Beijing Marathon featured runners pissing on ancient walls and Adidas team in blackface

There was outrage for everyone at the Beijing Marathon this weekend. Soon after the race was over there was uproar on the Chinese web regarding photos and accounts of people relieving themselves on the outer walls of the Forbidden City, today a photo has emerged of an entire team of runners wearing blackface. 

Now, while not exactly ideal behaviour, its forgiveable for runners not to bother queuing for a porta-potty during the race (everyone remembers Paula Radcliffe having a poo by the side of the road in the London Marathon), but seriously guys, how about using a wall that isn't 600 years old? 

Dozens of male marathoners, including foreigners, were caught with their pants down answering nature's call along the palace walls. The photos triggered widespread outrage among netizens.

Marathon organizers have yet to respond to doubts expressed online as to the lack of sufficient toilets along the course.

Less forgiveable is the decision by event sponsor Adidas to field a whole team of runners in blackface, seriously:

This photo was passed to us by a foreigner who was there on the scene. We didn't attempt to contact adidas about this travesty, to confirm whether it was their idea or not. But by the looks of it, they must have known about it since all the runners are in adidas-issued gear and some even have the adidas logo painted on their cheeks.

Aside from the pissing and the blackface, the event went off pretty well. 30,000 runners took part, with Ethiopian Tadese Tola winning the men's race with a record time of 2:07:16 and China's Zhang Yingying winning the women's on 2:31:19. 

Update 19.30 CST: A source who spoke to members of the blackface team at the marathon on Sunday writes to say:

They're not blackface, per se, though there's plenty of room for misinterpretation, especially based on that photo; up close they actually look more like puppeteers or mime artists - they're decked out entirely in black, head-to-toe. The intention, however misguided, is for the runners to appear as "shadows", etc. 

[Image via City Weekend]