2012 London Games - For 2 U.S. Runners, Dead Heat Controversy Simply Will Not Die - NYTimes.com The sprinter Jeneba Tarmoh is in Los Angeles, training to run in a relay in London, and still struggling to understand how a close race at the United States Olympic trials nearly three weeks ago became a national controversy and left her without a spot in the 100 meters at the Summer Games. In the 100-meter final at the trials on June 23, Tarmoh was unofficially declared the third-place finisher ahead of her training partner and friend Allyson Felix - good for a spot on the Olympic team. But after a review of finish-line photos, race officials deemed it a dead heat for third place, leading to days of drama over which of the runners would earn the Olympic berth. United States Track & Field officials gave Tarmoh and Felix options: One could cede the Olympic berth to the other, or they could break the tie with a coin toss or a runoff. Ultimately, Tarmoh ceded the spot. Tarmoh and her agent, Kim Holland, said in telephone interviews this week that they remained dismayed by how the disputed finish was handled, though they said the situation had not adversely affected Tarmoh's relationship with Felix or Bobby Kersee, who coaches both runners. "I don't accept what happened," Tarmoh said. "They said, "You won," and took it away." As an indication of how conflicted she remains, Tarmoh said track officials "did the best they could do with the time they were given," but added that she grew uneasy with the situation once USA Track & Field asked them to "make a decision based on how much they invested surrounding the runoff controversy." "We were puppets," she added. I couldn't do it. After crossing the finish line, Tarmoh did a victory lap waving a United States flag, while Felix, a two-time Olympic silver medalist in the 200 meters, told reporters "fourth is the worst." But 45 minutes after the end of the race, once finish-line judges decided that third place was too close to call, the official result was posted: dead heat. "This was an evolving situation," Jill Geer, a spokeswoman for the track organization, said about the confusion and controversy. We didn't have a process in place. In track, results are determined by whose torso crosses the finish line first. The image that judges typically examine to determine a winner, known as the outside shot, did not show who finished third. In that photo, judges said, the arms of Tarmoh and Felix obscured their torsos. "Normally when you have someone with a slightly twisted torso, you go to the other camera and it's easy to see who is ahead," said Giles Norton, a qualified USA Track & Field photo-finish official and director of marketing for Lynx System Developers Inc., the official timing and results provider for the track organization. Roger Jennings, who had unofficially called Tarmoh the third-place finisher, relied on her twisted torso to make his decision. But he wanted to see an alternate image to confirm his decision for the official results. The second image "shows you nothing," Norton said. "Ninety-nine times out of 100" the second shot reveals the winner, he said. "In most cases it wouldn't matter," he said. "You would give both people bronze medals and say, "Isn't that wonderful?" " The track organization's guidelines give runners up to 30 minutes to contest official results after they are posted. But by the time the official results were posted, 45 minutes after the race, Tarmoh was in the drug-testing tent. A USA Track & Field staff member there mentioned to Holland, Tarmoh's agent, that Tarmoh's third-place finish had been deemed a dead heat. The possibility of a dead heat was also mentioned by reporters during a news conference after the race. "I said, "You're kidding me," " Holland said, leaving Tarmoh to finish the drug-testing protocol. When we were in doping, we weren't privy to access the media or phones. Holland said she and Tarmoh did not receive formal notification of the dead-heat ruling until a phone call late that evening with Stephanie Hightower, the president of the track organization. "The first time I heard it was officially declared a dead heat was when Kim called me that night," Tarmoh said.