RE: SV: Fly off

[Roger Ladds]

Hi Aage and fellow members of the F2B Group

I would like to reply to Aage's observations and Comments. I do agree with his observations but not necessarily his comments.

Please read the following carefully:
The FAI Sporting Code is produced only in an English version, it is the responsibility of the National Aerosports Councils [NAC's] of each interested country to provide an appropriately Translated version for their members.
I want to make clear that it has become evident to the F2B Working Group that very few of the NAC's provide translated copies of the sporting code to their members. Often the competitor's understanding of the required rules is a verbal translation from another language which looses the context the original English version and therefore develops a misunderstanding of what is required.

The FAI Sporting Code, Section 4, Volume 2, covers the Judges Qualifications and Selection for Contests in the Annex 4B, Class F2B - Judges Guide, in paragraph 4B.2. As quoted in paragraph 4B.1. this is an AID for judges and as such is only regarded as a RECOMMENDATION rather than a firm RULE. It is also quite clear that most NAC's are ignoring this recommendation as it was also clear to the F2B working Group at the last World Champs in Landres that only three NAC's had any form of Judges Training scheme in place at that time. Now wether this is a blatant disregard for the FAI Sporting Code or ignorance due to the lack of Translated versions as above, is anyones guess!!

As a working Group we need to look into both these problems before we can make an educated decision about any related subject. I think some additions to the Sporting Code are in order to make sure that the above items are appropriately adhered to. Even to the point of policing the outcome to ensure conformity by the NAC's worldwide.

Now to Aage's observations, I do agree that the manouvres flown and the scores given often do not conform with the Sporting Code. As I said read the above carefully and digest, what I am saying is do not "shoot the judge first". Any competitor will try to find out what the judges like best by whatever means they have, they will then fly to those findings. There are however those competitors who will fly according to the rule book and accept the score they are given, these are the true competitors to me and very often this attitude will win competitions but makes the following places a lottery and yes this does depend upon the Judges. The judges panel is also a lottery, more so now we have six! you could have four that like the open non-rulebook type manouvres and two that like rulebook manouvres or the other way round so when you mix this up the results are not always what the spectator think they observed. As Human beings we seem to want to find fault in others even at the expense of making sure we have all the facts at our disposal. What we have to remember is this is a competition for an Aerobatic Champion pilot not a contest between officialdom, judges, pilots and spectators, we need to work towards this goal of the perfect event and as a Working Group we have that oportunity, let us use it wisely.

As for Aage's other comments regarding his observations at Landres, as a judge [at Landres] I have to say that one of the the most disturbing facts of large numbers of spectators is the ammount of noise they can generate when stood right behind you. I personally have no problem with spectators, in fact the more the merrier, but if you choose to stand close to or behind the judges to see the score sheets please BE QUIET. It is clear to me that despite spectators claiming they watched every manouvre in that flight and thought the score should be xxxxx. it is only the judge that sees all of the manouvres in every flight at that time and has an overall appreciation of the skill on show. If I am wrong perhaps I should be stood the other side of the wire, if you are right perhaps we have more qualified judges than we thought so please volunteer and swell the ranks. Do not mis-understand this comment but enjoy in relative quiet please.

Yes Aage you have highlighted some areas that need this committees attention and I hope we can work towards a solution for these problems in the future. You are correct to say there is a misconception of what is required but first we have to make sure everyone has a copy of the Sporting Code they can read and understand and to make sure those requirements are met in full wether it is a RULE or a RECOMMENDATION.

Regards

Roger Ladds

========================================
Message Received: May 03 2009, 09:54 AM
From: "aage wiberg"
To: f2b-...@googlegroups.com
Cc:
Subject: SV: Fly off



Hello Peter and members of F2B Group.

I discovered that a word is missing in one of my statements to the
discussion I started.

It is in this section:

Pilots that can only fly soft corners are welcome to participate but they
should not dominate fly off or even be in fly off. And a world champion must

fly sharply. ¨Why? The simple answer is because the rules say so. The real
aces are those who dare do this and persist doing it. They are the true
heroes of our beautiful sport. As it is now some really pilots are tempted
to fly wrongly because they see that it pays off because of judges who have
still not found out that F2B is a serious sport and not a beauty contest.

The missing word is "good." I meant :" As it is now some really good pilots
are tempted to fly wrongly because they see that it pays off because of
judges ......

My intension with this is not to offend judges that all do their best, I'm
sure.

But the issue is of so big importance, I think, that it is necessary to
bring it up.

We were a group of Danish stunt fliers watching the Landres fly off quite
intensely, and we all were frustrated to se the scoring compared to what we
saw. None of us are top fliers, but we have all been in this game long
enough to see what goes on.

Of course this is no new discussion, but as time goes on we must insist to
try to improve quality of judging, and find ways to do so.

So far only Joan and Keith have responded to my statements. Thank you for
that.

But what about the rest of the group?


Greetings.

