2020 Awards Night
The Perspective of a New Member
On Monday night, I looked at an old blog post of the 2019’s Awards Night Recap. Last year’s Awards Night was, for many, one of the last large social gatherings for the foreseeable future. At the beginning of 2021, I joined Prospect Park Track Club and wanted to get involved in the clubs activities and runs. While this year's Awards Night occurred as a Zoom meeting, the club's spirit and resilience is seen through the screen. Members continued the tradition of getting dressed up (in their red attire) and cheering on their teammates and friends for the Awards.
The energy was contagious at 6:45 pm as members logged into the platform for “Ice Breaker” breakout rooms. Even though this is only my second month in the club, I was lucky that I had familiar faces in my breakout room and we shared our excitement for the virtual Awards Night. Members were excited and ready for the Awards Night festivities, eating snacks, chatting about their Saturday runs and comparing the Zoom Awards Night to the previous Awards Nights!
Leanne began the PPTC Awards Night right on time at 7 pm. Thank you to Leanne for sending out all the emails and working to organize the Awards Night. She began the evening by sharing the land acknowledgment that we run on the unceded, ancestral homeland of the Lenape (Delaware) People. Leanne also shared that by registering for this event, members received a fifteen dollar gift certificate through Grubhub and will be receiving a PPTC neck gaiter. After joining PPTC, I value seeing all members wearing their PPTC gear in the park and on runs, a common connection that we are part of the same running club. I’ll be sure to wear my neck gaiter on my runs.
Leanne then introduced Adam Devine, who shared some words about Michael Koplin. Michael had a positive impact on the club and was generous with both his words and time. He was incredibly supportive of everyone and made all people feel special. Adam encouraged us to express our love to one another, in Michael’s memory.
Tom Meany then shared his President’s Address and the history of the club's event. He communicated that PPTC’s Awards Night used to be a small party and has evolved over the years to fill the Grand Prospect Hall. He shared that while we may have outgrown smaller venues, we have not outgrown Zoom and we are all lucky to virtually celebrate one another's accomplishments.
Tom shared that the awards night was well planned, a nice way to see friendly faces and celebrate our club and communities accomplishments. Tom remarked that he was blown away by the grand planning to put together the Awards Night where individuals brought their own personal skills to persevere and put on Awards Night, despite the limitations of the pandemic. He thanked the Captains Committee and asked Will Ngo to talk a little about volunteering with the club.
Will Ngo has been a club member for two and a half years and joined the club to connect and run with other people. Will volunteered at the Al Goldstein race and felt like he was getting a lot out of running, the community of PPTC and wanted to help out wherever he could. Will joined the Social Committee, the Communications Committee, the Clothing Committee, the Race Committee and the Grant Committee. Will was a race director for the Turkey Trot and designed the belt buckle for the 50 miler and is the chairperson of the Design Committee. He writes the weekly Speed Read sent out to all members with information about group runs and events each week.
After a detailed discussion of Will’s contributions to the club, Tom announced that Will won the President's Award. Will was one of the first people I met on my first run with the club. I was a new member and he was incredibly welcoming and kind to me. Congratulations, Will on receiving the President's Award!
Then the club moved forward with announcing the rest of the night’s awards. It was great listening to the different announcers and hearing all the amazing contributions people have made to the club. As a new member, I had the opportunity to meet some members at weekend runs, but it was great to see the whole community of over one hundred people and the motivation that people have to work together to help one another achieve and conquer their running goals. Even through a screen, the friendship and love the club members project was clear.
2020-2021 has been a year like no other, with everyone facing adversity in the pandemic and all of us working to persevere to live our best, safest lives. This looks different for all of us, however together as a club, through virtual meetings we are able to foster and form our community of like minded people and celebrate our accomplishments.
A warm congratulations to all the winners and to all the attendees it is so wonderful to have everyone sharing in an event with friendly, familiar faces. While we do hope we can one day resume in person social events when it is safe, a virtual Awards Night was a wonderful way to honor all of the hard work of all runners and the amazing community that is built from PPTC.
