Awards - Performance of the Year

ecoli

Bit later than planned but here are the Nominations for the Performance of the year:

Rainbow Kirby - Barcelona Marathon
Oncoc - WW Relay leg 5
RoadRunner - Berlin Marathon
Magnet - 24 hr Irish indoor record
Opus - Leizpig Marathon
Sarsfield Rock - Connemara Ultra

I will post the rest as I go along and will keep them open until 31st of Dec and announce the results New Years day to give people a chance to vote over the holiday period.

If you want to post why you feel performance deserves it feel free to do so but dont have a pop at other nominations

donothoponpop

ecoli wrote: »

Ocnoc - WW Relay leg 5

If you want to post why you feel performance deserves it feel free to do so

Some great nominations in there all right- plenty of talent on this forum! Best of luck to them all.

If I might champion the hill-running section for a moment, I'd like to expand on what made Ocnoc's run such a performance highlight of the year. The Wicklow Way Relay is won and lost on navigational errors, so emphasis is placed on a runner knowing their route inside and out. Ocnoc had been scheduled for the first leg, before injury forced our hand- as captain I had to insist he run leg 5 at the eleventh hour, despite him never running this route before. That's an awful responsibility to carry, for an errant turn can bring dismay to 7 other team-mates who have trained hard for this highlight race. The sensible thing would have been for him to run it cautiously, double-checking his map at each junction.

Added to that, this particular leg is especially difficult, being one long, twisting, never-ending climb; followed by a foot-pounding hard descent. Its the sort of leg that suits a good climber going up, or a good descender coming down- rare is the hill runner who excels in both. Other legs offer something in terms of effort and respite, before effort again: less so, leg 5.

Once the climb begins, towards Poulanass waterfall, your calves start complaining, the hurt orders your brain to slow down. Ocnoc ran fast up this, and kept going, fast through the next series of twists and turns, each of which offer false hope of the summit. The only way to beat these turns is to cheat them: hard to the next turn, now hard to the next, now the next, and so on. Even then (as anyone who knows this climb will tell you), your mind is screaming for the constant disappointment to stop: surely the next turn must be the f***ing summit?!? This goes on for about three times longer than for the official designation of torture comes into play: until finally, the summit is reached. For ocnoc to reach this point after a hard-ran series of never-ending hill repeats to a never-ending series of turns, is hugely impressive, and had he strolled down, he would have been feted as having run a successful leg.

But the measure of this run was that it was only half done- although his legs must have been screaming for quiet, he forgot the climbing effort, and threw himself into the immediacy that is a fast descent. Legs flying, stride widening, a race with gravity to the finish. This is where the un-recce'ed runner goes astray: running faster than the brain processes information, its all too easy to let a junction slip, and your effort counts for nothing. Ocnoc was running with his map in hand, checking each junction as they flew by, all the time chasing down the runner ahead. His descent was about the quickest ever seen on this leg. When so much was at stake, he ran it fast, he ran it hard, he ran it correct. He came screaming into the changeover point, roaring and barechested, having left nothing on the course. To be only a few seconds over one of the hardest records in the WW Relay, despite the course being extended by a couple of hundred meters, is phenomenal running. But to have done so to the best of his ability, and given everything to his race, and to his team, is the mark of a champion performance.

Pisco Sour

How were the nominations decided? Was there a vote?

menoscemo

04072511 wrote: »

How were the nominations decided? Was there a vote?

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=75836601

menoscemo

I have to say this is a no contest for me. While there was some great performances this year, only one was World Class and that was Magnets 24hr Record. The title says it was an Irish indoor record but no-one has run further outdoors either (the nearest challender outdoors is 11km behind). Not only was this an Irish all time female record, it also easily beat the distance of all male contenders in the Irish 24hr Championships held in Belfast this year. Another thing to point out is that the distance makes the gold standard of the IAU, meaning that it qualifies for for any world championships etc. This basically means that it's the equivalent of qualifying for the Olympic games over shorter distances, nobody elses perfromance on Boards comes even close to that kind of level.
I guess not many people would have predicted she run so well either, while many would have predicted that the other nominees would have achieved the times they did. Bear in mind it was the first time magnet had competed in a 24hr race.

