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Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me a third time, and then nominate me for the...

Next Year, I'm Not Doing Anything Stupid Award

Contest created by Brian McNeil. Email nominations to him.

It's time again for the VHTRC "Next Year I'm Not Doing Anything Stupid Award!"

This award was inspired by an experience I had on a training run several years ago with a group of fellow Furrbutts. The members of the club generally avoid the standard Washington conversation of "What do you do, and for whom do you work."

One day several years ago, with the temperature close to zero, several members of the club were out on the Maryland section of the A.T. for a run. Fingers & toes and drinking tubes froze solid as did the hot water I had cached that morning. Talk somehow turned to work and credentials. We took an inventory and found that the group contained two JDs, three PhDs, a CPA, a DVM, and several MBAs. Dr. Bill Parlett observed that we were a club of "over-educated idiots." All sensible high school drop-outs were warm at home, while we were shivering in the woods.

This award is named in honor of longtime member Bob Coyne, who was heard to utter these bitter words when his Grand Slam attempt ended badly. The award pays tribute to our own distinguished membership of over-educated idiots.

If you have an example of especially bad decision-making by a member of the club, which occurred in 2009, please e-mail Brian McNeill at bmcneill@imf.org the individual's name and a brief description of why you believe the decision is more noteworthy than our usual baseline idiocy. Photographs would be most appreciated.

Previous Winners

• 2009 Mike Bailey
• 2008 The MMT entry process
  The TARP bailout made more sense
• 2007 Scott Crabb & Quatro Hubbard
  It's easy to mistake Montana and Wyoming when navigating on a trail run. They're both big, generally square states out west
• 2006 Gary Knipling
  For demonstrating how not to milk a venomous snake while on a trail run.
• 2005 Vicki Kendall
  For running TWOT on wet-leaves, while carrying a bruise the size of bath-towel on her leg and hip.
• 2004 Deb Pero
  For a case of frost-bite developed while dodging snowmobiles that passed her at 60 mph and bushwhacking across a mountain in sub-zero temperatures.
• 2004 Peyton Robinson, Special Lifetime Achievement Award
  Anyone who would push a baby-jogger 185 miles in the cold rain while Keith Dunn taunts him deserves it.

Brian R. McNeill
bmcneill@imf.org