EYOC 2013

[Homer]

And on a serious note - when I invented NEDS & SEDS in the build up to WOC 99 the aim was firstly to offer support to potential WOC medalist but we all knew that that was a very small pool of athletes so training was open to all. We had a great number of youngsters (18+ coz we went for beers) come along and from reading the modern day SEDS stuff they still get a good throughput of youngsters.

Perhaps no coincidence that over half those selected for EYOC are from Scotland.
Maybe BOF could learn something from what SOA are doing?

[AndyC]

just been listening to Steve Cram and Paula Radcliffe bemoaning that we haven't taken all eligible athletes to Moscow -clearly we're not alone

[Gross]

http://www.scottish-orienteering.org/soa/page/vacancy-head-of-performance-orienteering

Gross - your country needs you!

It'll take a 17.5 hour week just to read the job description

[Big Jon]

http://www.scottish-orienteering.org/soa/page/vacancy-head-of-performance-orienteering

Gross - your country needs you!

It'll take a 17.5 hour week just to read the job description

You always were a slow reader!

[Catfish]

DM,

Registering for JEC was very simple all I did was contact the organisers through their website, explain the situation and then send the entry details via email and pay. See below details for entry deadline for JEC 2013, which I copied from the JEC website:

Registration
Final entries are to be submitted before 15 August 2013 via the contact email
>> jec2013@free.fr

However please be aware GB did not send a team the year we entered. I would suggest you sound out BO ref entering a self funding M18 Team, They can only say no, email the chairman and EO. However you will have to be quick as the closing date is not far off. You mentioned entering as a England Select Team again because BO have entered I do not think Orienteering England would support you. However I would ask BO to explain why their was no official selection policy announced for this competition, as it was mentioned on a number of camps that some sort of team would be entered.

On a personal note over the years and especially the last 7 years I have found it very frustrating trying to find out what the junior selection criteria has been, especially after the demise of the FCC. Perhaps its time to do away with BO and split to the home nations, which we might have to do if the Scottish referendum is a yes vote.

All so frustrating I know, however if you don't try you don't get, I wish you well.

[PhilJ]

more selection madness:
http://grahamgristwood.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/angry-surprised-and-disappointed.html

[SJC]

I would suggest you sound out BO ref entering a self funding M18 Team,

Good luck with this. It is disgraceful that we are not making the most of these international opportunities. The more international experience our juniors get the more the incentive to continue with the sport and perform well in the future.

[RS]

Just read Phil's post ' more selection madness:' and the link. I'm absolutely appalled by the selection criteria. Developing athletes need a lot more 'developing' to get anywhere near GG's results. Euro meeting showed this when the GB team were beaten by 2nd string and lower foreigners and many of them by the other elite punters from their home countries. Development takes place from grass roots up and these selections need to be earned by good results.
Rant over. Not sure if I've explained myself well but I suppose what I'm saying is that the selection policies stink.

[mharky]

You don't know what you're talking about.

[greywolf]

didn't they disregard the squad selection criteria to accommodate Helen P? perhaps they can do so again...

[graeme]

Not sure if I've explained myself well but I suppose what I'm saying is that the selection policies stink.

You haven't. You didn't even say if it's the WOC or Squad selection you're talking about.

For gg's WOC selection it came down to whether the selectors willing to overlook one huge mistake (middle) and one hitting of the wall (long). Published selection policies give no guidance on that. I don't think it was easy for the selectors, but since you think it's clear cut, perhaps you'll tell us who they should have left out?

The GB squad is pretty much an irrelevance anyway, but gg has "Achieved required Domestic Performance Standards in races specified in the season schedule."

The selection policy is good. The selectors have difficult decisions to make.

(Not sure if I've explained myself well but I suppose what I'm saying is "what mharky said")

[PhilJ]

As you are in the EDS Mharky maybe you can enlighten us outsiders, as "we don't know what we are talking about" or are you gagged from commenting on the selections by BO...I know Helen P has had to bite her lip more than once (as she has admitted on her blog), for fear of being dropped.....sounds more like a Masons organisation than a sporting body..then again maybe the comparisons are not that dissimilar looking at how BO runs itself.
My son is an M18, though he has been injured this year and not been running for selections but all his M18/W18 mates are totally pissed off with the JEC selections, many have put 2 fingers up to BO and wondering why the feck they bothered going to selection races, and deciding now to look at other sport to do, time will tell.

[graeme]

Maybe BOF could learn something from what SOA are doing?

BOF? learn from Scotland?

[mharky]

I don't get told how selectors make their decisions, they don't tell us. They have to follow the guidelines, and I have no reason to believe this hasn't been done.

Helen Palmer published the WOC selections on her blog before they had been publicly announced and when we had been specifically told not to make the team selections public. I noticed when she put it online and thought that it was bad form. Imagine if someone had found out they weren't going to WOC from someone's blog, rather than from the performance coach.

If you want to know about the WOC selections, then read the selection policy and look at the selection race results. There is not a single selection that was controversial. However, I also think a very different team could have been selected that also wouldn't have been controversial. Can you categorically say that any of the team shouldn't have been there? It's easy to say that people who weren't there should have been, but try doing the opposite. And based purely on the information that the selectors had.

The issue that GG brought up about the national squad selections is an important one. Technically Helen and myself are too old for the EDS, but the selectors made allowances as we had both shown that we were still developing athletes. However in 2011-12 I wasn't in any national squad, I hadn't been in any squad since 2007. But I went on to make the WOC team, and European Champs, and World Universities.

Here is a piece of advice to anyone aspiring to be elite. If you can't become good outwith the national squad, you won't become good when you are in the national squad. There has been much talk after the JEC/EYOC selections, and the same is very much true for juniors.

[rocky]

^^^^^Post of the Day^^^^^

The only thing I would add is that if you want to make sure you're in any team, make the selectors job easy by making it impossible to ignore you. If you can't make yourself a dead cert then don't whinge if the selections don't go your way.

-m