For all these reasons Maget has to win perfromance of the year.

Mr Slow

For me it has to be Rainbow Kirby, it's all about the guts and glory plus she put herself through the mill on the back of the race with IT Band Strain which only has her back in double digits distance wise this week.

rovers_runner

menoscemo wrote: »

I have to say this is a no contest for me. While there was some great performances this year, only one was World Class and that was Magnets 24hr Record. The title says it was an Irish indoor record but no-one has run further outdoors either (the nearest challender outdoors is 11km behind). Not only was this an Irish all time female record, it also easily beat the distance of all male contenders in the Irish 24hr Championships held in Belfast this year. Another thing to point out is that the distance makes the gold standard of the IAU, meaning that it qualifies for for any world championships etc. This basically means that it's the equivalent of qualifying for the Olympic games over shorter distances, nobody elses perfromance on Boards comes even close to that kind of level.
I guess not many people would have predicted she run so well either, while many would have predicted that the other nominees would have achieved the times they did. Bear in mind it was the first time magnet had competed in a 24hr race.

For all these reasons Maget has to win perfromance of the year.

Agreed and it has my vote.

This performance & record by Magnet is a level to aspire to for the very best who may pass through here reading/posting.

RacoonQueen

I nominated RainbowKirby. Had no hesitations about it - even after considering magnets race myself, hers was the first one that popped into my head. Magnet is a different level to her, it's all relative. Magnet put in fantastic performance, trained hard and raced hard - for her level.
As did RK, and RK put a lot of doubters (myself included) to shame.

So yes, a middle of the field marathon result is on a par with an Irish record at an international ultra running event.

Both of them raced well in their respective races for their respective abilities. Vote for who you want to vote for, don't detract from one persons achievement. No need for that.

tunguska

ecoli wrote: »

but I dont have a pop at other nominations

Im happy for you man, you should win some sort of humanitarian award.

Im very surprised not to see emerald007s 70min national half marathon effort on the list. It was after all a run of some of quality.

gerard65

TRR Berlin Marathon was by far the best performance of the year.

TheRoadRunner

gerard65 wrote: »

TRR Berlin Marathon was by far the best performance of the year.

That's the one I and my 5 fake pseudo-accounts will be voting for anyway!

opus

menoscemo wrote: »

For all these reasons Maget has to win perfromance of the year.

I'd agree with you there but of course everyone's achievement deserves recognition. Must admit I'm baffled as to how my bit of a run in Leipzig last April is mentioned in such illustrious company

RayCun

The rules in these nomination threads are very simple - if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all.

This is the first year discussion has been allowed on these threads, and now we see why :rolleyes: Maybe next year the people nominating will be asked to write a short blurb explaining the nomination, and we'll include those in the thread then close comments.

tunguska

RayCun wrote: »

The rules in these nomination threads are very simple - if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all.

This is the first year discussion has been allowed on these threads, and now we see why :rolleyes: Maybe next year the people nominating will be asked to write a short blurb explaining the nomination, and we'll include those in the thread then close comments.

If somebody doesn't agree with the nominations they're entitled to say what they feel. And if thats not the case then its just a fascist regime. Fair enough theres a difference between disagreement and disparaging, but as far as I can see nobody is slagging anybody off. It seems to be a case where its ok to speak so long as you tow the line.
I dont agree with the nominations myself. Theres only one performance on that list that I think is worthy of the accolade Performance of the year(RRs berlin marathon). Im not gonna slag off the other nominees but come on, there are some serious performances that have bizarrely been omitted:

Bazmans national half marathon

emerald007s national half marathon

Heffsarmys silver medal at the novice cross championships(not to mention his dublin marathon)

Pronators dublin marathon


I could go on. I'm entitled to express my opinion the same way everybody is entitled to vote for who they like, fair enough. But it just seems like great performances are being ignored, for whatever reasons. It seems like the faster the time, the less acknowledgement the athlete recieves. Similiar to the point made about how much national coverage that lad who did the marathon in 11hours got compared to the coverage that Linda byrne recieved, even though she qualified for the feckin' olympics.

donothoponpop

tunguska wrote: »

