Young, Birk-Jarvis win 2019 Curtis Pugsley Athlete of the Year Awards

PROVO, Utah – All-Americans Clayton Young and Erica Birk-Jarvis were both named BYU track and field’s 2019 Curtis Pugsley Athletes of the Year.

The Curtis Pugsley Award is BYU track and field’s highest recognition and is given every year to one athlete from each of BYU’s men’s and women’s teams. The honor is given based on personal performance during the previous season. The award is named in honor of former BYU track and field athlete Curtis Pugsley (2000-2004), who passed away in 2013 after a battle with cancer. During his time at BYU, Pugsley earned multiple All-America honors and won a conference championship in the decathlon. 

This year’s award featured a strong pool of nominees including All-Americans Conner Mantz, Young, Birk-Jarvis and Andrea Stapleton-Johnson. 

Young won the 10,000m at the NCAA Outdoor Championships with a time of 29:16.60 and received first-team All-America honors. Also during the outdoor season, he was named to the All-America First Team after he finished sixth in the 5000m (14:09.00) at the 2019 NCAA Outdoor Championships. During the indoor season, he earned first-team All-America honors in two events after placing third in the 5000m (13:45.35) and sixth in the 3000m (7:55.86) at the 2019 NCAA Indoor Championships. 

Birk-Jarvis received All-America honors in three different events during the 2019 indoor and outdoor track season. She became the 3,000-meter BYU school record holder in indoor track after posting a time of 9:00.69. She made the All-America First Team during the indoor season after she took second in the distance medley relay (10:54.14) at the 2019 NCAA Indoor Championships. She was a first-team All-American in the 3000m after she placed fifth (9:05.62) at the same championship meet. In the outdoor season, she was named a first-team All-American as she finished fifth in the 3000m Steeplechase (9:46.47) at the 2019 NCAA Outdoor Championships. She also set a personal-best and new school record at the MPSF Indoor Championships where she placed first in the mile with a time of 4:34.59. In addition to those performances she placed first in the 5000m with a No. 1 school-record time of 15:38.12 at the Stanford Invitational and clocked 9:42.54 for the fastest 3000m Steeplechase in school history at the NCAA West Preliminary Round and to finish second overall. 

"I am so grateful to be honored with this award," Birk-Jarvis said. "I look up to the strong women who have won it before me. I am thankful for my coach who has helped me dreamer bigger than I ever thought possible.”

Young and Birk-Jarvis join a notable group of athletes that have also received this award, including the 2018 winners—Rory Linkletter and Whittni Orton. 

The winner was determined by a scoring system based on accomplishments in the 2019 indoor and outdoor seasons. Points are awarded for performance at indoor and outdoor championships, All-America recognition, school records set or broken and BYU top-10 placement.