2012 GBR National Squad Selection Criteria Revealed

[orienteeringUK]

2012 GBR national squad selection criteria revealed. Not by BOF, they don't seem to think it important to release their selection criteria. Fortunately, we do.

Elite Performance Squad

Athletes expected to gain individual top 10 performances at World Championships and focussed on preparing for the 2012 World Orienteering Championships in Switzerland.

Average % behind up to 105%

Elite Development Squad

Athletes who have demonstrated the potential to gain top 10 performance at World Championships and focussed on preparing for the 2015 World Orienteering Championships in Scotland.

Average % behind = 105-112.5%, expected age of athletes 19-26

Talent Development Squad

Athletes who have confirmed their potential to progress up the talent pathway and are ready to progress to in-depth specialisation and master the sport-specific skills necessary to become top 10 performer at World Championships.

Average % behind = 110-117.5%, expected age of athletes 15-20


Selection races were BEOC Sprint & Middle, JK Sprint, Middle & Long, BOC Long, WOC Test Middle & Long).

Hollie Orr's average % behind was 104.0, compared to Claire Ward's 106.7 or Rachel Rothman's 107.2. However Hollie didn't get in the Performance Squad and they did. Why? Because they clearly feel that all these girls belong in the national squad. But Claire and Rachel are too old for development, which means they have to be performance.

Seemingly, even though there is no extra benefits to being in performance, the size is capped at 4. So with Sarah Rollins, Helen Palmer, Claire and Rachel in, the younger Hollie Orr has to be dropped into development. Helen Palmer has a score of 103.8, just better than Hollie, but she never actually beat Hollie in the 3 races than ran together in the UK this season. This demonstrates how the purely statistical selection criteria isn't perhaps the best way to go.

Tess Hill came 4th in the World Cup final. That an absolutely fantastic result, one of our best female performances in the last 5 years, and better than Sarah Rollins has EVER achieved. Yet, she is also in the development squad. We can only assume for the same reason has Hollie, she is young enough to be put in and free up some spaces for the older women who don't actually meet the squad selection criteria, but have been put in anyway.

The strange thing is, Tessa's 106% is better than partner Murray Strain's 107.2%, but he is in the male performance squad. BOF clearly have to ability to spot that Murray is a sprint specialist with huge potential for podiums and medals, and overlooked his forest races that pull his average down. So why have they not done the same for Tessa?

Not that BOF have announced it, but so insulted by this selection Tessa Hill has formerly rejected her squad selection.

Other than that, lots of elder women with better percentages the younger ones., 5 development athletes failing to make the development standard, some with score in excess of 128%.

The men's side isn't so bad. Murray Strain and Matt Speake have been given the performance selection. Murray obviously for his world class sprint, and Matt Speake was off with injury this year, but has been a WOC team member for many years and even ran in our relay in Japan 05. Both of whom also are too old to be in the development squad anyway, but unlike in the girls, there isn't anyone you would actually put there instead of them. We're making the assumption that Matt Crane and Oli Johnson have formerly retired from international orienteering, not the BOF have announced that either.

Richard Robinson, Ant Squire and Mark Nixon were all regulars near to top of the results boards this season, but all too old for the squad. Mark is perhaps the most unfortunate, his average is 106.5% this year, 5th highest of any man to be running in 2012.

Other than that, nothing too surprising, David Brickhill-Jones has been dropped, despite running several races this year and having some exceptional performances in Finnish sprint races in the past few years. And again, some development athletes entirely failing to make the development standard.

So what is more important, age or ability. BOF have clearly decided that age is THE defining factor to be taken into consideration during the selection process. We, however, think that selecting athletes in such a dynamic sport as orienteering requires a little more instinct than using a simple spreadsheet and removing anyone over the age of 26 who isn't already at WOC.

[andy]

2012 GBR national squad selection criteria revealed. Not by BOF, they don't seem to think it important to release their selection criteria. Fortunately, we do.

who are 'we'?

Good post

[orienteeringUK]

[AndyC]

2012 GBR national squad selection criteria revealed. Not by BOF, they don't seem to think it important to release their selection criteria. Fortunately, we do.

who are 'we'?

Good post

Good Question as well

[King Penguin]

Who are the members of the group which makes the selections ?
Or is it just one individual ?

[andypat]

2012 GBR national squad selection criteria revealed. Not by BOF, they don't seem to think it important to release their selection criteria. Fortunately, we do.

who are 'we'?

Good post

Good Question as well

A very good question as it turns out...

[Mrs H]

I've saved the post - so if it gets moderated again I'll re-post it if you like.

Tessa's omission gobsmacked me and was behind me opening a debate on the selections when they were announced - I'm well impressed at her rejecting what was offered - have you thought of signing up for the english Archery team Tessa? You obviously have two strong bow fingers

[graeme]

Mharky,

We figured this out a few weeks ago
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=12672&hilit=squad+selection
Like I said then...

I think that all the performance people "preparing for 2012" are older than all the development people "preparing for 2015". Either they figure if you haven't made it by 23(?) you never will, or else the lists are retro fitted to some age-related criterion.

Quite why they only allowed themselves 4+4 in the "over-25s" isn't explained, but if you take that as the fixed point, the selection gives (IMO) as strong a combined squad as possible.

We punters need not be told the details, we can figure them out for ourselves, but pissing the athletes off by not explaining it isn't very smart. Nor is sniping anonymously.

I hope to see Tess and yourself on the team next year.