If somebody doesn't agree with the nominations they're entitled to say what they feel. And if thats not the case then its just a fascist regime. Fair enough theres a difference between disagreement and disparaging, but as far as I can see nobody is slagging anybody off. It seems to be a case where its ok to speak so long as you tow the line.
I dont agree with the nominations myself. Theres only one performance on that list that I think is worthy of the accolade Performance of the year(RRs berlin marathon). Im not gonna slag off the other nominees but come on, there are some serious performances that have bizarrely been omitted:

Bazmans national half marathon

emerald007s national half marathon

Heffsarmys silver medal at the novice cross championships(not to mention his dublin marathon)

Pronators dublin marathon


I could go on. I'm entitled to express my opinion the same way everybody is entitled to vote for who they like, fair enough. But it just seems like great performances are being ignored, for whatever reasons. It seems like the faster the time, the less acknowledgement the athlete recieves. Similiar to the point made about how much national coverage that lad who did the marathon in 11hours got compared to the coverage that Linda byrne recieved, even though she qualified for the feckin' olympics.

Who'd you nominate tunguska? Because thats the criteria for inclusion, we've all got opinions on what's a great performance; so long as more than one person nominated, it got included. It's very unfair on the mods to liken them to a fascist regime when they are just overseeing this for a bit of fun. Any of your performances listed above would be worthy of inclusion, I doubt anyone would question that. I presume you nominated one of them?

PS I nominated a mountain performance because thats the corner I know most about. Bazmans leg 7 WW relay run is superior to his national half performance (IMO!), but its not on the list either. Apologies if you did nominate something and its not there, I get where you're coming from, but surely there's enough quality in the selection to make a vote?

Slogger Jogger

I think the comment thread should be closed once the nominations are published. Publishing comments which came from the nominators would be useful, but having discussion on the nominations after the nominations doesn't add a lot of value.

In order to nominate you really needed to be well versed in lots of people's achievements this year, whereas I tend to only dip in and out. I'd have nominated Pronator's leg 8 on the Wicklow way Relay as that was a killer run. Thats not to say there weren't other great performances but I just wasn't aware.

btw, fair play to all nominators and the mods for progressing the awards.

tunguska

donothoponpop wrote: »

It's very unfair on the mods to liken them to a fascist regime when they are just overseeing this for a bit of fun.

Theres "overseeing" and then theres being heavy handed and in my opinion it was heavy handed.

donothoponpop wrote: »

PS I nominated a mountain performance because thats the corner I know most about. Bazmans leg 7 WW relay run is superior to his national half performance (IMO!), but its not on the list either. Apologies if you did nominate something and its not there, I get where you're coming from, but surely there's enough quality in the selection to make a vote?

I nominated RR, but at the time I thought you could only nominate one performance. Is that true? If its not I'd like to officially nominate the other performances I mentioned above. So my list would be(in no particular order):

RR for berlin marathon
Bazman national half
emerald007 national half
Heffsarmy novice cc
Pronator Dublin marathon

donothoponpop

tunguska wrote: »

I nominated RR, but at the time I thought you could only nominate one performance. Is that true? If its not I'd like to officially nominate the other performances I mentioned above.

You were right the first time. Everyone gets to nominate the best performance they want, and if there's more than a couple of people who agree, its gets included.

tunguska wrote: »

Pornator Dublin marathon

He goes fast and hard for hours:D

tunguska

donothoponpop wrote: »

He goes fast and hard for hours:D

Freudian slip there. I know Ian wouldnt be too happy about me giving wind of his er, other occupation.

robinph

tunguska wrote: »

... Theres only one performance on that list that I think is worthy of the accolade Performance of the year(RRs berlin marathon). ...

Why do the other nominations matter then?

One ARTist, one vote.

Pronator

donothoponpop wrote: »

You were right the first time. Everyone gets to nominate the best performance they want, and if there's more than a couple of people who agree, its gets included.



He goes fast and hard for hours:D

Jasus - this forum is never dull:D

I can certainly state that I have no connection to the porn industry;)

So many brilliant performances and I could ramble on mentioning each one.

My personal favourite is our new resident "Ricky Hatton" TRR Berlin's run - you fat B*stard:D

But my vote goes to Magnet and her incredible 24hr performance. It stands above all other achievements.

