[He takes a moment. Mulls it over.]

...Right. Right, that makes sense...

[He doesn't sound entirely convinced, but that's...better, he thinks.]

The people we beat also nearly...took everyone out of the race, with the cheating they did last year. The others still cheat, but they haven't done anything quite that bad; it doesn't make it okay, but sometimes you have to take the lesser of two -

[...uh]

...cheaters.