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Lead Stories: Thursday, August 28, 2008

Chris Derrick Named First Ever Gatorade National Boys XC Runner of the Year

Posted January 15th, 2008 at 3:36 PM by Adam Jacobs

Section: News & Results, Announcements, Cross Country, High School

In its third decade of honoring the nation’s best high school athletes, The Gatorade Company, in partnership with RISE Magazine, today announced Chris Derrick of Neuqua Valley High School (Naperville, Ill.) as its 2007-08 Gatorade National Boys Cross Country Runner of the Year. Derrick becomes the first student-athlete to win the award, since The Gatorade Company announced the addition of boys cross country to the Player of the Year program this past October.

The award, which recognizes not only athletic excellence, but also high standards of academic achievement and exemplary character demonstrated on and off the racecourse, distinguishes Derrick as the nation’s best high school boys cross country runner. A national advisory board comprised of sportswriters and sport-specific experts from around the country helped select Derrick from more than 210,000 high school boys cross country runners nationwide. Derrick is now a finalist for the prestigious Gatorade Male High School Athlete of the Year Award, to be presented at a special ceremony the afternoon prior to The ESPY Awards in July.
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Lois Ann Gilmore named Masters Athlete of the Year

Posted November 30th, 2007 at 9:00 AM by Martha Jones

Section: News & Results, Masters

Lois Ann Gilmore of Janesville, Wis., one of the most successful and prolific age-graded masters distance runners in history and a survivor of two life-threatening illnesses, on Thursday was named USA Track & Field’s Masters Athlete of the Year. The announcement was made by the Masters Long Distance Running and Track & Field Committees at USATF’s Annual Meeting in Honolulu.

Gilmore, 77, has run 54 road races to date this year, at distances from 5 km to 15 km. Her accomplishments have included an American record time of 26:01 for 5 km, which has been the distance at which she has found the most success.

More than a decade ago, age-grade standards were established which enabled the performances by athletes in different age groups to be compared. Using the tables, performances at a given age are assigned a percentile to indicate where it would rank on a scale of 1-100. Out of Gilmore’s 54 road races this year, a remarkable 35 of them are 90% or above.
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