Thanks to Tunguska (not the porn bit;)) and SJ for the mentions, 2012 I look forward to racing you both and others on the forum.

menoscemo

tunguska wrote: »

Theres only one performance on that list that I think is worthy of the accolade Performance of the year(RRs berlin marathon).

You don't think Breaking an Irish record, gaining the world 'A' standard for an event while simultaneously beating all Irish males to tackle the event this year to be worthy of the award? I know 24hr races are not your thing, but seriously.....?

tunguska

menoscemo wrote: »

You don't think Breaking an Irish record, gaining the world 'A' standard for an event while simultaneously beating all Irish males to tackle the event this year to be worthy of the award? I know 24hr races are not your thing, but seriously.....?

I have to head off now but I'll answer your question tomorrow. But the short answer is no. I dont think the nomination you quoted is in the same league as the ones I quoted.

gerard65

menoscemo wrote: »

You don't think Breaking an Irish record, gaining the world 'A' standard for an event while simultaneously beating all Irish males to tackle the event this year to be worthy of the award? I know 24hr races are not your thing, but seriously.....?

Memo, you've got to realise this means nothing to many people as ultra's are a niche part of general running distances, but a fast marathon is understood by everyone here. I'm sure the ultra was a great run but it hardly registered with me as I've no interest in ultra distances and generally its not on the radar, gets alot of publicity or Boards A/R/T but I don't think this forum registers big in the general athletics community in Ireland.

RayCun

Slogger Jogger wrote: »

I think the comment thread should be closed once the nominations are published. Publishing comments which came from the nominators would be useful, but having discussion on the nominations after the nominations doesn't add a lot of value.

Yep. (I would but I don't think I can without also closing the poll)

Everyone had a chance to nominate the performance (or log, poster, debut...) that they thought was worthy of an award. And everyone gets to vote for the performance (etc) that they think deserves the award out of all the nominees. It would be nice if people could talk about how one performance was good, without having to slag the other nominees in the process, but apparently we can't have nice things :rolleyes:

gerard65

RayCun wrote: »

Yep.

Everyone had a chance to nominate the performance (or log, poster, debut...) that they thought was worthy of an award. And everyone gets to vote for the performance (etc) that they think deserves the award out of all the nominees. It would be nice if people could talk about how one performance was good, without having to slag the other nominees in the process, but apparently we can't have nice things :rolleyes:

Have posts been deleted? I've read back and can't find any slagging.

RayCun

gerard65 wrote: »

Have posts been deleted?

Yes. ecoli posted a simple rule at the beginning

If you want to post why you feel performance deserves it feel free to do so but dont have a pop at other nominations

which should be easy enough to follow.

It's great that people feel a performance is so good that they want to post about it. But if you're going to do that, write as if you don't know what else has been nominated. Write as if you are explaining why you nominated that performance (if you did). There's no need to downplay other performances to explain why your favourite is worth voting for.

--amadeus--

RayCun wrote: »

Yep. (I would but I don't think I can without also closing the poll)

You can close the thread and open a new one with a new poll. You can then edit the poll so that the starting numbers are the same as whatever figures are currently on here, I can't remember exactly how but someone on the Mod forum could advise. Not sure if that will "unhide" the results on this one but this thread can be deleted I assume...

(FWIW I don't see a need to close this thread, it's an interesting debate )

RacoonQueen

gerard65 wrote: »

Have posts been deleted? I've read back and can't find any slagging.

Yes, my earlier post was in response to posts that were deleted while I was posting.

What's with all the bitching? The mods can only put up a poll based on what was nominated. People are going to nominate what they think of, yeah, emerald007, pronator, heff etc as mentioned also have cracking performances which deserve recognition. They weren't nominated though, not because people don't think they deserve recognition, but, probably because people just didn't think of them when they were nominating.

Maybe next year, before nominations start we can have a discussion thread where people can bring up performances they think are worthy of nomination so everyone can make a more informed choice when they're nominating.

