Most notable prize you ever won?

$6,500, tied for third in 1983 Mobil Indoor Grand Prix overall standings.

I once won a porcelain mortar and pest set. You wouldn't think that it would be notable, and I didn't either. So, I brought it as our family's gift to our church's white elephant Christmas party. Apparently, the award was more notable than I thought as 3 normally nice women nearly threw down in order take it home. It was really bizarre.

Just curious: if a race only advertises "awards," does that mean there are no prizes? Or do they sometimes give you something anyway? I would definitely try to incorporate more local races into my training if they paid off with gift certificates, food, etc.

Mr. Price wrote:

Your mom's panties.

My mom is 69 years old. I guess she wasn´t using strings...

I have never won anything worth mentioning, but my grandpa´s cousin (Eyvind Johnsson) has won the Nobel Prize in literature.

Pete. wrote:blah blah blah...

I'm not sure why you'd want to impersonate me, "Pete." since the original joke wasn't all that original or funny (IMHO, and I have a potty sense of humour, but I guess I could be wrong, and taste in humour is a personal thing). Actually, though, my mom will be 69 this month, so that was a pretty good guess. I don't think about her underwear too much though. Couldn't say what she wears.

I won a Brooks Brother's business suit. Still have it like 15 years later. Great quality.

Pete wrote:

I don't think about her underwear too much though. Couldn't say what she wears.

This is healthy.

you are wrong, yer mom jokes are always funny.

Pete wrote:I'm not sure why you'd want to impersonate me, "Pete." since the original joke wasn't all that original or funny (IMHO, and I have a potty sense of humour, but I guess I could be wrong, and taste in humour is a personal thing).

I have won prize many on many occasions with $600 be the highest in one race. The last two years I ran a local road race that had small prize money, but free tax preparation by liberty tax service - that is a $250-300 value which is sweet. I also won $100 cash for winning the race (5 mile - 24:47 and 2nd was 28:27).

I just remembered another one......once I won a race outright by at least a minute. It was a really small field and went 12k zigzagging up a small mountain. I was hot as balls and I worked like hell to keep the pace up.

At the end of the race they tell me its age graded and that some 69 year old guy 12 minutes back gets the new Timex watch (which was state of the art back in 1994) and I got a pair of Sneaker Balls for coming something like 15th in the adjusted standings.

That one sucked.

I won a free pizza from some crappy pizzeria in West Chester Pa from their XC summer series - it was absolutely the worst pizza ever, I could have done better with wonder bread, government cheese, and catsup. I ate it all though.

I won a pie in albany. I ate that too.

non-running: most outstanding alumni one year. They gave me a crystal plaque with a white glove in the case to handle it. It was pretty funny.

--A baseball signed, "Congratulations, Stan Musial"

--$100 given to me by Marla Runyan (16:14 5k)

Two come to mind:

A CamelBak. Would have been a great prize if it were a trail ultra or something, but this was a road 8K.

A frozen turkey. For a race held the day *after* Thanksgiving.

Non-running: I got a medal from the President (well, actually the VP gave it to me).

Running: I won a legitimate race. Once.

Racing: $400 road race up San Gabriel Mountains (worth about $1000 now).

non-racing:

Publication of Enduring Quality for a paper on Global Climate Change in Nature.

-cr

What did you do to win the "innovation award"?

Complete financial support from the Canada Council for the Arts for a year in Tokyo which I managed to stretch out into a year and a half.

The Ohio Tournament of Champions (wrestling) gave away clocks as trophies to the top 6 placewinners this year. Had I not done a stupid illegal head scissors I'd have also gotten a watch for first place. Kinda strange first place prize since the watch probably wouldn't fit a little kid, middle school and high school kids wouldn't find it "cool", and the college/open division wrestlers are probably looking for something a little more appropriate to wear to work. It wasn't a digital watch so I couldn't have timed my runs with it anyway.

Once I got a lack of an award because the charitable program the race was put on by wanted to reach their $10,000 raised mark and had to do without age group medals in order to get there. Nothing like taking first place and still coming away empty handed (of course if I had placed top 3 overall I'd have walked away with money. Lesson learned: run faster)