Grand Pioneer Day was full of friends and fun

SPORTS SHORTS
by Scott Boyle
Can a Pioneer Day celebration get any better?  Near-perfect weather, an ideal parade with so much candy the grandkids couldn’t pick it all up, and a busy carnival at Veterans Memorial Park with all the wonderful shade.
There were engaging games, a rousing runners race, marvelous mudbogging, spellbinding softball, trecherous tractor pull, and even nocturnal golf.  That, coupled with all the familiar faces from days of yore made for a lovely weekend.  For the brand “Monacello” we ride!”
The annual Blue Mountain Pioneer Day 5K race turned out to be a high school cross country event, with 11 of the first 12 finishers being teenagers.  
Only semi-old guy Walter Bird was able to interrupt the high school stream.  Collin Hatch, a member of last year’s state champion Buckaroo cross country team, was the overall winner of the race, followed closely by Jens Brewer, another Buck harrier, and two San Juan Bronco runners, Cole and Chase Chamberlain.  
Next were three more Buckaroo runners, Everett Hatch, Kyler LaRose and Tyler Bird   
Bailey Goodwine, another runner for MHS, was the overall  winner of the women’s race, with Wendy Ramsay second, followed by Cambria Welch and Dianna Nielson.  
A total of 73 runners participated in the popular annual event, run by high school xc coach, Jeff Hunt.
SAA were the winners of the Blue Mountain Fastpitch tournament, besting the Pueblo Bandits late Saturday night.  
The SAA team, led by former Monticellians, Ricky and Billy Manzanares, have won the tournament before and played some awesome softball.
The most dramatic game was a semi-final game against the Bandits, a pitcher’s duel that saw the game go into the last inning with the score knotted at 0-0.  
Neither team had even had a runner past second base the entire game until SAA homerun derby runner-up, Mr. Barnes, stepped up to the plate and blasted a solo walk off homerun to win the game.
Page Break, a regular at the tournament finished third place, followed by the Jason Workman Memorial Team in fourth.  Northern Electric won the drop down tournament.
The softball tournament brought 14 teams to the fray, more than in recent years.  Tournament chairman, Greg Westfall, was pleased with the tournament, as were all the new teams, from Pueblo and Fort Collins, Colorado.  While here the teams checked out the famous Hideout golf course as well.  
Players were delighted with the number of fans watching the games, saying that they usually play to about 15 fans, not the hundreds that viewed the tournament under wonderful conditions.
New this year was the Pioneer Day Nighttime Golf Tournament.  The players played nine holes in daylight and the back nine in the dark.  Well, not totally dark, as the course was lined with glo-sticks which lit the course enough for players to even use golf carts.  
Players used glow in the dark golf balls that provided some fireworks type entertainment for the golfers.  
Nine four man teams entered, with Team Young (Jon Young, Billy and McKade Maloy and Brad Young) posting the best best-ball score of 57.  
Second went to team Wilcox (Brad and Ethan, Kelly Pehrson and Dave Moore), who rolled in with a 60.  
Team Crane (Dennis and Sam, and Corbin Black) were third shooting a fine 63.  Organizers hope this inaugural event becomes an annual affair.
We would report on the mud bog games, but we couldn’t identify any of the winners.
Le Tour
I was right, Bradley aWigginza won le Tour de France, as I predicted, and Ernie Els won the British Open, as no one predicted.  Next up in just a few days is the 2012 London Olympics.
Speaking of the Olympics, Sportshorts caught up with 2008 Beijing Olympian and adopted Monticellian, Lindsey Anderson.  
Anderson is the happy mother of nine-month-old future runner Teyton Anderson.  Teyton is the apple of her parent’s eyes and has been the reason Lindsey stopped running for a year.  She has been teaching at Morgan High School and coaching at Weber State.
Recently, Anderson resumed her training on a small scale, aiming for next year’s world championships in Russia running her speciality, the steeplechase.   Of special note was the announcement that the Anderson families will switch to an every other year camping event on Blue Mountain.  Anderson and her husband were in attendance last year, but hopefully will be in Russia next summer.