UTofMB Final Standings: 2025
We were pleased to host our annual Awards Night and present the winners in our Ultimate Trails of Manitoba series on November 8, 2025, at the Centre culturel franco-manitobain.
We got to celebrate YOU, the MATR members who raced across the province at 18 trail races, donated your time to volunteering at them, and joined us to cover over 350km of trail at our trail work parties!
Top Participants
We are pleased to present the Top 3 participant awards in 2025 to:
1st place: Linda Hamilton - Linda earned her title as the Ultimate Trails of Manitoba top runner by collecting the most points (334) by running her first and many, many more trail races this season. There was barely an event this year which wasn't graced by her enthusiasm for trail racing. She picked up a few extra bonus points by often being the oldest runner registered for the event she ran!
2nd place: Sam Neis - Sam fought valiantly for the top spot, missing out by less than 10 points. Sam, like Linda, raced at many, many races this season and earned bonus points in multiple categories. He also picked up a few extra points by attending a trail work event put on by Trails Manitoba this fall.
3rd place: Devin Drury - Devin raced at six races this year and picked up points in several categories including being a top finisher at some events, racing across regions, and being the youngest racer at two events.
Congratulations to Alex Pinella, our top finisher from last year who just missed out on the podium this year and Tima Faria for placing 4th and 5th in the series, respectively.
Guardian of the Trail Award
Each year, Urban Trail Canada sponsors the Guardian of the Trail Award and recognizes the MATR member with the most combined points from volunteers at trail work events AND races this year! This year, the award recipient is Leif Larsen. Leif joined us at almost all of trail work events over the past 12 month. Leif’s presence always had a big impact and we were delighted to have his dog Bjorn the border collie at trail work, too.
Category Awards & Prizes
Trail Prodigy: We had two runners who really stood out this year collecting points for being the youngest in some races they entered and had dynamite runs: Maia Idzikowski and Carthy Caswell.
We also recognized the youngest MATR member runner at any event in 2025, Rydan Fleming.
In our Master of Masters category, from the pool of the oldest MATR members to race this year, Grange Morrow made quite the debut, running his first (several) trail events this year.
This year we recognized three race volunteers. They volunteered to help make your day at an aid station:
Helen Baker
Kelly Zipp
Deanna Rempel
We recognized three runners for outstanding performances this year, placing in the top finishers of an event:
Robyn McCormack
Carly Issak
Mark Gray
Our Longest Time, Biggest Heart runners in 2025 were Natalie Sala and Shelley Kyle.
We were able to recognize two Fresh Blood runners this year from the group of MATR members running their first trail race this year:Arlene Ebora and Scott Dodds.
In the First of the Fence category from the folks who were fastest to register for a race in 2025: Joel Toews managed to be the first to register for two separate events and accumulated the most points in this category.
We have two categories to recognize and encourage runners to participate in events organized by sevearl of the race directors.
In the Tour Grit category for hitting the trail at races organized by at least three different race directors: John Helsdon
And for the Racing Across Regions category and racing at events by two different race directors we have Aaron Webb.
Middle of the pack members or the Goldilocks members., who landed right in the middle of the points standings:
Xuan Nguyen
Allen Francis
Clint Vandersteen
Graham Halford
Tanis Malkoske
We recognized two trail work volunteers this year. These folks gave back to the Manitoba t trail community by volunteering their time to trail maintenance:
Brian Johnston
Janet Young
We also recognized the following runners for turning up to the start line and finishing an event.
Renée Desjardins
Bre Peters
Megan McKenzie
Brent Manke
Zac Friesen
Ryan Morin
To participate in the fifth annual Ultimate Trails of Manitoba series, all you need to do is get your 2026 membership!
Read more about the series and plan your race year.
Door Prizes
We were also able to give away amazing door prizes to help get the audience out on trails in the next year thanks to the generosity of Actif Epica, Groovy Granite, On The Edge Running, Prairie Goat Vertical Kilometer, Prairie Chaos Backyward Ultra, Race RMNP, Rider v Runner, Trails of Toba, and Wonder Athletes.
2025 Completed Races
Frozen Falcon
Actif Epica
Manitoba Snowshoe Run
Oxbow 50
Suffer on Centennial
Birds Hill Trail Series - Aspen Dash 5k
Old Tom Backyard Ultra
Birds Hill Trail Series - Bluestem 13k
Flying Acorn
Grand Sand
Prairie Chaos Backyard Ultra
Birds Hill Trail Series - Esker 8k
Prairie Goat Vertical Kilometer
Rider vs Runner
Race The North Face
Epic East Gate
Bellringer 5 Hour
Groovy Granite
Beaudry Fall Classic
Pinawa Trail Run/Hike
Final Standings
