Cancelled races and events. Re-use of lost statuses.

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Hans Koraeus
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Cancelled races and events. Re-use of lost statuses.

Post by Hans Koraeus » Thu Jan 19, 2006 2:06 am

The current rules have shown to be very hard if a race is cancelled late in the season. In some cases the time advance rule have made it impossible to announce a new event within the used time limits. The result is then that a status this way will be lost for the region. And since higher world ranking statuses are few it’s something you would like to avoid.

The Time advance rule
The whole idea with the current World Ranking status/point system is that racers will know the status of the competitions before they plan there travel. We can’t expect that all racers can enter all competitions during the season so it’s important to be able to plan in advance. The higher the status the more important it is for racers to know in advance.

Major: 4 months
Main : 3 months
Prime: 2 months
Basic: 1 month
Plain: (no time advance needed)

Luckily it has been very rare with cancelled events. But there have been many events that have had big problems with rain. To avoid having a cancelled event because of rain you should always try to have a race site protected from bad weather.


Re-use of lost statuses for cancelled events
In the case a race is cancelled anyway for whatever reason this is a proposal of how to try and avoid lost statuses.

- General rule
If a status is lost the next event with underlying status will take its place. If no next event exists the previous event with underlying status will take its place.

Ex:
If a Major is cancelled the next Main event will take its place as a Major.
If a Main event is cancelled or upgraded the next Prime event will take its place.
If a Prime event is cancelled or upgraded the next Basic event will take its place.
Basic and Plain statuses will be lost if cancelled but since there are no limit on these statuses it’s not a problem.

This system can work by itself automatically.

- Additional rule
A Prime event organizer may announce what Basic status event should be its replacement in case of cancellation. This should then be announced within the time advance rule (2 months) for the Prime event itself and the replacing Basic event. This may be useful since the next Basic event after the Prime event might be too small and not ready to handle a Prime status.

A Basic event can only be replacement for one Prime event.

This rule might be very important for Prime events to consider because the Prime event may not only need replacement for its own cancellation. It may also be that it needs replacement because of an upgrade to Main status because a Main status event has been cancelled.


Is this a proposal that could work?

Wesley Tucker
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Re: Cancelled races and events. Re-use of lost statuses.

Post by Wesley Tucker » Thu Jan 19, 2006 2:27 am

Hans Koraeus wrote: - General rule
If a status is lost the next event with underlying status will take its place. If no next event exists the previous event with underlying status will take its place.

Ex:
If a Major is cancelled the next Main event will take its place as a Major.
If a Main event is cancelled or upgraded the next Prime event will take its place.
If a Prime event is cancelled or upgraded the next Basic event will take its place.
Basic and Plain statuses will be lost if cancelled but since there are no limit on these statuses it’s not a problem.

This system can work by itself automatically.
Corky,

Sorry. This doesn't work. Here's an EXAMPLE of my reasoning:

A MAIN is scheduled for September but is CANCELLED.

A PRIME is scheduled for October

A PRIME is scheduled for November.

This rule says the race in October gets MAIN STATUS just because of it's place on the contest calendar. This does nothing to take into account the prestige, sponshorship, organization or competitiveness of the November event. In other words, promoters who are scheduling events specifically in warmer climates in colder months are going to be penalized because they didn't schedule right after a main that got cancelled.

What's more, there is the distinct possibility of a race later in the year has a tradition of good racing but a more recent race getting prime status just in time to move up to a Main simply because of a weekend on the calendar.

NOTE: These are just examples. The same reasoning applies to cancelled Majors followed by two Mains, etc. Or a Spring event followed by two summer events.
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Post by Hans Koraeus » Thu Jan 19, 2006 3:09 am

Wesley,

Don't forget that it is very rare that events get cancelled. I only know of two higher status events that has been cancelled during the last three years. It is also very rare with lots of high status competitions at the end of the year. Only exceptions I can find is:

2005 Stockholm Winter Clash Dec 10 (Prime)
2004 Morro Bay Oct 8 (Major)
2004 Mountain State Race Oct 17 (Prime)
2003 Mountain State Race Oct 19 (Prime)

Sure people can plan for the 0.05% chance of a cancelled event but is it worth it. The thing is that if it happens at least the status is not lost. It may not be the perfect situation but it's an extreme situation and to be compared with having the status being lost totally.

I don't understand why you say it doesn't work. Your example only shows that it would have worked a little bit less good in your example. One could imagine that all event organizers could choose what replacement event they would like. The important thing is if nothing is done there is a solution which is priority 1. Then if you want to handle the 0.005% case where the standard solution is slightly less good for you, you could state your replacement event specifically.

Wesley Tucker
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Post by Wesley Tucker » Thu Jan 19, 2006 3:22 am

Corky,

I hate it when someone says, "someone ought to do something." So in this instance I guess I'm guilty for saying, "that won't work, someone ought to do something!" I should have not posted my response until I had an alternative solution to offer.

So, it's an hour later and I got an alternative to propose.

Is it possible to determine IN ADVANCE a race's status and "provisional status?"

Again, here's my example:

August MAJOR RACE

September MAIN RACE (tentative MAJOR)

October MAIN RACE

October PRIME RACE

November PRIME RACE (Tentative MAIN)

Do you see what I mean? All races are assigned their status early in the year and their "tentative status" in the event of a cancellation of higher-status race. This way everybody knows what to expect no matter what happens as the year progresses.

I agree with you that it's a situation that until now has happened rarely. Let's consider, though, the growth of slalom. Here in the USA EAST we already have situations developing with more than one race scheduled for the same dates. I don't think this is a bad thing. It's great to see so many races happening.

That is what should be considered as rules are developed: not the foreseen or probable situations, but the unforeseen and improbable ones. It's the curse of plenty that needs to be planned for so that rules aren't made as we go along.
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Post by Hans Koraeus » Thu Jan 19, 2006 9:53 pm

Wesley,

I could imagine your way of dealing with it as well. It would need even more work though in setting statuses. We would then need the following:

USA East
Main (tentative Major #1)
Main
Prime (tentative Main #1)
Prime (tentative Main #2)
Basic (tentative Prime #1)
Basic (tentative Prime #2)

Beware that Main's are tentative events together with all other Main events in the West Atlantic region.

So for USA East in addition to today to select 2 Main and 2 Prime events you also have to decide:
- Tentative Major order on Main events (in West Atlantic region, together with all other regions on your side of the Atlantic).
- Tentative order for the selective Primes (in USA East region)
- Tentative order for 2 Basic events (in USA East region)

I say if a region can make it happen let's go with that. I think it's enough having 2 tentative events for each Main, Prime and Basic status.

If there is no descision made it falls back on my General rule explained before.

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