Scoring system for next year

John Wallis · Post by **John Wallis** » Thu Dec 04, 2008 9:41 pm

If you're interested in competing in the club XC league next year this may be of interest to you.

Paul Myerscough has come up with an idea for a handicap system for the glider you fly to try and make it possible for you to win the club XC league on a DHV 1 or the new equivalent.

The idea is the higher the spec of glider you fly the bigger the handicap. For example if you fly a DHV 1 you would score the whole distance of the flight. If you fly a DHV 2 you would be handicapped
by a certain percentage and so on all the way up to a 2/3 and full on mental machine.

At first I was against this as my feeling was the likes of Miskin and Guthrie are the top men and they are the pilots to beat - end of story. But having listened to Paul I think the idea has merit and will be disscussed at the January meeting.

Plus Brian will be pulling the names out of the hat for the new teams for the club challenge for 2009.

Plus if you feel the scoring system format should be changed for 2009 be there. At present it's OLC for the winter XC and Open distance for the summer XC league. Maybe we should make it all open distance or maybe involve the 3 turn point menu.

Whichever the best pilot will win as per normal.

Post by **gary stenhouse** » Fri Dec 05, 2008 6:43 am

funny how dhv rating comes into flying. as when i was been brow beaten
about flying a 2-3 there reasons not to fly it was it will make no differance, that is untill you are in directly flying against it. could be complicated as i will be e flying 2 gliders next year though. the thing that is done at the comps is serial class winner and sports class which is 2 and below. after all if ali was flying a 10 year old dhv1 he would probably still winn. if you realy want to make it fair then no flights outside the weekend can count for the overall winner. this way those who get off more than others are at no advantage.

i would say the best is intoduce more trophys to the pg for seial and sports class as there is a disproportianate amount of trophys for 5 hg pilots against 50 pg pilots.

cheers gary

Post by **colin keightley** » Fri Dec 05, 2008 7:28 am

gary stenhouse wrote:funny how dhv rating comes into flying. as when i was been brow beaten
about flying a 2-3 there reasons not to fly it was it will make no differance,

cheers gary

but it would make a differance if you have a 2-3 pilot who can fly his wing to its full potential.

I think people say its better to fly a lower wing 100% than it is to fly a higher wing at 50%. In the BPC and the BCC the lower class stops at 1-2

Post by **gary stenhouse** » Fri Dec 05, 2008 9:01 am

its always a hard one as miller will always say if out on the same hill on the same day then if you win you win but if you are not then how do you know that they are better as if you are not there then you might of flown further.

take the bpc i beat most of the top pilots on the second day and came 5th overall but we all know i was not realy in the top 5 pilots but on that day i was. either way the scoring sytem works it will probably still be the same winner

cheers gary

Misk · Post by **Misk** » Fri Dec 05, 2008 9:48 am

Interesting idea.

Done on percentage of glide ratio?

comp glide 10:1 distance x1
2/3 glide 9.5:1 distance x1.053
2 glide 9:1 distance x1.111
1/2 glide 8.25:1 distance x1.212
1 glide 7.5:1 distance x1.333

A further correction for race harness? x.95?

It'll get complicated!

It's a pointless exercise if you apply the handicap on a performance basis as above. For example Ali flies 100 km to be equal on a DHV 1 you have to go 75km! It's just not going to level the playing field. Ali will still win by a street.

To provide a close competition you will need to have disproportionate handicapping. Perhaps as a function of distance flown the previous year?

That means you are handicapping the person not the wing they fly - is that the aim of it? You want at least one of your club champions to be purely the best pilot either the XC league or the club comp guy. Try the handicapping on the club comp by all means but it is pointless, and making a rod for your own back, to handicap the XC league. In the good old days we used to get round it by saying that if you were in the league you couldn't win the trophy - perhaps extend that philosophy to BPC pilots as an equivalent?

