Prior to 2005 the Leatherman’s Loop results were tallied by hand by dedicated volunteers who insured the timing and finish order were recorded smoothly and quickly. The end result of their toil was a collection of posterboards with that year’s loop results meticulously pasted in order and hand tallied to determine winners in multiple categories. Tony and Judy Godino have kept these records of achievement for over 20 years and have released these one of a kind documents to me to photograph and post for the Loop website.
The first board from 1987 was actually on display at this years (and some other years) loops near the teepee. Check here for a photo of where it all began.
In 1987 there were 2 poster boards. Each year the Loop drew more runners and the number of posterboards went up. Each board holds 50 finishers so the final race from 2004 has around 800 finishers which works out to around 16 boards. Multiply an average of 8-10 boards per year by 18 years of the loop recorded and you get 150-180 boards (plus the assorted Blue Moon races held intermittently during the years). See photo above left to see the 40 pound pile of paper.
The archive project can use your help. I will be photographing the poster boards and putting them into photo galleries online. These will be organized and posted into years. Some folks have suggested using “crowdsourcing” to help transcribe the names, times, and results into a text format from the photo jpg format. I am not sure how that will happen but for now I will photograph and post the boards in the coming weeks and months. I will post a story here when I have a year done – not sure how long it will take. Onward! -Rob
