Here are the results of our 2018 Western States 100 Prediction Contest.
We’re only posting place-specific rankings through the top three. (For a refresher on the rules, check out the contest entry page.) Read on to find out who won the contest, and who did the best at picking the men’s and women’s fields individually.
With a huge jump in participation to almost 1,600 entrants (versus 1,117 last year) and with what apparently was a relatively predictable year, there was a huge decrease in scoring this year. This year, a full 1,476 entrants had scored of 50 points or fewer as opposed to only 208 such entrants for the topsy turvy 2017 race or the slightly higher 509 such entrants in 2016. Indeed, there were 655 entrants with 20 or fewer points this year and a full 58 with 10 or fewer points this year. For perspective, last year’s winner Kristin Zosel did so with 24 points, a feat bettered by an incredible 848 entrants this year.
I regret that I’ve decided to go a bit lighter in textually analyzing the various contest winners this year… I’m at the wrong end of the firehose of work while trying to cram in a bit of my own last-minute Hardrock 100 training.
The Winners
Thank you again to Drymax, Jaybird, Buff, Altra, Julbo, and CamelBak along with artist Maggie Tides for providing the great prizes for the contest. Without them, the only thing to come out of the contest would be bragging rights. On to the winners!
- Taylor McPherson (5 points) wins with the benefit of the third tiebreaker, a literal coinflip. Taylor’s 5 points came by way of 4 points from his women’s predictions and one from his men’s. He correctly predicted both Courtney Dauwalter and Jim Walmsley to win (second tie break), and was one for two in picking Jeff Browing for the men’s masters win (correct) and Meghan Laws for the women’s masters win (incorrect), just the same in both cases as the fellow 5-point scorer and runner-up.
Tayler McPherson’s picks.
Grant Acosta (5 points) is only a runner-up by way of a random coin flip. He fared better than Taylor… in scoring a perfect zero points with his women’s picks while tallying 5 points amongst the men.
Grant Acosta’s picks.
- Aaron Lighter (6 points) took third by way of the first tiebreaker with his picks of Jeff Browning and Meghan Laws for the masters wins coming out better than the three other 6-point scorers: Adam Nelson, Paul Gillan, and Michael Heinsich.
Adam Wurr is our random grand-prize winner for which he gets the same loaded prize pack as Taylor McPherson minus the art.
Maggie Tides Western States 100 course Triptych.
The Overall Contest Field
Here’s a breakdown of the number of folks tallying 50 or fewer points other the past seven years: 2009 – 46, 2010 – 107, 2011 – 274, 2012 – 446, 2013 – 694, 2014 – 683, 2015 – 807, 2016 – 509, 2017 – 208, 2018 – 1,476.
Below are the full results:
Men’s Predictions
David Mulkeen was the lone perfect score for the men’s predictions. Even more amazing, he picked the top-five men… in perfect order. Unbelievable!
Women’s Predictions
You can’t get any better than Grant Acosta’s perfect score… although he was matched by Ben Gee and Brady Gross. Beyond that, all four nailed the Superfecta…. getting the top four in perfect order. Nice work!
Final Words
Thanks to the nearly 1,600 individuals who fully took part in the contest… more than four times the total number of starters (369) in this year’s Western States! We had a lot of fun bringing it to you and hope you had a lot of fun participating.
