Nopesport Urban League 2010

[Roger]

The standings after round 1 are of course just the Edinburgh results by category. I see no need to repeat them here.

For Carlisle, the organisers are insisting that M/W16 and under run a separate course, with "fewer and less busy road crossings". This is their perogative, of course. Fortunately the Urban League has the perogative to allocate points as we think is fair, so for this race I'm intending to adopt the practice used in similar previous situations, namely to rank all the M/W18s who are running the designated course (3), and then continue allocating points down the juniors on course 4. I wouldn't do this if the cut-off was imposed at 10 or 12 (with what has usually been a parkland course for the youngsters), but I feel that M/W14s and 16s are capable of featuring strongly in the final standings and shouldn't automatically be excluded from scoring Urban League points.

This isn't meant to imply criticism of the organisers, who -- unlike me -- are familiar with the local road conditions.

Points update next week, if I can fit it in amongst the preparations for getting a large numbers of controls onto the correct sites for St Valentine's Chiltern Challenge.

[EddieH]

Interesting that the league encourages 16's to compete and ranks them, yet BOF think that ranking them is dangerous despite the lack of cars in conventional events.

[IanD]

Interesting that the league encourages 16's to compete and ranks them, yet BOF think that ranking them is dangerous despite the lack of cars in conventional events.

I don't think you appreciate the tremendous mental strain that being ranked could inflict upon a 16-year-old.

At that age, they will be sitting exams which will affect their future careers, they could have joined the army and be learning how to cope with people trying to kill them, the orienteering rankings would be the straw to break the camels back.

[geomorph]

Interesting that the league encourages 16's to compete and ranks them, yet BOF think that ranking them is dangerous despite the lack of cars in conventional events.

I don't think you appreciate the tremendous mental strain that being ranked could inflict upon a 16-year-old.

At that age, they will be sitting exams which will affect their future careers, they could have joined the army and be learning how to cope with people trying to kill them, the orienteering rankings would be the straw to break the camels back.

Yeah - orienteering ranking is like alcohol and voting and driving, far too risky at 16.
(never mind the marriage and family.....)

[awk]

Out of interest, where did you get the information that this is why M/W16s and under are excluded from the rankings? No criticism - genuinely curious. I've not seen any recent reasons given for this - the ancient reasons (when I was on Coaching Committee) didn't actually include the M/W16s not being able to cope with the strain.

[madmike]

So with Edinburgh and Carlise down, I think the remaining NUL races for 2010 are:

20 Mar – Huntingdon
27 Mar - Pickering
11 April - Nottingham
23 May – Ripon
31 May - York
4 Sep - Sheffield
5 Sep - Lincoln
18 Sep - London
25 Sep - St Andrews
3 Oct - Warwick

[IanD]

Out of interest, where did you get the information that this is why M/W16s and under are excluded from the rankings?

http://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/news/news.php says "All competitors who are members of British Orienteering and aged 18 and above will be eligible to score Ranking points".

Bearing in mind that the rankings are primarily derived from non-age-based colour-coded courses, it is clear that a specific decision has been taken to exclude 17-and-under (not 16-and-under) juniors from the ranking, even those winning Black courses.

[awk]

Yes, but I wasn't asking about evidence for the fact that younger orienteers (whether under-18 or whatever) had been excluded, but for evidence supporting the claims as to why they had been excluded.

[IanD]

Yes, but I wasn't asking about evidence for the fact that younger orienteers (whether under-18 or whatever) had been excluded, but for evidence supporting the claims as to why they had been excluded.

Fair question. I am unable to find any documentation saying why they have been excluded. My assumption may be incorrect.

I have found a document headed "Summary of Board Discussions and Rationale for Decisions" http://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/downloads/documents/majortopics_summaryofboarddiscussionsandrationalefordecisions.pdf.

This says

The recommendations were adopted by the Board with the following exceptions:
Recommendation 5: All competitors who are members of British Orienteering running TD4 and TD5 courses (or the highest technical level of course available at
sprint/urban races) at Ranking events should score Ranking points. There should be no exclusions based on age or any other factors.....

The initial implementation is that competitors aged 18 and above in the year of the event will be included. There should be a further debate with Coaching Committee and Junior Competitions Group about the inclusion of younger competitors.

It gives no hint as to what reason the board had for going against this recommendation of the Ranking System Review Group.

All I can say is that in the absence of any alternative reason being offered, and knowing that some adults to perceive a need to "protect" youngsters from competition, this remains my best guess.

Whatever the reason, excluding people who regularly win Black courses makes a complete mockery of the rankings in my view.

[SJC]

I have found a document headed "Summary of Board Discussions and Rationale for Decisions"

It gives no hint as to what reason the board had for going against this recommendation of the Ranking System Review Group.

Haven't I heard something like this before ?
If the Board are going to ignore the recommendations of Review Groups they set up then they really do need to justify their decisions.

[DM]

I've asked the question why and await a clear answer. So far all I have is a comment that the majority of respondents to the Ranking Working Group survey said they wanted juniors IN the rankings but several committees vetoed this (as stated in another post).

The Why question remains unanswered.

For selection races for the M16s now run Blue (length) and often share the course with adults, often parents who they take great delight in beating. It's just not consistent that on the one hand they are obliged to run so called long courses and on the other are told they should not expect points becuase a couple of committees want to (try to) prevent them running exactly these courses.

The lure of selection means they WILL run blue so why not just accept this and put themk in the ranking scheme?

[Scott]

See the June 2009 Coaching Commitee minutes.

In summary; the Committee reaffirmed its view that ranking lists for M/W18 and under should not be published. Ranking lists are not used for selection of junior activities. We do not think that juniors should be put under ‘ranking pressure’ nor do we feel that travelling to events to collect ‘points’ is a good development activity for youngsters; much of such pressure comes from parents. The Ranking scheme was not seen as an incentive.

[Angry Haggis]

See the June 2009 Coaching Commitee minutes.

In summary; the Committee reaffirmed its view that ranking lists for M/W18 and under should not be published. Ranking lists are not used for selection of junior activities. We do not think that juniors should be put under ‘ranking pressure’ nor do we feel that travelling to events to collect ‘points’ is a good development activity for youngsters; much of such pressure comes from parents. The Ranking scheme was not seen as an incentive.

Maybe there needs to be a distinction between "Senior" and "Junior" courses rather than an age distinction for the rankings - "Junior" courses being defined as cannot be planned with T.D. more than 4. Senior courses get ranked, Junior ones don't. That way, most "normal" under 18s wouldn't get ranked, for the reasons above, but the few super-elites who do "run up" get their points and get to affect other people's ranking points.

This would also solve the problem with very good people, when running "easy" courses (i.e. TD <5) when recovering from injury, from adversely contributing to the rankings by beating everyone else on the course.

[NeilC]

A lot more than just the super-elite juniors run Green + courses though.

Interesting that the minutes say that the lists shouldn't be published. Perhaps then more secret lists could be held and used for seeding etc purposes. Seeding of juniors does happen - just that it's done manually.

[SeanC]

The urban league thread is discussing the ranking lists, and the ranking list thread is discussing urban orienteering.