Anyway, this thread has gotten very silly. This is all meant to be a bit of fun. There are great logs which weren't nominated, good posters who weren't nominated as poster of the year etc etc

RayCun

RacoonQueen wrote: »

There are great logs which weren't nominated, good posters who weren't nominated as poster of the year etc etc

We were going to have a LEGEND of the year poll, but everyone nominated the same person;)

RacoonQueen

RayCun wrote: »

We were going to have a LEGEND of the year poll, but everyone nominated the same person;)

I don't blame yee. I am pretty awesome.

menoscemo

--amadeus-- wrote: »

You can close the thread and open a new one with a new poll. You can then edit the poll so that the starting numbers are the same as whatever figures are currently on here, I can't remember exactly how but someone on the Mod forum could advise. Not sure if that will "unhide" the results on this one but this thread can be deleted I assume...

(FWIW I don't see a need to close this thread, it's an interesting debate )

Problem there is that the poll might not recognise who had already voted in the previous one, thus people would get to vote twice.

I agree, no need to do it at all.

pconn062

tunguska wrote: »

I nominated RR, but at the time I thought you could only nominate one performance. Is that true? If its not I'd like to officially nominate the other performances I mentioned above. So my list would be(in no particular order):

RR for berlin marathon
Bazman national half
emerald007 national half
Heffsarmy novice cc
Pronator Dublin marathon

I'm not the most regular poster on this forum but I check in at least a couple of times a week so I'm not sure about voting. Could you (or anyone) fill me on some of the performances you listed? I know about Roadrunners savage 2.36 marathon and pronators awesome Dublin marathon but I don't know about the other three. Cheers

Pisco Sour

Really just seems to be a case of people patting each others backs!

<mod>

I've deleted everything except this from 0407's post.
Yes! It is a case of patting each others backs! It's an awards thread! If you don't agree with a nomination, you don't vote for it! There's no need to say why you're not voting for it, to tell everyone why you think it's a bit **** compared to the one you're voting for - just don't vote for it

</mod>

RoyMcC

I dislike awards because they turn into bitch fests and position-taking. Why is it so difficult to just respect the nominations (if you didn't make one, too bad), appreciate the reason(s) for the nomination and just cast a vote? :mad:

misty floyd

It's meant to be a bit of craic lads. If there was a real ceremony for this, the music would sound along the lines of:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGwwJEE7k48

ecoli

Let me explain why I said no having a pop.

This is an award thread in which people are nominated by peers not themselves as such it is not fair to put posters in the limelight only to have a go at them or their performance.

I can see where people are coming from but this is not designed to be a debate thread. The only reason I left it open was so that people could explain the performance/ log/ poster for people who are not aware of it. For example Magnet has not been around that much since her performance so people who came to the forum since the summer might not know her achievement. Likewise with the likes of Bazmans accomplishments etc

If you dont agree thats fine at the end of the day your vote will show that

In terms of nominations maybe I didnt make it clear there was no restrictions on what you could nominate or how many at the time it was completely open and in fact this thread has all the nominated selections so I didnt omit any on my judgement.

Never thought awards would cause so much grief it is just a way of reminding and acknowledging boardsies and performances from year gone by

Its a feel good thread that is what these were there for designed for. No one will remember in a few weeks time who won etc and to be honest no one cares its more about acknowledging what boardsies have done throughout the year.

Again some performances slip peoples mind as people tend to follow certain boardsies more than others but that is natural hard to follow every race by everyone

shotgunmcos

I voted for the WWR leg by Ocnoc as I felt he toasted himself for the ascent and then descended on pure adrenalin like a crazy fool. There is having the guts and then there is leaving it all on the line. He must have descended like it was pitch dark and there was a jaguar stalking him. I struggled a bit to decide as I felt all of the others were very worthy. Magnet was awesome indeed and I think I just didn't give TRR the vote as the image of that mad dance over the last 20 meters gave me chucky nightmares. If it wasn't for that craziness it coulda' been a 1:35 It was a savage marathon performance all the same so well done again lad'.

robinph

Might not be enough "performances" in a year, but an award for "Stupidest crossing the finish line video" could be one for the future. We've got the windmill and silly dance by TRR in Berlin 2011, Misty screaming across the line in DCM 2010...

Pisco Sour

Stone mad this whole thing is. My posts keep getting deleted for slagging or having a pop, even though not once have I actually had a pop at anyone, and in fact the person I am apparantly having a go at is the person I think deserves to win this thing. I'm exiting this thread. Has lost all real value as far as I'm concerned. I agree with the poster who likened it to a fascist regime.

