Men's Rules
Benjamin Johnson
requirements used for the past several years in conjunction with the
2000-2004 FIG skill values.
A complete specification of these requirements is posted on the NAIGC
website at http://naigc.net/index.htm (under the section Rules &
Policies / Men's Rules). Here is a brief summary.
General Requirements: 5 A's, 4 B's, 1 C
Special Requirements: 4 per event, except vault - see NAIGC website for
details
Point's awarded for
Difficulty: 1.7
Special Requirements: 1.2
Presentation: 6.2
Bonus: 0.9
While these will be the current "official" rules unless voted
otherwise, the rules were only very briefly discussed at the 2005 NAIGC
nationals meeting. There has been a lot of recent discussion regarding
alternatives. Recently, as well as in the past several years, numerous
suggestions have been offered. Here are the main ones as I recall.
1. Adopting NCAA rules
2. Adopting high school rules (e.g. from Illinois)
3. Adopting some level of J.O. rules
4. Creating NAIGC's own rules
5. Adopting a mix of some of the above (e.g. current "official" rules)
Concerns regarding these suggestions have included
1. Difficulty of NAIGC rules, compared to skill level of NAIGC gymnasts
- expense/difficulty obtaining FIG code of points
2. Lack of a standard nationals system for high school rules - Lack of
judging pool in some regions
3. Expense/difficulty in obtaining J.O. materials?
4. Time required to create a thorough set of rules (though significant
effort has been made already) - lack of agreement on what facets of
gymnastics the new rules should emphasize - lack of available judging
pool for new rules - no certification procedure for judges
5. Difficulty in providing qualified judges - general confusion about
the rules
The current "official" rules seem to fall into category 5 above.
Whatever rules the NAIGC chooses to adopt, the following concerns
should be addressed:
1. Feasibility for host school to provide competent (certified?) judges
with knowledge of the rules
2. Availability of information regarding rules
3. Appropriate level of difficulty (to identify and separate the best
ten gymnasts competing in the NAIGC?)
I look forward to a fruitful discussion.
Benjamin
Benjamin Johnson
Listserve that motivated this topic. If you wrote one of these, and
want it removed, let me know and I will do that. I've also included my
own comments below. The previous emails were from Ed Sergeant, Scott
Irwin, and Hate Hahn.
(1. from Ed Sergeant)
Dear NAIGC Member:
The college clubs of Texas have decided that they will be using NCAA
rules for their 2005-2006 season. On their behalf, I recommend that
at this year's NAIGC Nationals, you consider making the same change
and vote to also adopt NCAA for the following reasons:
1. Most important - the scoring will be fair for all competitors.
2. There has been a lot of confusion over which rules govern - no
one seems to know what the rules are until Nationals. Confusion
leads to unfair scores.
3. Athletes should be competing under one set of rules all year.
The earlier meets will give you an opportunity to "build" toward
Nationals.
4. Since there is already a good set of rules for collegiate level
athletes,
this would eliminate the need to write and update your own rules.
Thank you. Please let me know what your thoughts are.
Ed Sergeant
Texas Gymnastics Conference -President
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Benjamin's Comments: You have made some good points. I especially
agree with your desire to eliminate confusion about the rules. I would
be more inclined to go with J.O. rules, as the NAIGC women have done,
especially now that the levels for men and women correspond to each
other. I am curious as to why you prefered NCAA rules over J.O. rules
when both were an option for TGC.
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(2. from Scott Irwin)
To Everyone,
Ed made several important points in his email. Of concern for the
last
couple years has been having judges that are qualified. Usig the NCAA
rules
would allow for those judges to judge the meets and should make the
scores
more consistant and fair for all competitors.
While this is a good idea, I believe the JO code should be used
instead
of the NCAA code. The reason for this is that there are more JO
judges, and
the code is not as difficult.
If I remember right didn't the national committee decide to use a
modified JO code, with the modified FIG values? My point is that what
was
decided at Nationals needs to stand, unnless there is a major movement
to
change it.
Sott Irwin
UW-Madison Gymnastics Club-President
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Benjamin's Comments: I agree with everything you said.
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(3. from Nate Hahn)
Ed, and other people confused with the Men's rules.
Ok, Rather than have people keep saying that there
havn't been rules established I figured I'd throw in
the truth. Men's rules have been decided on, they
were decided on years ago but the problem is that no
one exactly knew what they were. At EMU
nationals(2004) the men's teams(or a representative
from the team) got together and decided rather than
dealing with the "green book" or constant changes we'd
actually go with the rules that were already
established and just make sure everyone understood
them.
Now... Those rules were pretty simple. They were club
rules with added "training skills"... The rules are on
the NAIGC website. You can reach the rules by going
through Purdue's website.
http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~gymnast/
Then go to NAIGC links, and go the NAIGC, and then go
to mens rules. They say 2002 code of points, but that
was just when they were updated last. The only other
change is that it's the current FIG code and the
document says 1997-2000 code. Other than that it
should be correct.
In theory each year at nationals people should
nominate other skills to be "training skills" that
arn't part of the FIG code or upgrade current
"training skills". It should be voted on and then it
should be updated on the site. My guess is that this
has not happend and hence the confusion.
By the way, ultimately every school decides what rules
they are going to use based on judges available to
them and there isn't much we can all do about it. We
just have to hope they listen to the NAIGC's wishes.
So if you want to make that nomination to change the
rules then go ahead, but there are rules in place.
Any other questions feel free to email me directly.
I hope that cleared everything up.
-Nate Hahn-
Purdue Gymnastics Alumni
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Benjamin's Comments:
Despite what is clearly written on the NAIGC website, people "have
been" confused regarding men's rules for the past several years. To my
surprise and amazement, Buffalo actually seemed to be trying to use
these rules at last year's nationals. By contrast, in the previous 3
years, the Nationals host did not even attempt to use the "official"
men's rules (EMU - high school rules, TEXAS - 2000-2004 FIG and no
developmental skills, Ohio State - backyard gymnastics rules). I can
imagine several reasons why the host school might have chosen to use
other rules. My main point is just that .. there is a reason that
people are confused about the rules.
In addition to the obvious problem mentioned above, the rules
themselves make it difficult for the host school to find people who are
both competent, and willing to judge using the "official" rules,
precisely because our rules are non-standard, and nobody seems to have
put any thought into them for the past several years.
You can tell a gymnastics judge nearly anywhere in the US that you use
NCAA rules, or or that you use J.O. level 9 rules with level 10 bonus,
and they will know what you are talking about. But you cannot just say
"we use rules you get to by following Purdue's website; and by the way
there's a list of 47 new developmental skills that should receive
credit if you see them."
In my opinion, our organization has a long way to go before we are able
to adequately maintain our own rule system. Until then, I suggest that
we should adopt a more standard set of rules, either NCAA rules, or
some simple modification of an appropriate J.O. level.
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