British Relay Classes

[Mrs H]

I was just thinking about the British Relays following my post on the British champions thread (basically saying that if there were no short courses at BOC a lot of people wouldn't bother travelling for colour coded and that would leave clubs hard pressed to field relay teams).

I started to think about the classes as the top age class is M/W60 a team which must include one woman - does anyone else think this is not meeting the needs of the current demography in the sport - surely there are now so many M and W 60+ that they should have separate relays - and possibly even at 70 too. A club can always still field a woman in a men's team if necessary - and win a medal too (HOC M18s came second at Penhale with a team of Young Neville, Fazza and Tessa - mind you they never got any clotted cream ).

any thoughts?

[LostAgain]

It would be interesting to listen to different proposals for what the British Relay Championships aim to achieve?

I fully support the inclusion of the Mens and Womens Open and Mens and Womens Short.

After this I think many clubs find it difficult to enter teams in the other categories. The JK format seems more inclusive. Mini Relay, Open 40-, Open 48-, Open 120, Open 150, Open 165, Open 180 prizes for 1st - 3rd team and 1st ladies team.

As Graeme has suggested and I think most of us would concur, the thing that makes for a superb relay event is a large number of teams.

[JennyJ]

Why not just have say 6 different relays but multiple prize winners within them (ie age classes) like when womens open is run with M40+ etc etc. I think it's great to have lots of prize winners - good for publicity and motivation.

[DM]

Tend to agree with Mrs H about age classes at the top end, especially the need for M60 and W60 classes. Not so sure about 70 s classes but that may just be the age profile in our club at the moment.

Nearer the other end is another gap in my opinion, what does a W16 or M16 do? Run against W18s or M18s who are 2 years older/faster. Surely there should be a class for 16s, there is in individual so why not in the relay?

I wouldn't be too worried about the clotted cream, best avoided for health reasons, full of fats...but delicious all the same

[distracted]

Why not just have say 6 different relays but multiple prize winners within them (ie age classes)

If the more teams competing, the better, that's the way to go. I liked it last year in Culbin when there were only 3 mass starts, felt it made for a much better relay atmosphere and probably easier organisationally too!

[andy]

Why don't our top 3 races have the same classes? (outside the 'open' and 'short' categories)

Scottish - bewildering handicap system
British - M/W 40/50/60/14/18 and mini relays
JK - 120+, 165+, 48-

so there are similarities but each one is fundamentally different. I find juniors can be competitive at one event but not the other. Surely if it was the same at least people would have a chance to aspire to being in a certain team rather than the club captain fitting people in where they are needed. Have BO(F) ever tried to do this?

Definitely agree with Jenny about reducing the courses being run, 6 sounds about right too. Less courses, more gaffling?

[greywolf]

Why don't our big relay competitions just have 3 races?

Men: 3 * 5km
Women: 3 * 4km
Young Juniors: 3 * 3km TD3

Men & Women with prizes for "Open" and various (but not too many - Juniors, vets, super vets) age categories therein. (Personally I would go for a JK-style system of classes - e.g. M/W120+ rather than M/W40)

Maybe the very old men (M200+ !) would run against the women if 5km is too far - might balance the numbers up a bit to

Would mean big mass starts, lots of side by side racing in the forest and some genuine competition in the middle of the pack

[Tatty]

In Scandinavia there are usually just 6 classes - Mens and Womens Open, 40+, 16-
End of story

[andy]

Would mean big mass starts, lots of side by side racing in the forest and some genuine competition in the middle of the pack

sounds great

[King Penguin]

I agree with Mrs H re British Relay 60+ category.
We had 3 M60+ running in M50+ teams as we had run out of 60+ women to match them up with.

... and while we are on the subject of classes, the CSC junior groupings definitely need an overhaul. With W16, W18, M16, M18 all running Light Green there's little chance of the girls (esp. W16s) scoring for their club. The could still run the same course, just score them separately, esp. as BOF seem determined to growing participation by focussing on juniors/schools. Even in a single-sex class a 4-year bads is 20%-25% of their lives ! and an awful lot of development goes on in those 4 years.

[seabird]

Having organised relay teams for the previous 10 years for a large club, the multi-class BOC format has proved far more difficult to raise teams for than the JK format. In reality there are very few actual races, with several classes sharing a course. I would agree that the degree of course sharing could increase as JennyJ suggests.

But do we really need age-class winners? Is it a tradition that has had its time? The JK format seems to work extremely well and very easily accomodates the growing number of older runners Mrs H identifies. Maybe someday we will need a 210+ class, but I don't think we are there yet.

[graeme]

Scottish - bewildering handicap system

The premise is very simple - any three people can form a relay team, and will be
assigned three courses with a spread of distances, trying to reflect what's appropriate for their age and gender. The outcome is big mass starts, lots of side by side racing in the forest and some genuine competition in the middle of the pack.

Yes, there are many allowed permutations for big clubs. But surely this is better than the very restrictive age-groups in BOC, which can lead to the worst possible outcome (for all concerned) of two ultracompetitive types and one easygoing plodder - exactly the "fitting people in" problem you complain about?

Less courses, more gaffling?

but we've been trying less course at the BOC and JK for a couple of years now - we were promised it would lead to bigger fields, it hasn't. Isn't it time to go back to decent lengths?

(or maybe you meant fewer courses )

[andy]

actually I was a bit harsh towards the Scottish system, which I do like...

I just have bad memories of team/class/course allocations in the computer tent last year..

[greywolf]

The Scottish system http://www.scottish-orienteering.org/in ... ships-src/ is great for levelling things up, especially when (as in Scotland) you have 2 or 3 really strong clubs and then lots of very small clubs whose best 3 runners might be 2 M45s and a W16... and it does lead to some good racing - last year the eventual 1,2,3 started their final legs in 3rd, 9th & 10th...although in the absence of a PA this only became apparent from studying the splits a couple of days later...and of course it requires that the planner and controller read the guidelines and plan the various legs to the appropriate length....

[SAL]

I really like the Scottish system - it's very flexible. People can form themselves into teams with others who are like-minded, regardless of age, and it's more fun.