TFBubendorfer

Godwin's law has come to A/R/T once again. :rolleyes:

RacoonQueen

RayCun

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=73470703

RacoonQueen wrote: »

Who's going to be the Hitler mod now! :eek: :pac:

I win!

rovers_runner

04072511 wrote: »

Stone mad this whole thing is. My posts keep getting deleted for slagging or having a pop, even though not once have I actually had a pop at anyone, and in fact the person I am apparantly having a go at is the person I think deserves to win this thing. I'm exiting this thread. Has lost all real value as far as I'm concerned. I agree with the poster who likened it to a fascist regime.

You can say what you want here, as long as the clique agrees with it :rolleyes:
My suggestion would be
a) A proper nomination/vote thread for performances that are of a high standard
b) A mollycoddling personal achievement catch all nomination/award thread for people who need a pat on the back

ultraman1

robinph wrote: »

Might not be enough "performances" in a year, but an award for "Stupidest crossing the finish line video" could be one for the future. We've got the windmill and silly dance by TRR in Berlin 2011, Misty screaming across the line in DCM 2010...[/QUO

not forgetting woddles 2 x sixshooters in berlin

robinph

ultraman1 wrote: »

robinph wrote: »

Might not be enough "performances" in a year, but an award for "Stupidest crossing the finish line video" could be one for the future. We've got the windmill and silly dance by TRR in Berlin 2011, Misty screaming across the line in DCM 2010...[/QUO

not forgetting woddles 2 x sixshooters in berlin

I think he did an aeroplane in Paris as well, but not sure if that is on video.

tunguska

RacoonQueen wrote: »

What's with all the bitching? The mods can only put up a poll based on what was nominated. People are going to nominate what they think of, yeah, emerald007, pronator, heff etc as mentioned also have cracking performances which deserve recognition. They weren't nominated though, not because people don't think they deserve recognition, but, probably because people just didn't think of them when they were nominating.

And thats the point I was trying to make RQ. I know people didnt go out of their way to ignore certain performances, but the fact is they went pretty much unnoticed and that says it all in terms of the general mentality on these boards(and due to the fact that the lads in question are very humble characters who have no interest in self promotion). But it shouldn't be a case of out of sight out of mind, thats not right. I know you can't bash people over the head and order them to vote for certain performances but at the same time some thought has to be given to something other than whats right in front of your face.

RacoonQueen wrote: »

Maybe next year, before nominations start we can have a discussion thread where people can bring up performances they think are worthy of nomination so everyone can make a more informed choice when they're nominating.

Agreed, that'd be a good way to go.

Zuppy

IMHO this is a very entertaining thread. :-) I agree with being able to explain your vote should you choose and not having a pop but good honest debate is what the forum is about.

I can't remember this being too much of an issue in the past (maybe rose tinted glasses). What has changed since last year?

I voted for Magnets performance not because I follow the Ultra scene but because it was a stunning performance and she kicked a massive amount of Butt. Not belittling anyone's performance but this one was world class.

donothoponpop

tunguska wrote: »

And thats the point I was trying to make RQ. I know people didnt go out of their way to ignore certain performances, but the fact is they went pretty much unnoticed and that says it all in terms of the general mentality on these boards(and due to the fact that the lads in question are very humble characters who have no interest in self promotion). But it shouldn't be a case of out of sight out of mind, thats not right. I know you can't bash people over the head and order them to vote for certain performances but at the same time some thought has to be given to something other than whats right in front of your face.

Three of the "best of" performances that got nominated, I had never noticed before they were nominated, and I read a lot of race reports. If it wasn't for them being nominated, I'd have missed them. Sure there's a lot of other great stuff that hasn't been nominated, but I don't think there's anything standout that is head and shoulders above the best of what's there already.

tunguska

donothoponpop wrote: »

Sure there's a lot of other great stuff that hasn't been nominated, but I don't think there's anything standout that is head and shoulders above the best of what's there already.

I think we'll have to agree to disagree about that one.

RayCun

Zuppy wrote: »

I can't remember this being too much of an issue in the past (maybe rose tinted glasses). What has changed since last year?

There wasn't any discussion in previous years (as far as I can see), just the poll.