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Regarding how they figured she cheated - From the highlights in the linked article: "‘Based on her splits, I believe she did the north section correctly the first time through, then on the next two laps, she turned around at the Yurt Aid station, cutting off ~6K from each loop, or ~12K in total. That would be fairly consistent with the pace she ran in the other sections.”

But I agree, it was flimsy on evidence. Circumstantial. That being said, apparently from yesterday's article, they determined this was done in a few different races.

As far as cheating goes, they need to re-design their race courses so they prevent the type of situation that occurred (basically a cross-over and repeating loops), and/or they need to put checkpoints at certain areas to record the racer and ensure the racer is not cutting things short, and they need to add more officials to watch for suspicious activity.

Pineland Farms Trail Challenge
August 8 at 7:30 AM ·
At this years GiddyUp Pineland Farms Trail Festival 50 Mile race we have disqualified women’s second place finisher Maude Gorman from MA after receiving complaints that she had cut the course multiple times. Upon collecting timing mat data we were able to show that Maude cut the course at least twice at between mile 18.1 to 29.3 (running a 6:07 pace) and mile 33.6 to 44.8 (running a 5:17 pace).

After asking for clarification from the runner, we were given conflicting statements and she sent us a picture of her watch but she would not send us her Garmin data for verification.

Further more, we’ve been contacted by other race directors on the subject and found this to be a pattern in her recent races.