I received my letter (pgs-d for two years) today! I guess I'm doing a phd after all ... The letter is dated march 19 for anyone who wants to guess how fast (or slow) canada post can send letters to their address
I know two post-docs who'd received nserc funding in the past. They've each had about 6 or 7 first author publications in decent journals from their phds. From what I've heard, the PDF is really hard to get - these people really stood out from other people in the department (such was my perspective as an undergrad anyway)