[b]At the end of the day the wing you fly is an indication of your intent and ambition - most definitely not your skill or ability [/b]

Stick your current club champion on a Bolero and he'll still walk it - and quite rightly so. The whole point of the top guys is they are there as a rabbit to the rest of us.........

Also while I'm at it be careful of extending the scoring of the flights to turn point flights. The software for the club league sometimes gets confused if a pilot 'stops' in mid air due strong winds and can misscore flights. Easily corrected in GPS Dump but each problem flight requires individual attention and the overall positions won't be viewable on the league.

If the handicapping goes ahead you'll be putting me at an advantage wing wise - I have a EN C wing which is equivalent to DHV 2......................

I've changed me mind - it's a great idea!

As John says the idea is well worth a proper discussion as you never know what comes out of ideas like this.

brian day · Post by **brian day** » Fri Dec 05, 2008 4:58 pm

My feeling is that if we are going to look at a handicap situation, then it should be a separate competition.
A good idea and worthy of investigation. All flights though should be treated as if you are flying your highest rated glider. (that should slow the ginger one down a bit

) I could suggest a few other handicapping factors as well,,,,,,nil points for porn tash flyers

Stuart Bertram · Post by **Stuart Bertram** » Fri Dec 05, 2008 8:41 pm

Good idea - now where can I get a dhv minus 2

Stuart

John Wallis · Post by **John Wallis** » Fri Dec 05, 2008 10:47 pm

Ian as a matter of interest where did these figures originate?

Done on percentage of glide ratio?

comp glide 10:1 distance x1
2/3 glide 9.5:1 distance x1.053
2 glide 9:1 distance x1.111
1/2 glide 8.25:1 distance x1.212
1 glide 7.5:1 distance x1.333

A further correction for race harness? x.95?

Misk · Post by **Misk** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 5:18 am

I made them up - just an estimate of glide performance for each DHV class. BCC apply some handicaps based on glider and pilot rating I don't know what they are?

Sad Northerner · Post by **Sad Northerner** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 1:19 pm

Do we go down the ‘open distance’ only route to keep things simple or do we try and promote a variety of flying techniques by including defined flights? My attitude would be to keep the format at close to the National XC League as that would be the natural progression for most club pilots and it’s best that the skills now rather than then.

Flights should be submitted within 1 calendar month for the day are done no questions asked. I have no idea why this is not currently the case but would like to know.

Handicap system? ….it’s gonna get messy.
To answer this question we need to ask ourselves who has won in the past and why. In most cases people at the top of the National XC league are people with flexible jobs who can pop out for flight at the drop of a hat; Dean, Smarty and Jake Herbet are people who spring to mind. Demographics also play at part. In 2002 ( I think ) Kia Coleman won the Nat XC most of his flights were done from Long Mynd (in the south where it’s always warmer and cloudbase is at least a grand higher). Where does Kia live? I hear you ask….the bottom of Long Mynd is the answer.
So if we bring in a handicap system for people who fly DHV2/3 etc then, if we want to make things really fare, we need to introduce a handicap system for above factors as well ; looks like we’re going to be asking Ian to get his calculator out again.
Ask any pilot of ability, Miskin, Rudd or Smarty etc, to put weather, location and glider performance in order of conduciveness to XC flying and glider performance will always, always come last. Jake Herbet’s and Smarty’s performance in the XC League and Chris Fosters performance in the 2007 BPC stand as good testimonies to this.
An alternative may be to award differently, Why don’t we have a weekender for paragliding? or a trophy for the best flight on a DHV 2….1…whatever?

At the end of the day we have to ask ourselves what does the league means to us as individuals and as a club. Is it the battle for 1st place that is most contested or 3rd and 4th etc..etc… Is it really the longest flights which are the most admired or enjoyable or is it specific flying incidences, when someone makes it round a section of headland for the first time or gets high when all other are decked? In my eyes it is just a league and only one measure of a pilots ability…..if Sandwith came last next year he’d still be my hero.

