Are "Black" and "National Rankings" incompatible ?

[King Penguin]

I like long runs. I have only ever "run down" when recovering from injury / operation.
I have frequently run up, other than at inter-club competitions such as CSC, local league etc. I keep an eye open for local Long Os and run the longest course.

In the last month I have run two Blacks, both in the Forest of Dean - prime orienteering country. I enjoyed them both and am not regretting selecting these courses. However, neither of them were quorate, so no-one gets any ranking points. The first had 11 starters and 10 finishers but one of those is non-BOF so didn't count. Yesterday there were 8 starters and 7 finishers.

In between these two I seriously considered running Black at another event; also inquorate (7 starters & finishers). In the end I ran my "designated" course as I was a late-shift helper and needed to get back to relieve others, and it would not have been fair on them to be out longer.

Is the "minimum 10 finishers" rule in danger of putting runners off entering Black, and subsequently putting clubs off planning Black courses ?
Extra courses have been added to many events to give everyone more choice (good) but are people being put off their preferred choice by the expectation of limited competition ? Are other courses (e.g. Short Green) in dange of also becoming inquorate ?

Does the "minimum 10 runners" rule need reconsidering ? Should it be reduced to a lower number ? e.g. 7 would have worked for all 3 of my examples in the last month. If not, should some form of mins / km comparison be done against the "nearest quorate" course to award points ?

Discuss.....

[andy]

yes! it's often similar in Scotland with fewer than 10 competing at some SOL events on the black. I don't see any mins/k formulae working, but certainly reducing the numbers required would help...

if I were a points chaser I'd run green more often, like you I've only run it when recovering from some injury! (both times winning, getting a lot of points and upsetting old people - heard someone pointing at my name on results and complaining)

[graeme]

The difficulty is that the rankings are based on the spread of times is on the course. With small numbers, the estimate of the time an average runner should take is bad enough. Getting an accurate measure of the "spread" from small number is much worse.

So taking the spread from a small number of runners caused big errors, and occasionally silly scores. Rather than reexamine how to do the stats (which would have enlightened them to other problems), the rankings people just chopped out small courses.

Anyway, scaling to min/km does not tackle the main problem. Provided you eliminate outliers, 10 runners is probably ample to get the expected time for an average runner.*

The spread is there to distinguish "difficult" areas from "easy" ones. Assuming the course covers the same type of terrain, this will be the same on all courses. Taking the spread measurement (ratio of average time to standard deviation) from the larger courses is probably more accurate here.

Imperfect, but this would be the best way to solve the problem.

* in normal stats, this error would be a third of the typical spread of an individual's
ranking scores, around 20points. This is 2% (really, it is ) - you're unlikely to do better by scaling.

[graeme]

upsetting old people - heard someone pointing at my name on results and complaining

Yes, some people do seem to think they have the right not to race the other age groups.

first M21 but beaten by an old man, a girl, and a young 'un

Even National Champions!

[andy]

Yes, some people do seem to think they have the right not to race the other age groups.

I especially like racing people who are of a similar standard to myself, don't care about age, it's all about the close fought competition

Who knows how they'll choose the champions!

meh, I wasn't even there for the Scottish Score champs, which isn't really a championship event (local in BOF terms). Tom can have his Scottish Score champ trophy as he deserves it more than you or I

[andypat]

I've no knowledge of stats, but I agree a way must be found to include courses with less than 10 runners, particularly black. If the ranking system doesnt acknowledge those running the top courses its pretty much pointless in my opinion (and I cant see me ever running black to help boost the numbers sorry).

In ref to the Scottish Score Champs - agree its status as a champs is on a shoogly peg for various reasons (not least the lack of regular score events) - but I really enjoyed the event on what was not necessarily the most inspiring area. I thought the fact it was a score event enhanced my experience of the area (and the weather).

And a final commendation for the white course which was well planned as a genuine TD1, unlike a recent (regional) event!

[graeme]

Who knows how they'll choose the champions!

Unfortunately they seem to have gone for the tried and trusted method: "get graeme
to sort it out."
So, congratulations to Tom then!
...and can we have some ranking points please

[Scott]

Development Committee have been having the Black course ranking points discussion very recently. Personally I think what is actually needed is some data on the courses which current miss out on ranking points - if there are lots of courses just missing out with eight or nine runners then we can probably make a strong argument (to whoever is in charge of the Ranking List now - Events Committee?) for slightly lowering the threshold (I have promised to attempt to gather this data when I have time ). But there is unlikely to be a sensible way to award points on courses with, say, less than five runners.

[andy]

...and can we have some ranking points please

it was registered as local, so no
can you even get ranking points for score events?
edit: also, apologies for hijacking the thread, blame graeme!

[Sunlit Forres]

Organisers and planners should think very carefully before deciding whether to put on a black course. If there's likely to be a significant elite turnout then the answer is obviously "yes" but if it means that there will be 8 runners on Black and 12 on Brown it would make for a far better contest to stick with just the brown course.

After trying to help my son with his maths homework I now classify my knowledge of stats as "poor" instead of "abysmal" but just enough to understand Graeme's point. Awarding ranking points for very small fields really isn't a good idea.

A look at the results for previous events of similar status on that area ought to be a guide. The pulling power of other events the same day should also be considered. I would prefer the onus to be put on event organisers to make appropriate efforts (eg suitable publicity) to ensure fields of ranking dimensions for each course if they think their event should be awarded ranking status.

[Scott]

The problem is that it's not just Black courses that are affected - I'm told that Short Green and Very Short Green courses have also been missing out on ranking points as a result of being inquorate. The solution here isn't as simple, as although everybody who would want to run Black is presumably capable of running Brown if there is no Black on offer (although they may just chose not to come to the event instead), not everyone who would want to run VSGreen is necessarily capable of (enjoyably) running a Green-length course.

[andypat]

Can someone explain why in the previous system you could get ranking points even if you were the only person in BOF on your course (you just got an average of what you had already) and why thats changed?

Clearly this must be a stupid question but I'm not sure why......

[graeme]

Graeme's point. Awarding ranking points for very small fields really isn't a good idea.

That wasn't quite my intended point. What I should have emphasized was ...
Awarding ranking points based on poor statistics for the spread isn't a good idea.
But you can get good stats for the spread from other courses in the same terrain

and by doing so you could bring the black and very short green courses back into the system.

[roadrunner]

Can someone explain why in the previous system you could get ranking points even if you were the only person in BOF on your course (you just got an average of what you had already) and why thats changed?

Clearly this must be a stupid question but I'm not sure why......

So the best way to get a good ranking score would be to have one great run, then find five more events where you're the only ranked competitor...

[Spookster]

Ecclesall Wood Regional Event had 11 BOF finishers on Black on Sunday, so they got ranking points. However, it's clear from the graph that the slowest two of these have been "under scored" by about 100 points in comparison to competitors running at a similar speed on other courses. I assume this is a syptom of the point Graeme is making.

Only 4 starters on Very Short Green, so that wasn't ranked.

Ecclesall-rankings.pdf

Ecclesall Regional Ranking Points by course

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