The month of February is always an exciting time at PrimeGrid, as it marks the start of the annual [Tour De Primes Competition](http://www.primegrid.com/forum_thread.php?id=7805).  Badges are awarded to those who find the largest primes and also those who find the most within the month of February.  In honor of the event, I decided to switch my BOINC GPU rigs which normally crunch PPS Sieve (sieving does not find primes) to prime finding subprojects on the off chance that I might find some prime worth noting.  Imagine my surprise when I checked my email today and saw this:

![Prime.PNG](https://steemitimages.com/DQmeZfqQpqpWB42Xoyz2iqnANcpYyWDacsifGiLTEbK4vyc/Prime.PNG)

>Dear Primefinder,
>
>Congratulations! Our records indicate that a computer registered by you has found a unique prime number. This computer is running BOINC, is attached to the PrimeGrid project, and is assigned to the Generalized Fermat Prime Search n=16 (GFN-16). What makes this prime unique is that it's large enough to enter the Top 5000 List in Chris Caldwell's The Largest Known Primes Database.
>
>Since you have auto-reporting selected, the following prime was submitted on your behalf:
>
>Added 124228 : 30250088^65536+1 (490257 digits)
>
>This prime was found on this workunit which will automatically show as a prime result after verification by the Largest Known Primes Database.
>
>If you have any questions or concerns, please contact us and we will surely resolve any problems.
>
>Once again, congratulations on your find! Thank you for participating in PrimeGrid.
>
>PrimeGrid staff

The prime can be seen in [this](http://www.primegrid.com/workunit.php?wuid=554208920) Workunit from PrimeGrid and is available on the list of the top 5000 primes [here](http://primes.utm.edu/primes/page.php?id=124228).  

>30250088^65536+1 is prime!!!

My prime is currently ranked as the 2047th largest prime known on the list of the top 5000.  This prime is also the 142nd largest Generalized Fermat prime currently known.  I cannot express how happy I am to have found this prime and especially during this month of competition.

For those wondering, I am currently leading the competition on the [Tour De Primes Leaderboard](http://www.primegrid.com/challenge/tdp_2018.php).  This probably won't last long given the intense competition, but it would be great publicity for Gridcoin if one of our members could win a jersey this year!