Pacific Association 2021 Awards Ceremony: just 10 minutes in outstanding ultra lives

After a 2-year COVID hiatus cancelling the 2021 edition, we were back to celebrate achievements of our USATF Pacific Association members, phew! From runners to race walkers and Track & Field athletes, from Olympians to the back of the pack, from competitors to volunteers, coaches and officials the 2.5-hour program seemed both too long to be digested online and too short to give enough credit to all the award and kudos recipients!

While the invitation included the word banquet, I prefer calling this a ceremony since there was nothing to eat or drink. Sorry, that must be my French half, there is no real gastronomy you can enjoy online...! ;-) 

The invite also talked about the 2nd edition. While this is the case at the overall Pacific Association level, as long as I've been participating into the MUT Grand Prix since 2007, we have had these banquets on the LDR side and my copy of the 2007 season celebration says it was the 12th edition in April 2008, making it a 1996 tradition (indeed, our first Grand Prix season was 1994-1995)!

MUT? For the outsiders, this stands for Mountain, Trail and Ultra Running, three different sports we group under the same umbrella for critical mass purpose. Three sports which span from 10K to no distance limit, from races lasting less than one hour to 6 days and beyond, on roads, trails or tracks, on flat or super steep courses. So much fun!

As I mentioned, we had these LDR banquets all for ourselves, Road, Cross-Country (XC) and MUT and 2 hours were barely enough to listen to special guests and properly address all the award recipients. This time we only had 19 minutes. While it was a bummer the Road Grand Prix had been cancelled last year, at least that was leaving 9 minutes each for XC and MUT. Carl covered XC in captivating details about the accomplishments of Age Group Champions as well as Club awards for each the age groups.

For MUT, I started by stating that we had started 2020 with 3 races before the shut down and, in 2021, managed to run an entire Grand Prix with 10 events over a period of 4 months, instead of our typical 10-month span, talk about catching up after COVID! Unfortunately, many PA members and clubs weren't ready to get back so fast into action but we still managed to have 117 participants through the season.

From them, we celebrated our 2021 Age Group Champions:

• Women 20-29 – Kimmy Luzette Reyes, Pamakids
• Women 30-39 – Simone Angela Winkler, Excelsior
• Women 40-49 – Luisa Cheung, Pamakids
• Men 30-39 – William Nguyen, Pamakids
• Men 40-49 – Jonah Backstrom, West Valley Track Club
• Men 50-59 – Shiran Kochavi, Pamakids
• Men 60-69 – Chuck Amital, Pamakids

A few returning and defending champs, a few new names, welcome to that small club! All receive 50% discounts on their 2022 race registration fees as a super valuable bonus!

In addition to these Age Group Champions who met the 3-score minima, here are the other winners of their respective age group:

• Women 50-59: with a 71-point tie, Verity Breen, Tamalpa, and Kristine Barrios, Lake Merritt Joggers & Striders
• Women 60-69: Annette Lee, Lake Merritt Joggers & Striders
• Men 20-29: in a tie at 40 points, Steven Kool, Wolfpack Running Club, and Jose Cruz, SFRC Running Team
• Men 40-49: Matt Ward for a tie with Jonah Backstrom above
• Men 70-79: Steven Patt, Quicksilver

Making a note to clarifying the 3-score minima for a Champion title in line and the spirit of how the MUT rules have been applied in past years.

On the team side, we had an amazing grand slam or chelem by the Pamakids taking four out the four available honors! I had been 10 years since Quicksilver achieved this in 2011. Since 1995, this is the 3rd club to do so after Buffalo Chips' strikes of 2005 and 2006.

• Team Women – 1st Pamakids, 2nd Tamalpa, 3rd Lake Merritt Joggers & Striders
• Team Men – 1st Pamakids, 2nd Tamalpa, 3rd Excelsior
• Team Mixed – 1st Pamakids, 2nd Excelsior, 3rd Lake Merritt Joggers & Striders
• Team Overall – 1st Pamakids, 2nd Excelsior, 3rd Tamalpa

After these no-surprise awards since the results had been published in December, after Quad Dipsea, it was time to move to the even more exciting set of coveted Runners and Volunteer of the Year distinctions.

Given the range of events I mentioned above, not to mention the spectrum of age groups, recognizing only one individual is really challenging. First, there is the subjectivity in comparing athletic performances across such a variety of events, distances, terrains. Second, we also look at the involvement in our association. Third, the challenge of collecting the information across multiple disparate sources. Special thanks to our Richard Bolt who spends the year covering MUT, Nationally and internationally in his prolific almost daily-updated Trail News page on the ATRA (American Trail Running Association) website.

