Allowing running down in the Compass Sport Cup/Trophy?

[Shropshire born]

The could be made more so, but to state that they are non-inclusive is, to my mind, highly suspect. (Actually, I think it's plain wrong).

This is your opinion and one that many on here would agree with. But for me I came to Orienteering and joined a club because it had a less elitist and a more inclusive feel to it than my running club. But I soon found that if you had no interest in running your age group in club events like the CSC then you were left feeling a little left out for not representing your club. I orienteer for the challenge that racing with a map provides and the choice to run short or long, easy or hard with many events fitting this bill but not all. I no long belong to a club because of the whole trying to make me run up at CSC,league events etc.It put off been in a club I have renewed my membership as BOF only and now class my self as a casual orienteer.

[afterthought]

Great thread - nicely done SeanC.

One of the charms of the CompassSport Cup is the way it has an arbitrary set of rules that can significantly determine the outcome. And so it has been a good thing that the rules are tweaked every couple of years.

The basic principle is comparison by position of individual runners on several courses. I think at first there were not as many classes as there are now, but I don't remember how many. A club's score was for a certain number on each course - say 3 runners on each of 6 courses, total 18.

Many clubs had enough runners to get out a full team.

Some experienced runners felt excluded because they were "expected to compete against"
(not "expected to take part alongside") younger runners. Event economics and inclusiveness meant more courses were added.

Fewer clubs could field a full team. So the rule that only the best so many out of the total, say 13 out of 18, was imported from the junior competition, so that clubs were not so penalised for being short of runners in a particular class.

This year there are 11 courses in 9 sets. In the Trophy, best 13 count from a maximum possible 2 per set or 18. (25 from 36 in the Cup.)

Let us consider how the hypothetical SFO (Sustainable Future Orienteering) fares.
They are an age-balanced club, remarkably having two runners, one man, one woman, in each 5-year age band between 10 and 70.
If everyone runs their own class, their 24 runners allows them to have 2 potential scorers across the 18 scoring positions.
And where are the 6 spare?
2 must run men open
3 others must run women's or men's open.
(The 6th is a spare W45+).

SFO is disadvantaged by the bias to veteran classes. For example the M60/65s have a course, whilst the M21/M25 and M30/M35 share one. It would be fairer if a second open and a second women's open class were introduced, perhaps over shorter distances so that less fit or experienced members are not so daunted.

Also a club with more older and fewer younger runners than the level profile can use the running-up rule to fill their team.

But a club with more younger and fewer older runners - is there anything they can do? Can anyone think of a way for a University club to take part?

***

I therefore support SeanC's suggestion, although I would not complicate things with a time adjustment. That is a club can freely allocate runners to courses. The best 13 of 18 is no longer needed, all 18 can count.

Alternatively the competition could provide a fairer spread of courses, not biased to veterans.

This free allocation would provide an interesting issue for captains to think about. Who is good on what distance? But also it seems to me some older orienteers have a strong dislike of younger people running on the same course as them. I might argue that captains deserve this for coming up with the current rules.

[graeme]

Can anyone think of a way for a University club to take part?

You want a list?

With minimal changes, they could have staff members on the team.

More imaginatively, use something more related to ability than age to determine the classes. After all, it might be sensible for a hypothetical professor who trains every day, has 30 years experience and string of medals to be asked to tackle a tougher course than a newly recruited fresher. Let a complete novice run down a couple of colours.

[NeilC]

More imaginatively, use something more related to ability than age to determine the classes.

Sounds familar
http://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/images/uploaded/downloads/events_competitionrule2014_l_yvettebakertrophy.pdf

who trains every day

Thursday Jan 16th?

[DeerTick]

After all, it might be sensible for a hypothetical professor who trains every day, has 30 years experience and string of medals to be asked to tackle a tougher course than a newly recruited fresher.

Do you know anyone like that, Graeme?

AP

[Knee Deep Mud!]

Whilst not really having a view on the minutiae of the scoring system, I will add my agreement with the general topic of this thread. I am somone who hasn't run in the Compasssport Cup for years. The only real reason for this being the insistence that to take part as an M21/35/40 I had to 'run up' from my normal Blue course and do Brown. After a couple of years of doing this I decided that as there were plenty of other events, and my limited weekends were better spent doing those events where I could actually enjoy the orienteering. I just wonder how many other people have made the same decision?

[Knee Deep Mud!]

Thinking laterally, perhaps the easiest way to make the event inclusive for all abilities would be to use a score format? Everybody can then run as far as they want and have scores that are directly comparable with all other runners. The only question would then be to define how many people from each age class would count for the overall team score?

