Somehow, I haven’t managed to cover this contest yet, which is unbelievable.

Here’s the scoop. BigFix is sponsoring a Sysadmin of the Year contest. It’s got the backing of groups like USENIX/SAGE and LOPSA, and they’re giving away some pretty cool prizes.

The grand prize is interesting, and is one of the reasons that I think each one of you should throw your hat in the ring, even if you don’t think you have a chance. The winner of the grand prize splits a “progressive jackpot” with whoever nominated them. If you nominate yourself, you keep it all. The jackpot increases by $200 for every 10 nominations. It keeps growing until it hits a maximum of $5,000. It started out at $2,000. Right now, it’s at $2,200. I’m not great at math, but this tells me that your odds of winning the grand prize are excellent. ENTER NOW. Even if you don’t win Grand Prize, the “runner up” wins: a Laptop Computer, 1 Conference Pass to the 2010 LISA Conference, and Guitar Hero 5 + choice of Wii, xBox, or PS3. Seriously, ENTER NOW! There are also other prizes, and you’re pretty much guaranteed a t-shirt. But seriously, do the math, and nominate yourself. And if you have a problem nominating yourself for something like this, find someone else and trade nominations. Unless, of course, a few thousand bucks wouldn’t be welcome.

The one thing that I should mention is that the contest is only open to U.S. and Canadian residents, so unfortunately, all of you very deserving overseas admins can’t enter. So feel free to post below why you could totally kick butt in an international sysadmin tournament! :-)

For all things sysadminy, BigFix has also setup a Sysadmin of the Year Blog. Check it out! Also, if you’re a member of the twitterati, you can follow them at @SysAdRockStar09!

The winners are going to be announced this year at the LISA ’09 conference in Baltimore, MD. They’re having a special SysAdmin of the Year Award Party on Wednesday night. If you’re going to LISA (and you SHOULD go to LISA), you’ll see me there!

Alright, that’s it. Hurry, because the deadline is October 23rd. Enter Now!!!