Ali

John Wallis · Post by **John Wallis** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 6:57 pm

Ali we don't need any more trophies well at least in my opinion as it's cost a lot of club funds this year for what we presently have. However I would like to suggest for discussion that we make the weekender trophy hang gliding and paragliding in fact it might get to the point where all the trophies end up being contested by paragliders because let's face it there's a dearth of XC flights from our hang gliding pilots. For the first since time began all the hang gliding trophies were won by ridge runs!!!!!!!!! The only over the back XC was done by Wendy Patterson.

As for the handicap idea as I've said previously I was dead against it at first but the more Paul talked about it the more reasonable it sounded. I don't think it would get too messy as we would just use an agreed percentage of the flight for whatever glider is used. Nothing might become of this as there's a possibility there won't be enough interest from the majority of pilots in the club.

Having said that if I get an extra 50% distance awarded for flying a 2-1 I'll take it thank you very much. However it would feel like a hollow victory to be near the top doing it this way.

Maybe the way we should look at this is to ask the pilots that have flying for less than say 5 years and the club will give them a handicap just like they do in golf. If you've been flying longer than that you get nowt, you're a scratch pilot as they say.

I'm waffling now......................Just some ideas.

Getting back to the trophies should we award them all to paraglider pilots and forget the hang gliding side of things now

Misk · Post by **Misk** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 8:09 pm

I pushed the same idea past Gary. Make all trophies open for all classes of wings. It would certainly wake the HGs up and we may even see some ridgeds being used open XC. At the moment, even based on national leagues, the PGs would push them hard to the top spots. Would Sten be allowed to mix his HG and PG scores to make a decent total?

It would be a shame to see all that history swept aside though.

Post by **gary stenhouse** » Sat Dec 06, 2008 8:20 pm

great i am sub five years so big handicap for me please. the other this year or should i say next i will be now doing 100k plus flights on my hg as well as 200 on the pg so it will need to be one of a hell of a handycap for me not to win

Sad Northerner · Post by **Sad Northerner** » Sun Dec 07, 2008 1:05 pm

John

sorry mate but I'm not buying "the clubs too skint to buy any more trophies" line, (pardon the pun). I just can't believe the recession is hitting that hard.
Pauls idea is worthy of discussion but should not overide the consideration of other possible solutions. We need to be careful that we don't complicate things to the extent that only a few members understand what's happening in the XC league.

In the end, John, Pauls suggestion tries to regulate something that is beyond regulation. The XC isn't fair and will never be fair even if you apply all the mathematical equations you want to it...fact.

Formulas like this are best applied to club comp days where glider performance does make a difference and the of 'time off' and 'where people live' issues don't factor.

Trust me John there is a better way.

Ali

John Wallis · Post by **John Wallis** » Sun Dec 07, 2008 5:30 pm

Trust me John there is a better way

And that is.........?

I've got to hold my hand up here and say I like simplicity whenever possible.

myerscouse · Post by **myerscouse** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 8:54 pm

Trouble with debating stuff on the forum is it allways goes off on a tangent .
Consider the original idea..... and lets talk at the next meeting.

John Wallis · Post by **John Wallis** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 9:02 pm

But by airing the subject we can formulate ideas ready for the next meeting.

Post by **gary stenhouse** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 9:23 pm

for those who fly and have flown dhv 2-3 wings, which there is only 2 who fly them in the club as the other 2-3 are tecnicaly 2.

what is the diferance and why would you want to fly one?

as i am one of those pilots then i can safely say that i am flying one for myself and not to try and beat others with in the club. will it give me any advantages over a 2 or even a 1-2, the quastion is yes at times and in certain conditions but in most cases no. now if we are scratching on a light laminar day then for sure i will be able to stay up when others might not, but these are not the conditions that will win an xc league. the conditions to win an xc league are strong boyant conditions and in these the diferance becomes less. now if we were to include fai triangles and possible out and returns then this is where the 2-3 again will be an advantage. the other adantage could be feedback, but this in itself is something you have to feel and recognise and able to use it.