I have lived in Brooklyn for three years and finding community has been difficult! I tried everything from Sound Painting to Parkour to find my group of people. For the past few years, it has been my goal to find further community in Brooklyn and luckily I signed up for the first Sunday run of January and continued to go back to run with PPTC. While PPTC is a running club, it is also so much more than that. This is a group of people who look after and care for one another and while running we have the opportunity to nurture friendships and get to know all people.
I am a teacher and I know that Zoom events do not always go as planned with the infinite technological issues we all face, however the Awards Night was well organized with proper breaks and opportunities for people to connect with others and express happiness over their award winning friends. The chat was overflowing with positive messages to nominees and winners. It was fun for all members to cheer on nominated and winning members and a nice break for all members to have the opportunity to win some awesome raffle prizes!
Thank you to Jana Trenk who played a slideshow of all the pictures and faces of PPTC throughout the year during the brief intermission. It was a great way to see all the fun pandemic and non pandemic runs PPTC has taken part in!
The PPTC Awards Night wrapped up at 8:30 pm with a special thank you to all those who made this event memorable, special and worked to continue connecting the PPTC community.
Although I did not get the opportunity to attend any of the social events in person, I am really fortunate to be making connections and friendships with the PPTC community over Zoom and group runs. Thank you to the team captains and everyone who worked to create an amazing virtual Awards Night.
2021 was a virtual Awards Night that will be remembered!
2020 Awards Night Award recipients
President’s Award
William Ngo
Most Inspirational
Michael Koplin
Female Masters Runner of the Year
Pamela Ritchie
Male Masters Runner of the Year
Sean Quealy
Bob Mueller Award
David Coleman
Outstanding Single Contribution
Stephanie Mei
Female Runner of the Year
Leiba Rimler
Male Runner of the Year
Victor Zeitoune
New Member of the Year
Emily Golloub
Volunteer of the Year
Kelly and Peter Chian
COVID Consistency Nominees
Jennifer Bolstad, Crystal Kun, Oren Efrati, Janice Fuld, Dillon Glasser, Leanne Glasser,
Liz Grammer, Kelly Greene, Ruth Gursky, Lisa Maya Knauer, Will Ngo, Austin Maar,
Adam Wapniak, Albert Wu, and Maya Ziv
COVID Consistency Winners (selected by a drawing and recipients of $50 gift certificates)
Austin Maier
Oren Efrati
Lisa Maya Knauer
Adam Wapniak
Female Ultra Runner of the Year
Holly Chase
Male Ultra Runner of the Year
Brandon Vigilante
Raffle Prize winners
$50 gift certificate to Da Nonna Rosa
Ellen Alperin
$50 gift certificate to Brooklyn Running Company
Murray Rosenblatt
$50 gift certificate to Jackrabbit
Beth Moran
$50 gift certificate for Miriam Wiskind’s Pizza
Danielle Fagenblat
Jana Trenk
$100 gift certificate to Priority Fitness
Laura Laramier
One Physical therapy Session at Ascent Physical Therapy
with Andrew Eisen, valued at $185
Dillon Glasser
Hyperice Prizes
Hypervolt
Ruth Gursky
Hypersphere
Lisa Barzotto
Venom Leg
Morgan Liston
Custom PPTC Soaps by Kevin Romoser’s Soapso
Mathew Imberman
Rachael DePalma
Kelly Greene
Linda Chan
Virtual awards night photo contest winners
Best Dressed: winner of a $50 gift card to JackRabbit
Christine Frietchen
Most Creative Background: tied winners of gift cards to Bakline Running
Crystal Cun
Jana Veliskova
Most Festive Pet: winner of a $50 gift card to Brooklyn Running Company
Paulie Walnuts (submitted by fur dad Johnnie Nuzzella)
PPTC is a diverse and supportive team. We want to celebrate the diversity of our club and membership. We welcome and encourage everyone to share their stories with us.
Text by: Rachel Harris
Photos: Screen shots by Rachel Harris; Photo Contest Photos by winners
Edited by: Linda S. Chan and Rachael DePalma
Produced by: Linda S. Chan