Finn Melanson

Finn Melanson (born October 1, 1991 in Northampton, MA) is a mountain ultra trail runner based in Salt Lake City, UT. He co-founded the Bonneville Barnstormers, a road and trail running club based along the Wasatch Front, in 2018. Following an active political campaigning career, Melanson currently serves as the Marketing Manager for Huckabuy, an SEO software company based in Park City, UT.
High School Athletics
Melanson is a 2010 graduate of Cape Elizabeth High School (CEHS) in Cape Elizabeth, ME. During his time at CEHS he was the Wide Receiver for the 2008 and 2009 Cape Elizabeth Football teams that reached 2 Western Maine Finals and 1 State Championship. During his tenure, Melanson earned All-Conference honors twice and All-State honors once.
Political Campaigning
After graduating from the University of Massachusetts in 2014 with a degree in Political Science, Melanson joined the gubernatorial campaign of Independent candidate Eliot Cutler during the 2014 Maine election cycle. Melanson served as the Deputy Communications Director.
Following the 2014 election cycle, Melanson joined a group of 4 politicos that banded together to run a signature collection initiative to place a referendum for ranked-choice voting in federal and state primary and general elections on Maine's statewide ballot in November 2016. Over the next 3 years, Melanson would serve as a Field Director and Education Coordinator for RCV Maine, FairVote Maine, and the LWVME organizing and educating voters about this new voting system.
Voters passed the new system via referendum in November 2016. In November 2018, Maine became the first state in the nation to use ranked-choice voting for general elections for U.S. House and U.S. Senate elections.
Running career
Melanson entered the mountain-ultra trail running scene in the fall of 2016 after a 2014 northbound thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail. He has enjoyed some success at local Utah races with a 2nd-place finish at the 2018 Corner Canyon 50K and a 3rd-place finish at the 2019 Twisted Fork 64K, as well as some regional success with a 5th-place finish at the 2019 Georgia Race. Melanson will be returning to the 2020 Georgia Death Race to compete for a top-2 finish and one of the coveted "Golden Tickets" to the 2020 Western States 100 Mile Endurance race.
Melanson is an avid running writer. He maintained a running blog called "Runners' High" for the Bangor Daily News from 2016-2017 and has published race reports on "The Trail Runner's Project” since 2018.
Notable Race Results
* 2018 Georgia Death Race, 5th Overall in 12:43:11
* 2018 Corner Canyon 5K, 2nd Overall in 4:52:04
* 2019 Twisted Fork 64K, 3rd Overall in 6:24:54
2019 Race Schedule
* 2019 TNF EC San Francisco 50 Mile
* 2020 Georgia Death Race

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