Results and Rankings.

[DJM]

awk wrote:
Being fairly ignorant about things ranking, I'm sure there is a straightforward answer, but I'm a bit surprised that having jotted down a few sets of points from recent events this morning, they've all changed tonight (gone lower unfortunately). Is there one (straightforward answer, that is)?

I've not yet had confirmation and I've not checked it properly yet, but I know that the website developers were on the verge of incorporating the error corrections to the rankings algorithm. It may be that this has just happened (rather quietly) and that the whole database has been recaluclated at the same time.

Those commenting on anomalies in the past might like to have a look to see if they are still there ... I'd be very grateful to get feedback on this.

[Scott]

Have they taken the short-courses rule out? The crazy-high scores on light-green courses that resulted from that seem to have been reduced to rather more sensible levels.

[rocky]

Well the highest single score that I can see is still Dave Rollins' UK Cup final* that I mentioned earlier in this thread, so I'd argue that is an anomaly that is still there...
*where he ran a longer time for a shorter course than I did but got 50+ points more!

[AlanB]

My ranking scores seem to have been reduced, I usually do short blue, occasionally green. Still, if the new points are more realistic then all the better.

[EddieH]

As far as I am aware my points have not changed. If recent points have done might it be because they have decided to process a whole load of November/ December events that had not been successfully uploaded when the system was in flux?

[Scott]

Events from over a year ago have been rescored, so I think they must have tinkered with the algorithm a bit. Some people won't be affected very much - my points total is about the same as it was, but my six counting events have changed.

[King Penguin]

I have gone up almost 30 places, with no change in counting events or scores.

IanD's big score, from the day after the Harvester, has gone and as a result he is now below me.

[awk]

Those commenting on anomalies in the past might like to have a look to see if they are still there ... I'd be very grateful to get feedback on this.

The anomaly I reported has been improved very, very slightly, but is still very obvious. I could have run one of the shorter courses at over a min/km slower and scored more points, or to put it another way, those running shorter courses running over a min/km slower did score more! This applies to both adjusted and flat distances.

[EddieH]

The anomolously high Lincoln City scores seem to have been wiped out altogether. I am not quite sure how a small change in the calculations can lower scores by about 100 points but it has.

[graeme]

running shorter courses .... slower did score more!

Related, the anomaly that I always score higher running against M45s than against M21s remains. And even higher running vs M45S than M45L. (Also higher on long than sprint, but I can believe that's my preference)

The course length doesn't appear in the algorithm so it must be that slower (or maybe older) people are overranked. graeme(M45) would be several hundred places ahead of graeme(M21), which is exactly what isn't meant to happen.

[EddieH]

That is precisely why I expected to get high points on Saturday, but no M55 did despite running against older men and ladies. Cut out my idiotic mistakes and my points would still be low.

[madmike]

I always score higher running against M45s than against M21s remains. And even higher running vs M45S than M45L.

but I run m45s would hve thought you'd spotted that

[Eeyore]

That is precisely why I expected to get high points on Saturday, but no M55 did despite running against older men and ladies. Cut out my idiotic mistakes and my points would still be low.

Eddie,

As I understand the ranking calcs the base line for a course is the average of all the competitors on the course's ranking points. In the case of the short I'd guess that was quite low and hence your low score. You averaged just over 10 minute Ks on the course and if replicated on the medium that would have given you around 1220 points and on the long around 1205.

Don't get Edinburgh included in the Master's Cup series for 2012, and then you can run your normal course.

[DJM]

awk wrote:
The anomaly I reported has been improved very, very slightly, but is still very obvious. I could have run one of the shorter courses at over a min/km slower and scored more points, or to put it another way, those running shorter courses running over a min/km slower did score more! This applies to both adjusted and flat distances.

But, as I'm sure I've said many times before, there's a temptation to put absolute faith in comparison of mins/km (adjusted or otherwise for height climb) when there's often little real justification for doing so!

Two courses at the same event could:

have different fractions of path run
have different ratios of runnable to slower terrain
have different ratios of optimal route to straight line route
have height climbs measured erroneously
have different ratios of controls to course length, hence different amounts of slower navigation in the circle
etc etc

I would argue that, rather than seeing where your mins/km would place you on a different course, it's more reliable to see where your rankings points would put you instead!

[DJM]

EddieH wrote:
I am not quite sure how a small change in the calculations can lower scores by about 100 points but it has.

It's actually a big change in the calculations, but for a small number of classes, and a few people will have significant drops in points as a result. And, if a relatively large number of those affected subsequently happen to compete on one course, then it's perfectly possible that scores are ~ 100 points fewer after recalculation.