gold times

[DM]

Of course these rules wouldn't be necessary if people weren't playing "Championship Manager" with their club junior team and trying to be as underhand as possible in pursuit of UK junior team glory.

I don't reckon Yvette would have approved of spending so much time working out how to run some lanky 18 year old on a yellow course and bring home maximum points. She'd have probably said "let them run whatever they like & lets get down the pub."

Harry, with no rules wouldn't we end up with exactly what you are suggesting is happening now? 18 year olds on all courses. This would have a negative effect on the younger ones and they probably wouldn't turn out next time and the event would die - not what people want. I don't see what's wrong with understanding the rules and working within them to let the juniors achieve the best result they can....

Anyway, your scenario of the 18 year old on yellow will not happen because the eligibility for yellow is;

Any M/W10
Any M/W12 or M/W 14 who has not at any time achieved 3 gold times on their age class or on JM/W3 or higher courses plus has not finished in a top 10 position in their M/W Yellow at a previous YBT.

Your 18 year old fails to be eligible on both counts.

Eligibility for Orange, LG are similarly but not quite identically worded. Event guidelines are found via a link on the same page as the gold times on the BOF site.

[awk]

I never thought I'd hear myself say this but.....

As the gold system really isn't working (we've given it a go, but it isn't), I think the longer term answer will be to apply the ranking scheme to juniors, and allow its automatic system to deal with this. Badges could be based on it too.

I know there are some small anomalies with small classes, but better those than the bad feeling created every year by the current system.

[Nottinghamshire outlaw]

I am not actually involved in getting the gold times list produced any more (work wise) but some thoughts:
a) Producing updated lists of juniors who have achieved three gold times in ability or age classes works well providing:
ALL clubs which hold regional and national events send their junior results in to the BOF Ranking computer 'store' - NB it is getting better but despite repeated requests some clubs still do not do this. The events list shows which clubs' results are 'missing'.
b) As fewer juniors travel to attend regional and national events than previously but may improve via the colour coded system as they get older, do we need to look at incorporating the colour coded and ability class awards? I know that this was something which AWK was hoping would happen.
c) Perhaps if ALL club event results were sent into a national results database a simplified award system could be designed which would operate automatically (I am technically not competent to know whether this is possible but I presume that it would be)

If this is what people want there would be a cost implication but perhaps this would produce a good incentive scheme for new, improving and better orienteers. I know incentive schemes have been discussed before and most people seem to agree that they are a measure of how you are improving when you first start in the sport and provide goals for people of all ages not just juniors - aiming for CC time, then getting above a certain 'line' in age class courses etc.I remember back 21 years to when I first started and it was good to measure one's improvement via CC, silver and gold times.

A bit off the YBT topic but perhaps onto something for future planning - do we want to improve the results/awards system - future strategic planning topic??

[Snail]

The events list shows which clubs' results are 'missing'.

Thought I would check to see if my club is guilty Perhaps I am missing something but it isn't immediately obvious where this is.

Clubs submit their results to the ranking list page - is there something on that page indicating those missing?

On the juniors page there is a spreadsheet showing "JCG GB ranking events 05 to 07" with some sort of code in column D (either J, MW, or blank) but if this is it, it is a bit obscure.

[Nottinghamshire outlaw]

The list of which clubs have included junior results is up there with the gold times lists. See:
http://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/a ... ID=JUNIORS

[GML]

c) Perhaps if ALL club event results were sent into a national results database a simplified award system could be designed which would operate automatically (I am technically not competent to know whether this is possible but I presume that it would be)

Never mind a simplified award scheme, wouldn't it be good if the results from at least all Regional and National events (and District and Club events too if clubs want to submit them) were held in a single national on-line database, rather than the BOF website simply having a list of links to club websites that may or may not still have results from events that happended 6 months ago?

How difficult would it be to either add this to the existing rankings database, or build from scratch? (And for the avoidance of doubt I am not suggesting that anybody should have already done this, or that anybody in particular should do this in future, I am simply asking those that are better informed than me the open question "How hard would it be to do this?").

Graham

[candyman]

Wouldn't it just be much simpler if (to count for points) athletes of a particular age had to run a particular course (or higher). The current system does seem very complicated, I would certainly think twice about volunteering to be a manager.

[Nottinghamshire outlaw]

I agree Graham. Maybe an all singing, all dancing web site would have all event entries via BOF, all results available, rankings colour coded times, badge times etc - but what would the cost implication of that be??