[orienteeringUK]

Who are the members of the group which makes the selections ?
Or is it just one individual ?

There used to be a group of selectors, but this year they appeared to not have been used, which means that the selections were made by GC and SH

[orienteeringUK]

Dear Edward Nicholas,

I am fully aware that the spreadsheet which I put up a link to is NOT a BOF document. It is a spreadsheet that I compiled myself using the publicly available results that I sourced from the UK Cup database. As you will notice, I have spelled Rachael Elders name incorrectly, have included non-British athletes (Grace Crane and Riina Kuuselo), used shortened versions of many peoples names and my own coloring system. As a BOF employee you may wish to have a look between the version I created and put on the internet and the version which BOF produced. I have never received, seen or sought any BOF version, only was made aware of its existence.

Before you make slanderous false accusations which imply I have stolen and illegally distributed private BOF documents, you may wish to check if that is the case. If you so wish I can supply you with my file which you can interrogate to determine its provenance, but I can assure you the document is mine, created by me, using freely available results.

On your second point, I find it highly contentious that you remove the post because I have made an assumption that I clearly indicate is an assumption. I never once implied that what I said was a fact. However, my assumption was based on this publicly available statement by Matt Crane on Attackpoint "I don't think I've fully come to terms with what happened, but it was an embarrassing way to end my WOC career", and the fact that both athletes clearly make the Performance Squad selection criteria yet haven't been selected, the only plausible reason for this is that they have retired, rather than BOF think that they are not of the required ability. So, I have substantiated by assumptions.

You have not substantiated you claims that I have stolen a BOF document. I shall be contacting Mike Hamilton to make a formal complaint about this accusation.

[orienteeringUK]

And here is the link to MY DOCUMENT

Link corrected

[andy]

Dear Edward Nicholas,

I am fully aware that the spreadsheet which I put up a link to is NOT a BOF document. It is a spreadsheet that I compiled myself using the publicly available results that I sourced from the UK Cup database. As you will notice, I have spelled Rachael Elders name incorrectly, have included non-British athletes (Grace Crane and Riina Kuuselo), used shortened versions of many peoples names and my own coloring system. As a BOF employee you may wish to have a look between the version I created and put on the internet and the version which BOF produced. I have never received, seen or sought any BOF version, only was made aware of its existence.

Before you make slanderous false accusations which imply I have stolen and illegally distributed private BOF documents, you may wish to check if that is the case. If you so wish I can supply you with my file which you can interrogate to determine its provenance, but I can assure you the document is mine, created by me, using freely available results.

On your second point, I find it highly contentious that you remove the post because I have made an assumption that I clearly indicate is an assumption. I never once implied that what I said was a fact. However, my assumption was based on this publicly available statement by Matt Crane on Attackpoint "I don't think I've fully come to terms with what happened, but it was an embarrassing way to end my WOC career", and the fact that both athletes clearly make the Performance Squad selection criteria yet haven't been selected, the only plausible reason for this is that they have retired, rather than BOF think that they are not of the required ability. So, I have substantiated by assumptions.

You have not substantiated you claims that I have stolen a BOF document. I shall be contacting Mike Hamilton to make a formal complaint about this accusation.

Quoting for posterity

I was even going to add the comment to my original reply 'If only Mark Nixon can stay uninjured he'll be a regular', probably should have! I guess communication is the key, if someone has shown both interest and talent to be in a squad they should be told why they are not in it and what they would need to do in order to be selected.

This kind of disjointed, heavily moderated 'discussion' on a public forum probably isn't the best thing for either athletes or bof... Also not ideal that both people (going on the names other people have posted in this thread) involved have (had?) moderator accounts!

[harry]

I was led to believe Tess pulled out of the squad because she didn't want to participate in the compulsory programme of training that has been put together for the development group. The elite performance group has no programme of training we are a do-it-yourself outfit. So by quitting the squad Tess has effectively put herself in our shoes in that she can organise her own programme the way she wants it without this offered support from BOF. She will still get funding for WOC and (semi?)-funded pre-WOC camp which is the maximum any of the elite group get.

What do the elite performance group get? No programme of training but the option to email/ skype with Toni. But presumably Mark & Tess get to meet with him in person and go to his training sessions so they aren't missing out on anything except maybe a pat on the back>> eg. Well done, both had great 2011 seasons with big steps forward! Nice! Keep going!

I agree that all the policies should be openly communicated to anyone who is interested and that no selection system is perfect. But the best thing for athletes is just to be smart about how they expend their energy.

This selection /bureaucratic-sh*te can be intensely irritating and probably wrong, communication and encouragement of athletes could definitely be better all round!! The ageism thing is also a bit sketchy, personally I think even at 30 I can develop a lot more still, 2 consecutive really good focused O years behind me now & lots of improvement! But I totally see why BOF aren't going to help me out much if there are a flock of younger potential stars they can help instead - resources are limited after all.

But anyway the best thing is just to brush all this BS off and look forward. I have wasted energy in the past being pissed off about these types of things and it never does you any good in the long run. You have to just be resilient, keep believing in yourself. and move on as quickly as possible. Just do some Zen-techniques everytime you see the BOF logo and start to see red.. it works for me!

[Becks]

Spot on Harry! This was an amusing thing to wake up to on a Monday morning.

I can't wait to see what most of the names mentioned above do in future. I'm hoping at 28 I'm not too old to do plenty of cool stuff too. Good luck to all, the dedicated and exciting bunch that they are.

[Becks]

O UK, I think your PM inbox is full.