[sketchweppers]

Thinking laterally, perhaps the easiest way to make the event inclusive for all abilities would be to use a score format? Everybody can then run as far as they want and have scores that are directly comparable with all other runners. The only question would then be to define how many people from each age class would count for the overall team score?

Good idea, but have it as a completely separate competition - leave the CSC/T as it is (let the new rules bed in for a while). I'm all for more inter-club competitions - they are much more social than individual runs.

[graeme]

Do you know anyone like that, Graeme?
AP

Yes, EUOC have quite a few freshers this year...

Thursday Jan 16th?

[afterthought]

Still thinking about how this competition is biased against open age classes (please see previous post that mentions how the 10 years of M60/65 are one course like the 19 years of M21/35, and extra M60/65 can run the M21/35 course but not vice versa.)

It was interesting to compare age class limits for British and Swedish 25-person inter-club competitions. Of course things are very different in Sweden.

See http://www.25manna.nu/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/25manna-2013-pm-en.pdf

The Swedish event is a relay (5 legs have 4 parallel runners), so teams are exactly 25 runners, rather than best 25 of an unlimited number. Of the 25 legs, 8 are described as blue, 12 as red, 1 as orange and 4 as white.

In UK, maximum 4 x M21/35; it is 9 in Sweden.

In UK, maximum 12 x W21/35/40 (provided 4 x W40).
(edit - originally this said 4 x W21/35/40 but NeilC corrected, see post below.)
In Sweden there's almost no limit - it's 20, or 24 if there are 4 x W40, (there is a requirement for every team to have at least one M/W 16-.)

(edit) In Sweden a team is required to have 7 women. In UK a team needs at least 3 women and 16- juniors - but would likely do better if it had more.

So a University club could compete if it could find many W20/21 (and/or M40+ staff members) and a junior.

[andypat]

So you seem to be deciding the SOA 11 person/8 person/lets not do it this year since not enough clubs want to do it/ relay? By setting an exact number you immediately lose all of the flexibility of the CSC/T and set a bias against large club runners who wont make their team. Again, nothing against this competition per se but try it as a separate competition and dont count on too many Scots clubs making the trip since its hard enough getting them to come to the Scottish version.

[NeilC]

In UK, maximum 4 x W21/35/40.

I make it a maximum of 12 not 4.

[afterthought]

I make it a maximum of 12 not 4.

You're right. I'm sorry for the error. I will edit my post to show the error and correction.

It would have been better to have compared the minimum number of women needed in 25 counters.

[afterthought]

So you seem to be deciding the SOA 11 person/8 person/lets not do it this year since not enough clubs want to do it/ relay? By setting an exact number you immediately lose all of the flexibility of the CSC/T and set a bias against large club runners who wont make their team. Again, nothing against this competition per se but try it as a separate competition and dont count on too many Scots clubs making the trip since its hard enough getting them to come to the Scottish version.

I'm sorry my purpose in mentioning the Swedish relay (with over 300 teams completing successfully) was not to propose changing CSTrophy/Cup to relay, but to support the case, the next time the competition is revised, for more than 2/13 or 4/25 counters to be M21/35.

It does seem, however, most people here are in favour of the limit as is.

I also happen to prefer the simpler system of everyone counting the same number of runners per course, and I would like some easier courses, and more choice for teams to allow less experienced runners to run easier courses. So allow running down. I think the difficulty I have, and why I find myself in the minority, may be to do with the idea of why non-veterans might like to take part? So many of the posts seem to have in mind the results (club and courses) as being the most important thing.

Regarding your point about travel I agree. I think the matches coming up this weekend, where clubs local to each other come together under this format, can be the best.

[Red Adder]

It seems there is nothing that orienteers like more is a good whinge about the rules - so much so that perhaps we should all take up golf. [Their rule book seems to be about 1000 pages long and tries to thrash the minutiae out of every probable and several virtually impossible circumstance]. Anyway here is my three-pennorth. My main premise is to make the competition more inclusive - not to significantly counter any perceived demographic imbalances between clubs.

Max counters - leave principle but possibly increase the max counters (eg from 2 to 3 in CST).

Non scoring runners - Ambivalent as on one side it allows more people to contribute (albeit negatively) to the clubs efforts but on the other it gives some advantage to larger clubs over smaller. Perhaps someone would care to do the maths on this.

Running down - would allow as it increases chances of small clubs to field a full team and more people the chance to contribute. I would only allow you to run down by one course and impose quite a high tariff - say time * 1.5 (as points awarded are positional rather than proportional to time taken) . As the results are all computerised nowadays its shouldn't really be any real imposition on organisers.