People want more money spent on junior coaching (another thread), web site, comprehensive list of gold times so that the YBT runs easily etc etc

Candyman has already said that funding in the run up to 2012 will decrease. Sport England funding for all sports will be (mostly) regionalised after 2009 - all clubs and regions need to think about what they
want in order to sustain and develop the sport.

[Nottinghamshire outlaw]

If the age class = specific course rule came in for the YBT it would be the same as the Compass Sport Cup. Fine but not as 'developmental' for clubs to try to include as many of their juniors as possible so that everyone runs a course which is appropriate for their ability. Clubs can bring lots of juniors to the YBT but only a few to the CSC.

[Blanka]

Wouldn't it just be much simpler if (to count for points) athletes of a particular age had to run a particular course (or higher).

It would be simpler, but goes against the inclusivity of YBT. The idea at the moment is for the school/less experienced orienteer to be able to run and count for a club at a course they are comfortable. This would be lost if you said, for example, "anyone who is 14+ must run orange or higher", "anyone 16+ must run LG or higher" and so on.

[DM]

[quote="GML]
How difficult would it be to either add this to the existing rankings database, or build from scratch? (And for the avoidance of doubt I am not suggesting that anybody should have already done this, or that anybody in particular should do this in future, I am simply asking those that are better informed than me the open question "How hard would it be to do this?").

Graham[/quote]
This topic has been discussed to death before. Ranking system runs itself IF clubs submit the results. Getting clubs to submit is the issue.

I recall last year people were asking for a listing of juniors for YBT purposes. This year we get it (OK you need to get your head around the format a bit but it's not so bad) and we're still not happy. Seems BOF can't win but should be thanked for the effort.

[Mrs H]

Not quite the way it actually happened last year DM. We got the lists last year too - but they were not complete and more than one team manager was publicly ridiculed by BOF for not spotting the (invisible) holes in the list that was provided which had led to them innocently running some juniors on the wrong course.

After an official complaint was made to (and upheld by) mike Hamilton the whole thing was thrown back to the junior competritions Groups to be resolved.

they, in their infinite wisdom, decided that the system did not need altering.....12 months on here we are - as confused as ever and still being accused of dirty tricks to boot

All we are asking for is a set of clear cut rules to work within - i don't want to be put in the position again of being the parent of a teenage team manager whose burgeoning confidence as a facilitator in the sport has been destroyed by having their integrity called into question.

when I think BOF have actually done something to address the situation - then I will thank them!

[DM]

Not quite the way it actually happened last year DM. We got the lists last year too - but they were not complete and more than one team manager was publicly ridiculed by BOF for not spotting the (invisible) holes in the list that was provided which had led to them innocently running some juniors on the wrong course.

I stand corrected. Expecting people to spot invisible holes in the list was ridiculous so I'm not surprised a complaint was made.

Lists will never be complete if clubs don't submit results. How can we BOF/Individuals/whoever make clubs submit the results?? Some clubs post a note on their website saying this has been done when it hasn't.

Maybe I am more familiar with Excel so find the lists more understandable than others. In an earlier post I half offered to make the list more useable. Before I start on this if anyone has any suggestions on what would be a user friendly format please let me know, either here or better face to face. I'll be at Peter Palmers this weekend which I guess is where others involved with junior teams will be.

[Snail]

The list of which clubs have included junior results is up there with the gold times lists. See:
http://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/a ... ID=JUNIORS

Agreed - but how does the events list spreadsheet identify those that are 'missing'? The final column is supposed to show those supplying junior results; this includes three codes ("J" , "MW" and blank) but nothing to indicate what those mean.

And since events with all three codes are included in the rankings lists, it appears that some events have submitted ranking list results but not been included in the junior gold times database? Confused!

Unless those spreadsheets are reasonably accurate team managers / YBT coordinators have a really difficult job - if we can identify the missing ones accurately we could at least chase the offending clubs.

[Nottinghamshire outlaw]

Sorry I thought the lists were quite obvious: if it's blank junior results weren't supplied to the ranking computer. If it says MW it's because the event was age classes so the junior results would be in M10, W14 format etc. If it says J then it was an event which ran the ageless classes eg JM1, JW4 etc.

If you look at the names of the events you will see that National Events, Championships etc which use age classes (and the Scottish Six days) have MW in the final column whereas regional events have J in the final column.

I don't think it is very hard for a TM - there will be juniors who are occasional or school based orienteers who won't have been to many regional or national events because they only orienteer locally so it will be very unlikely that they have acquired 3 gold times. There will be those 'stars' who you will be sure have more than 3 gold times and the middle group between the 2 extremes will be the ones where you (or they) will need to check.