so if you were to beleive the reasons above, the current scoring system will give no advantage to the 2-3. the winter league is where the only advantage, as there is the ridge run scoring.

hope the above does make sense and hope that the next xc hangliding and paragliding does not have to be won by ridge runs and glorified ones.

cheers the ginger one

the other adv

Post by **colin keightley** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 9:34 pm

In the right hands the 2-3 is a winning machine through and through they are designed as such but those who reap the rewards are those able to fly these wonderfull machines to there full potential not us mear recreational pilots. No offence to the pilots in this club who fly them but I dont think 2-3 will have a huge advantage in this club.

Fingers · Post by **Fingers** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 9:34 pm

A simple handicap system?

If your in the top three in the XC league and you wish to ad to your flights you have to have it verified at take off you are dressed in women's clothing. Not just a pair of tights but the full shebang.

And I dont meen this womens/mens sports wear, I am talking about classy gear. Nice, sensible for the conditions outfit, tweed getup I have in mind, Monty python style.

Verified at TO that full attire is worn down to accessories and shoes.
No spare clothes allowed.

Simple.

This should ensure all get a fair crack at the whip and bring some entertainment to the uk XC scene.

John Wallis · Post by **John Wallis** » Mon Dec 08, 2008 9:34 pm

as i am one of those pilots then i can safely say that i am flying one for myself and not to try and beat others with in the club

Yeah right

Said the man that walked away with all the trophies

You're not competitive at all are you Gary

Post by **gary stenhouse** » Tue Dec 09, 2008 6:46 am

if i was realy competitive then i would of won by bigger margins as did have the oportunittys todo so. but since my accident i have taken a back seat and like to enjoy the flying more than see how far i can fly every time i take off. i must admit i have become lazy when i should have flown xc yet decided to land back by my car. to be a good xc pilot does not by any means say you are the best pilot.

lets see what happens next year as most of the pilots in the top 10 are all new pilots so i think it is only a matter of time before we will see a new overall winner and it could mean on a hanglider

Post by **chrisfozz** » Tue Dec 09, 2008 4:52 pm

In my opinion the best thing to happen in the club, for XC flying, was the introduction of the online XC league. It has been really effective in encouraging pilots of all levels to have a go and record their efforts. I think the decision to use the online league for the club comps last year was spot. It does however have one or two drawbacks; we can’t easily set the start and end dates for the comp, it can’t enforce flights be submitted within 4 weeks, it wont score an out and return or adjust results automatically for a handicap system (as far as I’m aware).
Scoring 3 TP as we did this year for the winter league is not the best in my view because it encourages repeat ridge runs; if we could make the online system score O/R, this would be better for the winter league when ridge runs are more or less all that is available. I would not extend turnpoint flights to summer leagues; because of where we live its not too hard to do 30k with a 3 TP ridge run, while it might bump someone up the xc league (I know I’ve done a few myself) it doesn’t help a pilot improve their XC flying. Straight distance for the summer league is the only way to go.
Nevertheless, I still think it’s the online league is the best thing since sliced bread and so we should continue to with the same format for next year.
I don’t have any strong feelings about a handicap system one way or another but I agree it could be a nightmare to administrate and I’d like to win the league outright without any help from a handicap system. I think we should all agree to submit flights within 4 weeks; let the dog see the hare!
What I do think would be an excellent idea would be a 1/2 category for the summer league – still part of the main league, everyone knows who’s on a 1/2 so you can see the results as they stand on the net. If you move on to a 2 or 2/3 you’re only eligible for the main prize. And theres nowt to stop a 1/2 winning it outright. I think this would be a real comp within a comp, very much worth winning for an up and coming pilot and provide a great stimulus for more xc flying.
chris

Post by **colin keightley** » Tue Dec 09, 2008 6:05 pm

I think chris has got it spot on.