The 2009 Illinois Trail Ultra Grand Slam (iTUGS) will finish up this weekend at the Farmdale Trail Run. It's been a long haul since they started this adventure at the Clinton Lake 30-Mile Trail Run back in March. We only have 11 current survivers and they are all signed-up for the Farmdale 32 miler. (Last year there were 20 Grand Slam finishers.) If these 11 finish on Saturday, they will be crowned 2009 Grand Slammers! I'll be at the Farmndale race (using it for a good long training run) and I plan on taking a group picture of this year's folks before the race starts. As each Slammer finishes, they'll get their regular Farmdale finisher award...plus an iTUGS finisher shirt...and the overall champions will also get a special homemade trophy! Rumor has it that this year we'll even have some adult beverages to celebrate the conclusion of the Grand Slam.
Best of luck to all 11 Grand Slam contenders. Hope you have an injury-free and pleasant run at Farmdale. After rain much of this week, the weekend weather looks to be cool and clear.
A special thanks to Adam Zimmerman for organizing the Grand Slam prizes this year. And everyone should be appreciative of the four race directors that make this possible: Andy (McNaughton Park), Larry (Rock Cut Hobo), Dave (Farmdale), and Chris from Clinton Lake (that's me!).
2 comments:
I hope they have big boy shirts since this race has a Clydesdale Division! My son asked me what my prize was going to be for running all four of these races. I told him I was like Charlie Brown at Halloween ... "I got a rock!" Last year Mr. Tapp gave out awesome engraved stones.
I told Adam (Farmdale guy that is doing the Slam awards) to use whatever sizes they had on file for the Farmdale race...but I did give him what everyone got at Clinton (for you that was XXL). I don't know if they have extra large shirts for the race or the Slam. Hope whatever they ordered for you fits well. I think they went with a camo-print shirt. Haven't seen the final product, but I think it'll look pretty cool. See ya Saturday! BTW, I do believe there will be alcoholic beverages for the Slam celebration.
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