# China's 16-year-old swimming prodigy Ye Shiwen: Cheater?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinas-16-year-old-swimming-prodigy-ye-shiwen-cheater/629937>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [July 31, 2012, 8:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinas-16-year-old-swimming-prodigy-ye-shiwen-cheater/629937 "2012-07-31T08:48:15Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Saffer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saffer/32/6440_2.png) [@Saffer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saffer)\
**Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 8:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinas-16-year-old-swimming-prodigy-ye-shiwen-cheater/629937/1 "2012-07-31T08:48:15Z")

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Poll on its way.  
[Link to BBC news story](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-19058712#)

I know there is a thread in the game room on this, but I want to get a better idea on people’s opinions.

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**Author:** ![Grumman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Grumman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grumman)\
**Post date:** [July 31, 2012, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chinas-16-year-old-swimming-prodigy-ye-shiwen-cheater/629937/2 "2012-07-31T09:48:19Z")

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While it’s possible that she is in fact cheating, I think it is absurd to jump to that conclusion. I had the same thought when reading [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=659139), where I learnt that reacting to the starting gun too fast is grounds for disqualification.