Aage Wiberg

-----Oprindelig meddelelse-----
Fra: f2b-...@googlegroups.com [mailto:f2b-...@googlegroups.com] På vegne
af Peter G
Sendt: 1. april 2009 13:06
Til: F2B Group
Emne: Re: Fly off


Thank you for suggesting to discuss Judges Guide issues, Aage, i will
open a related discussion later today, using your input as an opening
statement.

krgds Peter Germann

On 25 Mar, 00:00, "aagewiberg" wrote:
> Dear members of F2B working group.
>
> I agree with Paul walker that 15 participants are the right number. And 3
> flights is the right number with one to throw away. The champ can then
still
> win even if he/she crashes a plane in one of his or hers attempts to
perform
> the never reachable perfect flight.
>
> And it is a super idea to give juniors a second set of judges and their
own
> site. They are the future of our sport. Maybe we should give more
youngsters
> access to the junior fly off. There is time and room enough in a second
> arena.
>
> The fly off is the absolutely best day of a world championship for us
stunt
> fliers, and I saw a big part of it in Landres in 2008. I think fatigue of
> judges is a minor problem in order to select the best fliers for the
medals.
> I think more work should be done to select and educate the best possible
> judges that judge just what they se compared to a perfect pattern as we
can
> se it on Keith Renecle’s CL Sim. This I think was the major problem in
> Landres. Smooth elegant manoeuvres were judged up and those who tried to
fly
> according to rules with sharp corners and kept doing it under difficult
wind
> and turbulence conditions were disfavoured.. This has been a general
problem
> for too long. Judges should know that no championship should be won unless
> the pilots fly sharp corners. Cheating here makes the rest of the
manoeuvres
> come out much prettier to watch. But F2B is no beauty contest. Real stunt
is
> flying on a knife edge and we should se more flights ending in the asphalt
> because of a fraction of a seconds flying too long before the sharp turns.
> People like Luciano Compostello of Italy did this sometimes and one of the
> Yatsenko brothers did in Landres. Real stunt is when you feel it in your
> guts at the sharp turns near the ground. And crashes should occur more
> frequently because of the fact that there is only 1.2 meter from success
to
> disaster.
>
> Too many judges have for too long been judging wrongly. This has nothing
to
> do with fatigue ness. It has to do with a misconception of how stunt
should
> look.
>
> A pretty looking pattern with soft corners should not be enough to qualify
> for fly off. As long as this still happens we do have a problem. The real
> beauty of stunt is the mix of well shaped circular turns, straight flight
> and sharp breathtaking turns. And here lies the secret of why flying F2B
is
> so fantastic. Judges must learn this.
>
> Pilots that can only fly soft corners are welcome to participate but they
> should not dominate fly off or even be in fly off. And a world champion
must
> fly sharply. ¨Why? The simple answer is because the rules say so. The real
> aces are those who dare do this and persist doing it. They are the true
> heroes of our beautiful sport. As it is now some really pilots are tempted
> to fly wrongly because they see that it pays off because of judges who
have
> still not found out that F2B is a serious sport and not a beauty contest.
>
> In my view the biggest problem we face is the tradition of awarding smooth
> nice looking patterns, instead of more correct and more difficult flying
> with visible faults as a result of more demanding pilot work when you aim
to
> fly according to rules with knife sharp corners.
>
> Let us discuss what to do to about this!
>
> Greetings

[Keith Renecle]

Hi Roger and fellow members,

 

Thanks to Roger for his good comments from the judges perspective. It would also be nice to hear from other judges. I sncerely believe that Roger is correct in stating that one of the biggest problems has always been the fact that the rules have to be translated into many other languages and perceptions that have been incorrect have crept in through the years. There is also a saying in English that says that "old habits die hard." There are still many of our fellow judges, and indeed pilots as well, that firmly believe some of these misconceptions and simply refuse to change their attitudes. Sometimes, we as humans, only see what we want to see, and it takes an open mind to be able to change, even when the facts tell us to do so. This unfortunately takes time to achieve. Most of us do not like change. Even if the changes can be proved and are 100% technically correct, you then have to gain the acceptance of all of the pilots, and of course the judges as well. This means communicating with a huge group of people and in different languages.

 

We must remember that it is not that many years since we have had access to this amazing communications tool called the internet. We also have easy access to high-speed computers that can animate diagrams and simulate how our pattern should look. It is only 2 years ago that we actually had a proper international workshop on judging, and even then, many nations did not see the long-term importance of taking part in such a workshop. The feedback that we received from this workshop has really helped me to carry on with my interactive training system, and I believe that this will be another step forward in training better judges in the future. We as a group, have never provided proper judges training tools, and although we do indeed have some really experienced and good judges right now, we have to continue to train new judges. We therefore need proper training tools.

 

I also incorrectly believed that I would have my new program finished by last year. The software could not really do what I required, and of course my programming ability is not really that good either. With the global economies in crises for the last while, I also had to back off with my playing around and find other ways to survive. I refer to my time with models as "playing around" because I do not get any income for this work, and neither do I want financial reward out of this project. My reward is to give something abck to the hobby/sport that we all love.......sometimes!

 

So having said all that, I am still working hard on the new system, and it is getting better by the day. I have used parts of the program to train some new judges for our Nats in April, and it certainly has potential. I will have something to send as a trial version to demonstrate at the European champs this year. Unfortuanately, I don't have the funds to be there this time, but I will send a disk with the program to Peter Germann, and I am sure that he will be able to show it for me. The point is that we are indeed making progress, and although it is a slow process, I believe that we have taken the right steps towards achieving our goal in this regard. We just need to persevere, and keep on working together in a constructive manner.

 

The other valid point that Roger made about the spectators standing behind the judges and passing comments about each manoeuvre, is something that I think the we should take serious note of. Maybe the world champs organizors can help here by appointing someone to bring this to the attention of the spectators during the competition at regular intervals. Maybe even appropriate signs could be placed around the circle to ask nicely that people do not talk behind the judges. We just need to give this some thought, because this is really distracting to judges.

 

Thanks again for the comments from Aage and Roger.

 

Regards,

 

Keith Renecle

 

 

 

----- Original Message -----

---

No virus found in this incoming message.
Checked by AVG - www.avg.com
Version: 8.5.287 / Virus Database: 270.12.33/2120 - Release Date: 05/18/09 06:28:00