All four Program Coordinators are well-known judges who have been around for some time, but there are many judges who haven’t had the opportunity to work with them or interact with them. So here, in their own words, is a brief bio of each:

Toby Elliott

I began judging in 1999, right after qualifying for my first (and only) Pro Tour. I spent many years judging the Northern California competitive circuit before taking on a prominent role in GPs and PTs.

Since I got involved with the wider program, I’ve spent my time figuring out how to make it tick, and I’m most widely known for being in charge of tournament policy. I didn’t plan for that to happen; I just kept poking at it until we had the new IPG, shortcuts, communication policy, out-of-order-sequencing and a bunch of the basic framework in which we run tournaments. I accidentally invented end-of-round procedure at GP Denver when I just did it assuming that we always did it. Of course, I had a ton of people reviewing and revising these initiatives over the years to make me look good!

I’m excited to be a Program Coordinator. The program is going to face challenges in the coming months and years, and I’m excited to start breaking them down and working with my fellow judges to address them. I pushed hard for this redefinition because I believe that we have a ton of talented people in the program, and giving them opportunities to work on the things they love will produce spectacular results!

When I’m not judging, I work for Mozilla running teams of server engineers, and live in Silicon ValleyBoston with my wife, Jennifer, and my two cats, Urza and Mirri.

 

Sean Catanese

The mileposts on my judging career are best described by the communities I’ve served and the mentors who have helped me along the way. I have been fortunate that my mentors have included Toby Elliott, Riki Hayashi, Jeff Morrow, and Andy Heckt, among many others.

I started judging in 2007 in Northern California, and served my local communities at Great Escape Games and Big Brother Comics in Sacramento and EndGame in Oakland. I don’t judge too many local events here in Seattle, but I can be found at Card Kingdom several evenings each week.

Many judges are familiar with my work on JudgeCast, which I hosted, edited, published for about two years before handing the reins to the show’s current, more reliable hosts.

I served as the Regional Coordinator for the US Southwest before being given the opportunity to serve as a Grand Prix Head Judge and other program leadership roles. I was also the staff manager for both of the Modern Masters Grand Prix in Las Vegas (2013 and 2015), which were both the most fun and most challenging events to which I’ve ever contributed.

Outside of events, I’ve led the team which rewrote the unsporting conduct section of the IPG, helped launch the Exemplar Program, and led the creation of the Magic Judge Code and Judge Conduct Committee.

I’m excited to serve this term as a Program Coordinator because it’s an opportunity to shape an overall strategic vision for the judge program that we haven’t really had in eras past.

 

Jason Lemahieu

I’ve been judging since 2006, when Chris Richter realized that I’d consistently put up good results at Limited events, but was nowhere to be seen for the Constructed ones.  To this day, I’m yet to play a sanctioned match of Constructed Magic, despite making Day 2 of a Pro Tour (they were different, then).

Large tournaments were the initial draw for me to get into the judge program, and it wasn’t until I started traveling to Grand Prix level events that I realized what an amazing community was behind all of these awesome tournaments.  I still love large events, and certainly run my fair share of them, but over time, my focus has shifted to what’s going on more behind-the-scenes that makes this not just possible, but makes it worth dedicating so much time to.

During the week, I’m a Senior WordPress developer with the University of Wisconsin – Extension.  As such, many of my most known judge program contributions are internet-related.  In fact, I started this blog network you’re reading now, which is now home to over 100 judge blogs and almost 300 judge bloggers.  I’ve been a major part of JudgeApps since it was only a dream, and I was able to turn the idea of the Magic Online Judge Open (MOJO) into a reality as well. (Editor’s Note: He also won it. Judge!)

 

Kim Warren

In 2009 I played in Pro Tour Kyoto, where my terrible block performance undermined my reasonable draft and I failed to make day 2. Instead, I got cajoled into shadowing a side events judge for the rest of the weekend, and made the decision that I would certify in order to judge constructed PTQ seasons while still playing in the limited ones. Suffice to say, I’ve only ever been back to the Pro Tour since in the black shirt.

When I get interested in things I tend to commit pretty hard, so I quickly became a familiar figure on tournaments around the UK, then around Europe, and then all over the internet in the wider program. I’ve been heavily involved in a number of projects both on the policy and the community side of things, including spending time as the UK, Ireland and South Africa Regional Coordinator, helping to rewrite the Missed Trigger policy, bringing the Regular REL documents to their current incarnations and shepherding the Exemplar program through it’s early days. I’m very excited about the reworking of the leadership structure in the judge program and am looking forwards to helping to guide the program through this change.

In my ‘real’ life, I’m a PhD candidate studying the evolution of echolocation in bats and how that links to speciation. I also play rugby union for a local club in the UK women’s third league (Championship 2), so you might not see me at events very often through the autumn and winter…