To help alleviate the subjectivity, as the Chair of our MUT sub-committee, I reached out to a panel of MUT enthusiasts from runners to Race Directors, volunteers, club captains. I have to say that this year was quite a close call, especially on the men side. Just try for yourself, picking the most deserving individual from this liste of notable performances.

Notable MUT 2021 Female performances

• Beverley Anderson-Abbs
• Jed Smith 50-mile, 1st, 7:07
• Vol State 500K, 1st, 96:49
• Meghan Canfield
• Jed Smith 50K, 1st, 3:59
• Waldo 100K, 14th, 15:01
• Magdalena Boulet
• Western States 100M, 15th, 22:12
• Stephanie Garcia
• 2nd place 2021 USATF Half Marathon Trail Championship

Notable MUT 2021 Male performances

• Tim Tollefson
• Bishop High Sierra 55K, 1st, 3:52
• Western States 100M, 5th, 16:55
• Bob Hearn
• Vol State 500K, 1st, 76:09 (CR)
• Spartathlon 247K, 20th, 28:40 (1st American)
• Rich Hanna
• Jed Smith 50-mile, 1st, 5:51 (American M55-59 record)
• Rajpaul Pannu
• HOKA ONE ONE Project Carbon X2 - 100K, 2nd, 6:28
• No’to’mom 100K Road USATF Nationals, 1st, 6:57
• Malcolm Richards
• Jed Smith 50K, 1st, 2:51
• Edward Owens
• 4th place at the highly competitive 2021 USATF Mountain Running Championships
• 2nd place at the 2021 USATF Half Marathon Trail Championship.
• Meikael Beaudoin-Rousseau
• 7th at the 2021 USATF Mountain Running Championships
• James Flanigan
• 70-74 age group national champion at the 2021 USATF Mountain Running Championships
• Jonah Backstrom
• USATF 50k Road Championships 1st master 3:30:40 (11th overall male)
• USATF 100 Mile Road Championships 3rd master 19:08:25 (8th overall male)
• Quad Dipsea, 7th male, 4:49

To make quite a long story shorter, and without much suspense for those who attended the event live yesterday, Ladies and Gentlemen, your 2021 MUT Ultra Runner of the Years... Beverley Anderson-Abbs and Rajpaul Pannu!

Beverley is certainly not new to these honors, her perseverance and longevity are exemplary and inspirational. She has been the Pacific Association MUT RoY 4 years in a row from 2005 to 2008 and nominated in 2016. In the meantime, she set many Long Distance Running Age Group records for Canada. She has 204 trophies on UltraSignup and that doesn't count podiums in bike races!

In contrast, this is Rajpaul's first nomination and RoY win. We saluted his active racing with the Aggies and, of course, the outstanding 3rd ever fastest time on 100K road, on Jim Walmsley's heels as Jim was chasing the World Record in Sacramento. A few months later, Rajpaul returned on the same American River levee to win the 100K Road National Championships organized by Meghan Canfield, an event on our MUT Grand Prix last year (we'll be back there next month albeit not for a National this time).

And now on to an even more subjective exercise, selecting the Volunteer of the Year for the Dick Collins Award. And even harder task as there isn't even any measure or reporting in this area, no shared log of hours or efforts, most of them happening even behind the scene. Second, the rules says that only PA members are eligible, although many volunteers are not even runners themselves. This year, we selected a person who invested his ultra hours into helping as a knee injury prevented him to compete himself in the 2021 Grand Prix. When injury comes, unfortunately, you have the choice to either retreat from the sport, or engage even more to give back to our local community. Example abound of ex runners among the most dedicated volunteers, officials and race directors. At every race last year, we could see our VoY at road crossing, bib picking or manning aid stations and filling-up bottles. Ladies and Gentlemen, your 2021 MUT Volunteer of the Year, from the Go Green Pamakids Club... William Dai!

I closed our MUT section by sharing a visual representation of our 2022 Grand Prix, illustrating the diversity of distances and terrains. With shorter, sub-ultra events, we hope this will appeal to a larger audience, including younger runners. Yes, we have half marathons and we even had a 10K last month!

Thank you to the leaders of our Pacific Association for this opportunity to get together and take the time to recognize our members. Special thanks to all those who handled the logistics from First VP Irene Herman's initial idea and drive to make that edition happen, to those orchestrating the registration and collection of data, Cynci Calvin (Communications Chair), Angie Longworth (Secretary) and Dave Shrock (Past President). Full program available online (26 pages!). See you all next year, all the best to all for a successful 2022 and most fun in our MUT Grand Prix in particular. 2 events done, 12 to go!

Video recording available there, MUT section at 1:13:50.

PS: sorry for the lack of proper credits for the pictures, lost track as I was rushing to assemble my deck after work on Friday night. No money involved here at least...