Summit of Excellence Award

Joanna grew up and went to university in Eastern Canada but it wasn't until she moved to the Canadian Rockies permanently in 1998 that she really got schooled.  In 2007, after a few years working as a gearhead in some local climbing shops, she finally found a dream job that merged mountain culture with her love of outdoor pursuits when she began working for the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival.  Joanna has been the Programming Director of the Festival since 2014; she reads more than 70 mountain literature books and watches 350 mountain films annually.  In addition to being a voracious reader and film enthusiast, she is an avid backcountry skier and has skied throughout North America, The Alps, Kashmir, and the Indian Himalaya.  As a climber she has summited many of the classic 11,000 ft. peaks in her own backyard of the Rockies.  Her writing has appeared in Highline Magazine, Gripped, The Canadian Alpine Journal and Alpinist.  She also serves on the Mountain Culture Committee of the Alpine Club of Canada and is a representative of the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival for the International Alliance for Mountain Film.

Nancy has been alpine, rock and ice climbing and ski mountaineering for over 20 years.  She is the only female to have climbed all 54 peaks over 11,000 feet in the Canadian Rockies.  She was also the first woman to have climbed all 34 routes in Urs Kallen's classic 1977 guidebook to rock climbing on Yamnuska.

Nancy has successfully completed 46 of the 50 routes described in the iconic mountaineering book Fifty Classic Climbs of North America, a feat matched only by two others.  For the past three years, she has been climbing in Europe, Nepal, Pakistan, and Asia.

Nancy has been honoured with both the Guy Lacelle Pure Spirit Award and the Denali Pro Award.  In addition to her 20 years of management experience at the Alpine Club of Canada, Nancy worked for a decade as a presenter and emcee at the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival and its World Tour.  She has contributed her thoughts, ideas, and opinions to the Summit of Excellence Award since 2010.

Geoff Powter is an organizational development and leadership consultant, and one of the co-founders of the Watershed Organizational Development Group, based in Canmore, AB. Geoff has been faculty with Leadership Development at Banff Centre for the past 30 years and served as a member of the Board of Directors of Travel Alberta from 2016-2020.

Geoff trained as a clinical psychologist, and early in his career found an opportunity to blend his interest in the human mind with his passion for mountain adventure. Geoff has been an avid climber for more than four decades, and has climbed all over the globe, including 13 expeditions to the Himalayas. He was the editor of the Canadian Alpine Journal for 13 years, and has written two award-winning books — Strange and Dangerous Dreams: The Fine Line Between Adventure and Madness (which won the Jury Prize at the 2006 Banff Mountain Book Festival), and Inner Ranges (which won the Mountain Literature Prize in Banff, won the National Outdoor Book Award in the US, and was shortlisted for the Boardman-Tasker Award for Mountain Literature). He has written extensively about adventure travel, including regular pieces for The Globe and Mail. 

In 2012, Geoff received the prestigious Summit of Excellence Award for lifetime contribution to Canadian mountain culture. 

Louis began rock and ice climbing at age 15. Between 1999 and 2010, Louis made several expeditions to the Andean Cordillera which allowed him to accumulate several ascents of mountains over 6000m. Starting in 2007, he began turning his attention to the great peaks of the Himalayas. That year he summited Broad Peak (8051m) and climbed up to 7350m on K2 (8611m). In 2009, he climbed a new route on Nanga Parbat (8125m) and made two attempts on K2 (up to 8360m). His Himalayan tick-list continued to grow with an attempt on Gasherbrum I (8068m) by a new route on the south face in the winter 2011 (the first winter attempt on the mountain). The following summer 2011, he attempted Gasherbrum I again (up to 7950m) via the Japanese couloir route, and he summited Gasherbrum II (8035m). More recently, Louis went to Kyrgyzstan to climb Khan Tengri (7010m) and to Nepal to climb Tilicho Peak (7134m). Louis lives in Quebec, Canada and when he's not climbing, he works as a public health adviser for the Ministry of Health of Quebec.

Ever since her introduction to climbing in a dusty Ontario gym, Senja Palonen has made climbing a defining part of her life. World-famous Squamish granite soon drew her out west where she has become a prominent figure in the local climbing community.

For over ten years Senja coordinated the granting program at Mountain Equipment Co-op. Here, her expertise was integral in shaping the success of local and national grants supporting and promoting outdoor activity throughout Canada. Additionally, Senja ran the MEC Expedition Support program and co-created the MEC Adventure Grant with the Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival (VIMFF), helping many ambitious expeditions happen around the world each year.

Although Sarah climbs in some of the coldest places, she has the biggest, warmest heart in climbing. As one of the most sought after Association of Canadian Mountain Guides alpine guides in Canada, Sarah has also been a part of a number of first ascent teams worldwide and was the first North American woman to climb grades M11 - M14. It turns out that recognition is not what motivates her, rather what really drives her is usually curiosity. For well over a decade, Sarah has been offering female-only mountaineering courses. These courses have fostered hundreds of women to become self-sufficient in the mountains. The numbers jump to the thousands when you add in the co-ed courses she offers as well as her private guiding. For Sarah, the mountains are about connecting to herself and others.

David Smart is a climber, author, journalist, and editor. He has been climbing rock since the 1970s and remains an enthusiastic new route climber with a deep passion for the sport. Early in his career, he authored four guidebooks to rock climbing in Ontario and Quebec. A veteran journalist and editor, he is the founding editor of Gripped Magazine, Canadian Running Magazine, Cycling Magazine Canada, and Triathlon Canada. Over four decades, his work has appeared in Climbing, Alpinist, Rock and Ice, the Canadian Alpine Journal, and the American Alpine Journal, among other publications. 

His 2023 biography, Royal Robbins: The American Climber, won the Banff Mountain Film and Book Festival's Award for Climbing Literature and was short-listed for the Boardman Tasker Prize. Previous works include Emilio Comici: Angel of the Dolomites (2021), Paul Preuss: Lord of the Abyss (2019), and his memoir, A Youth Wasted Climbing (2015). His books have been translated into five languages. In 2022, he received the H. Adams Carter Award for Mountain Literature from the American Alpine Club in recognition of his lifelong contributions to mountain writing. In 2026, his book, Among the Pale Spires, will be published by Rocky Mountain Books.