
00:12:33
Speaker 1: Didn't we have a race that was canceled because of wind or something here that was scared that stuff was going to fly off? Thunderstorms.
00:12:37
Speaker 2: It was actually when we were in Memphis. We were running. We were about to run a Memorial Day race.
00:12:42
Speaker 1: But that and there was one here. We didn't run it. We felt bad for it. It might have been the Brooklyn half. that just the wind was high. The weather was fine, but the wind was high. What we're saying is they take runner safety pretty damn seriously. And if they think there's anything up, you'll start getting notices a day, a week ahead of time. Heads up, this is going on. Make sure you mind your water if it's going to be too hot. Yeah.
00:13:06
Speaker 2: So the race officials are just kind of like, yeah, I mean, it was a little warmer than normal, but obviously they would not want it to They wouldn't want to believe that one of their electrolyte water stations was compromised in any way. But look, they describe there were, and this happens in just about every race, there was a water slash electrolyte station every one and a half to two and a half miles along the course. For those who don't know, a half marathon is 13.1 miles long. So there are multiple water electrolyte stations along the way. And to have a very specific leg of this run, and yes, it was at the end where everyone fell ill. Look, that is a little alarming and there are, and there, if you go online, there are rumors going like crazy. circulating on social media suggesting that yes, a water station along the course must have been contaminated, must have been spiked. Something happened that these runners all somehow drank from this water. Now at the hospital, we don't know what kind of testing was being done, but the police are looking at what the hospital has found. And from what we, the last I checked, 28 went to the emergency room, 24 were treated and released. There were two in ICU. We know a couple people are still in the hospital. So this is serious. This is not just, oh, I got a little dehydrated and I need some IV fluids. So look, there is no confirmation at this point, obviously, that there was any known contamination. But that is what police are trying to find out. So they have set up a tip line. They are asking anyone with information to contact the Santa Barbara Police Department. And I don't think they would do this if there weren't enough information puzzling, mysterious issues with the situation that happened. They wouldn't just put out an investigation or conduct an investigation if they didn't feel like there was something that they might find.
00:15:02
Speaker 1: Robes, they need help. It's obvious something happened. They need to find out what happened to these people, if it was intentional or not. We could leave space. Robes, it could have been an accident. But they have to figure this out. And the Santa Barbara Marathon, half-marathon folks, need them to figure this out. The community of Santa Barbara needs this to be figured out. Ropes, you might have somebody out there willing to do this. What else are they willing to do?
00:15:26
Speaker 2: And honestly, even just hearing the story, thinking that this might put an idea in someone's mind scares the heck out of me as well. Because honestly, this never even crossed my mind. I absolutely drink from those water stations. I try not to do it that much because it ends up making me feel a little sick sometimes, but yeah, you need water along the way. And I'm telling you, I am ending this episode and going on to Amazon and purchasing a band with a water bottle because yes, this is it, I'm done. I absolutely am not going to take any chances. The thought of that is now forever in my head. I don't think I can unhear the possibility that someone would have the access to do this. There are enough sick people in the world. Sorry, but it's just true.
00:16:15
Speaker 1: There's one other thing to consider. You know what? Maybe I'm just thinking about this because it's New York. Robes, there's people, a million folks lining the streets. You have seen me take a beer from a complete stranger. Yep. During a race. Yep.
00:16:29
Speaker 2: You get desperate when you're hungry, thirsty, need some sort of fuel.
00:16:33
Speaker 1: Was it possible somebody was handing out something else? Completely... aside from any water station.
00:16:39
Speaker 2: It might not be an established water station. It could have been someone, and maybe it was even unintentional. I don't know. Maybe someone didn't have the same kind of hygiene that other people do and they're handing out orange slices. They're handing out, you know, there are plenty of items that folks hand out with their bare hands to runners. And when you're running and you need a little extra boost, you're not thinking, hmm, did that person wash their hands? What's their hygiene in their kitchen like? No, you're just grabbing stuff and taking it. So there are all sorts of possibilities. It could have been criminal. It could be accidental. And who knows? We may never find out, but let's hope we get some answers out of Santa Barbara. And just wanted to put this on your radar. Runners have had a tough couple of weeks here, but we shall persevere. And with that, everyone, we always appreciate you listening to us. I'm Amy Robach, alongside TJ Holmes.
00:17:31
Speaker 1: We'll talk to you soon.