WMA dragging its feet on revealing World Best Masters of 2016?

Mary Norckauer did it all — professional ice skater and pro baseball player in World War II.

Will 2017 get here before we learn who WMA picks as 2016 Athletes of the Year, aka World Best Masters? Notes have been shot to WMA President Stan Perkins and webmaster Jeff Brower. Hope to hear from them soon. In the meantime, John Seto of mastersrankings.com has compiled a list of the athletes with the most No. 1 rankings in 2016, indoors and out. The top topster is 92-year-old Mary Norckauer of Louisiana, who was profiled here in 2015. Mary had eight No. 1 age-group rankings. She does sprints, throws and jumps.

Here’s John’s unofficial list:

8 – Mary Norckauer (USA)
7 – Emmerich Zensch (AUT)
7 – Kathryn Martin (USA)
7 – Jean-Louis Esnault (FRA)
7 – Irene Obera (USA)
7 – Carole Filer (GBR)
6 – George Roudebush (USA)
6 – Myrle Mensey (USA)
6 – Jean-Claude Demarque (FRA)
6 – Flo Meiler (USA)
6 – Manuel Alonso Domingo (ESP)
6 – Kathy Bergen (USA)
5 РJos̩ Canelo (POR)
5 – Mohamed Farah (GBR)
5 – John Goldhammer (USA)

John also made this happy announcement:

Some have asked whether only members can view lists and be listed. EVERYONE (who competes in an organized competition run in accordance with WMA rules) can be listed and view everything on the site except for the current calendar year’s rankings lists. This means that everyone can see the 2016 rankings lists on Sunday, January 1st. 

Are all your performances listed? If not, click here to submit all missing performances. All inferior performances will be listed on your profile and the superior performances will be instantly updated on the rankings list.

The 2016 lists are about 78% complete. Some might think that is a lot of missing performances. I think it shows good progress considering last year at this time the 2015 lists were about 48% complete.

MastersRankings’ policy was to complete compiling and checking outdoor lists by the end of February. Whether that will be accomplished this year is yet to be seen – it is still possible. The progress made with developing relationships, improving productivity, improving QC programs and inserting 540,000 performances in 2016 makes me optimistic this policy can be restored within the next year or two. Pretty good considering the volunteer resources and limited funding. 

Print Friendly

December 29, 2016

One Response

  1. Ken Stone - December 30, 2016

    In response to query, Stan Perkins writes:

    We delayed the selection to allow results from Perth to be taken into account, and therefore the nomination date was extended.
    The votes have been cast but a minor matter still has to be resolved. It will be announced within a week I suggest and posted to the WMA website.

Leave a Reply