2012 Western States 100 Prediction Contest

Welcome to iRunFar’s fourth annual Western States 100 prediction contest! Montrail and Mountain Hardwear are once again supporting the contest with great prize packages going to the top three prognosticators! Read on to learn how this contest works, to see what you can win, and to enter the contest.

The Basics*
The rules are the same as they’ve been the previous three years. You select, in order, your top 8 picks in both the men’s and women’s field. Points are accumulated based on the difference between a runner’s projected placing and their actual placing. (Placing is gender specific.) Given the reality that some top runners will drop out, only your five most accurate picks per gender will count. All DNSs and DNFs will be scored as if the runner placed one spot behind the final finisher. Your goal is to have the fewest total points among your ten scoring runners (5 men and 5 women).

Here’s an example of how points are awarded for a single pick. If I pick Dave Mackey, for fifth man and he wins, I’d accumulate 4 points (|5-1|=4). On the other hand, if I pick Mackey to place fifth and he finishes as ninth man, I’d again accumulate 4 points (|5-9|=4). I’d get the same 4 points even if he’s beaten to the track by an additional woman.

Ties will initially be broken by the lowest number of points accumulated from the contestants’ picks for the men’s and women’s masters winners. (You can choose masters winners who you previously chose to place top 8 overall.) If a tie remains, the accuracy of picks of the overall winners will be the second tie-breaker. Any persistent ties will be resolved through a random drawing.

While anyone can enter the prediction contest, the Montrail/Mountain Hardwear prizes will only be awarded to folks with US or Canadian mailing addresses. That said, we’ll do our best to reward any winners from further abroad.

The contest will close at 6 pm 8 pm PDT on Thursday, June 21. That’ll give me time to once again analyze all your picks for a group analysis prior to the race.

To follow all of our Western States coverage, subscribe to iRunFar via RSS or via email. In addition, following us on Twitter will insure that you receive all of our live coverage we provide before, during, and after the race! On race day, we’ll also have Live Coverage page with additional insight and commentary as well as an open discussion.

The Prizes
As noted above, Montrail and Mountain Hardwear are once again providing great products to give away. To start, all first and second place will receive their choice of a pair of Montrail shoes. Those top two places will also receive their choice of one Mountain Hardwear’s Ultrafuel short (men) or a MH Pace(r) short or skort (women). In addition, the grand prize winner will take home a shirt from Mountain Hardwear’s Way2Cool line (men or women). Third place will win a Montrail hat to sport along with their choice of Montrail recovery shoes.

For those of you who like bullet points, here goes:

• First Place – Pair of Montrail shoes, Mountain Hardwear Ultrafuel/Pace(r) bottom, Mountain Hardwear Way2Cool performance shirt
• Second Place – Pair of Montrail shoes, Mountain Hardwear Ultrafuel/Pace(r) bottom
• Third Place – Pair of Montrail recovery shoes, Montrail Hat

You’ll also get fame. As proof, we’ll once again recognize last year’s winners, as they topped more than 350 entries. Nice work guys! 1st: Andy Jones-Wilkins, 2nd: Jay Thomson, 3rd: Bob Lapanja. For those who are interested, here are the results of last year’s contest as well as the “group-think” predictions the contest entries provided before the race.

The Contest
[Entry into the 2012 Western States Prediction Contest is now closed.]

*The Details
Only one entry per person. If you enter early and wish to change your picks before the deadline, you may replace those picks – please just use the exact same name and email address on subsequent entries. We suppose you don’t need to make all 18 picks, but be aware that a non-pick will be treated the same as a DNF. You can only choose a runner once per gender, but you can pick someone like Tsuyoshi Kaburaki to place overall and win the men’s masters category. No hedging bets, finding loopholes, or other funny business – we reserve the right to invalidate any entry that doesn’t follow in the spirit of fairness.

The Hints
We know that many people will be publishing posts with their Western States picks. In an effort to help you, the iRunFar reader, to make the best picks, we’ll be providing you with others’ publicly published picks as we become aware of them. However, you’ve got to do the reading on your own…. we’d recommend it as some top entrants will not be running the race. That’s the only hint we’ll give here.

• Here at iRunFar we’ve published our men’s and women’s previews and will be publishing a slew of interviews in the coming days.
• Karl Meltzer has posted his odds with Jornet and Greenwood as the favorites.

The Closing
If you want to talk through your ideas before making picks, go for it. For those wishing to go public on their predictions, please leave some or all of your picks in a comment after making your official selections. Go ahead, put your mouth where your mind is! Want to talk some smack about your predictions or your race… we welcome it!

If you enjoy what iRunFar provides, consider becoming a fan of iRunFar on Facebook or subscribing by the methods noted above.

[Editor's Notes:
Special thanks to Mitchell Goodman for once again being the brains and brawn behind this contest. There would be no contest without him.

Also, props to the VHTRC Bull Run Run Pick-the-Winner contests of yore. My enjoyment of those contests gave rise to this contest.]

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Filed under Contests, Races · Tagged with Montrail, Mountain Hardwear, Western States 100

Bryon Powell is the Editor-in-Chief of iRunFar.com, which he founded five years ago. Also the author of Relentless Forward Progress: A Guide to Running Ultramarathons and a contributing editor at Trail Runner magazine, he's quickly approaching 10 years as an ultrarunner and 20 years as a trail runner. These days he calls Park City, Utah and its trails home.
All posts by Bryon Powell