Age-based versus Ability-based for AWSA

[MISkier]

Perhaps I missed the thread on this, but I am hearing that there are proposals to move from age-based grouping to ability-based grouping in AWSA. I'm not sure of all the details, but I do have some questions:

 

1. Does this affect all tournament levels (C, States, Regionals, Nationals, E,L,R)?

2. Would the qualification COA and ranking scoring be moved to an ability-based model or remain age group?

3. If a skier does not want to reduce speed, would they receive the full buoy count for the higher speed and rope length that they select?

4. Would that higher buoy count (at any speed) apply to their ranking average and could it be assessed against the COA for their age division, assuming the COA remains an age-based qualification score?

6. Would the ranking scores from previous age-based divisions at higher speeds still be discounted when moving to the next division with a lower speed?

7. Are there details on this proposed approach posted anywhere? I did see a spreadsheet showing ability-based groupings by buoy count, but no specific rules or examples of how it would work in tournaments.

8. How does the model deal with changes in ability (either improvement or regression)?

 

I am open-minded about this. However, it probably does not impact me much. I have very little chance of any meaningful placement in any venue with or without this change. If the issue of higher speed options were handled correctly, I can see some benefit there and I know other skiers who have not wanted to slow down or would like the option to occasionally ski the higher speed. Allowing some flexibility there might be appealing.

 

@JeffSurdej, do you have information to share?

 

[ntx]

I hope this is a rumor. If you want ability base division. PLEASE go ski INT events. Leave age groups alone.

[JeffSurdej]

I'v been waiting for this post :) Yes I have information to share and I will respond to this post in a few hours, just need time to write it up b.c it will be a long post to provide all information leading to this idea. The truth is, right now it is so so early in the discussions of this idea and concept that I literally can not even answer any of your 8 questions. I love to get feedback but I was hoping to have a little more details before everyone started weighing in. BRB

[Horton]

I am w/ @ntx on this. I know other sports are successful with ability based but i can't get my head around it.

[Mateo_Vargas]

I don't see why both can't be done. A round of age based then a round of ability based. What competitor wouldn't want 2 ways to win?

[JeffSurdej]

@MISkier as I stated before its way to early to answer those questions but they are all good things to consider. It may end up being just for local events or extend into reg/nat. There would be a great deal of testing and simulating for at least a year to see if it has any merit. I did notice a few of your questions seemed more based around another topic up for proposal and that is zero based scoring which would allow any skier to shorten the line or go up in speed after making 6 buoys. Ability based divisions is separate from that. Right now there is not anything posted to review b/c it has not been finalized yet. We had a 2 hour phone call yesterday with the skier qualifications committee on this subject and the discussion was great and a lot of pros and cons were discussed. And rules meets this saturday which this topic will come up as well. I would predict that the membership will be able to see a more concrete proposal by the time the winter meetings hit this Jan, but even then the committees objective as of right now for 2017 will be to run a few formats of ability based skiing on rankings as a test, just to see how skier would rank and start to view where they would fall. And we would also like to have these test divisions as options for developing running orders at local events. So if a LOC wants to group skiers by ability we give them that quick and easy option. Note: they can do this now but it would be more beneficial to test if the formats are provided to LOC's

[JeffSurdej]

So first the why? Why is AWSA looking into this? Like any company or sport we have to look at ways to adapt, things that worked in the past don't always work for the new generation. If we don't try new things we can continue to see membership drop 5% a year. We have spend the last 10 years worrying about the top 1% of our sport and forgot about the bottom of the pyramid. For the top of our sport age divisions work just fine. The #1 answer in surveys last year for reasons skiers don't compete was that they didn't feel competitive enough so as long as we continue to make the guy who can't run the course or even run 22 off ski against 39 off in mens 1 just b/c he's 23 years old we are not going to solve that. In another survey when asked which new format skiers would like to see, ability based skiing as the #1 answer. And lastly we continue to be about the only sport in the world not formatted by some type of ability. The only ability divisions we have are open and MM and we do not even force those. Yes we have grassroots and that has helped but there is still no incentive for them to cross over into class C events when they have to go up against short line skiers, they say no thanks and we never see them again.

[JeffSurdej]

What we have so far: Right now it is in a very early stage of discussion, the spreadsheet that got out was just merely a look at how many skiers would fall into 6 buoy increments, it took the current 34 divisions (too many) to 19 (increases competition). But at this point that is all it was, just a way to see how many skiers are in the 50 buoy range vs 75 vs 100 etc. So yes it is the basis for a start but it is not a definite that we would go 100% ability and go 100% ability at reg/nat. Of course your feedback is very helpful but the committee would like to fine tune more details before we present anything for quality feedback. So far we have 2 ideas, 1) is 100% ability, with divisions every 6 buoys and the other 2) is to combine some of the current age divisions and then break them down into abilities, so we would take M1 and M2 together but then have 2-3 ability groups within them. Or combine Mens 3-4 maybe 5 and so the same. Once again we don;t have the exact breakdown, just discussing and like I said before what ever comes out would be put on a trial run on rankings and for running orders, lets people see it in 2017 and then see if its worth anything.

[JeffSurdej]

My personal opinion: I'm not a huge fan of seeing ability at level 8 and up. I think most top end skiers would rather go to nationals and compete in say mens 3 rather than compete in some 38 off group. That being said locally when I sit there and I'm the only skier in my division yet I see skiers in mens 4/5 that are close to me, I would much rather have fun and compete against them there. I 100% strongly agree that we need some type of ability group on the lower end of our sport, the entry barrier to enter AWSA is very intimidated. A college kid after running 3 buoys in college has to come ski against cole mccormick in mens 1? The last thing they are going to do is drive 2 hours, spend an entry to compete against skiers that much better. We have a broken system off ability for all skiers not running into short line. We need a place for them, like the good ole novice back in the day. So my belief is if we do anything we should come up with ability based groups for say Level 6 or even 7 and under, and then once you achieve level 8 perhaps you compete against age. I don't know the answer, or like someone said lets offer both. That way we don't upset the apple cart of what is working now for a lot of skiers but yet we provide a format and path for what's preventing new skiers from competing in AWSA events. Maybe we don't make any changes for juniors, and maybe we don't for age groups 6 and up. So let the thread begin on this subject :)

[Horton]

Modification of my earlier post....

 

If @JeffSurdej takes us down a new path i will support whatever it is simply because he is trying something new. The current path is failing so we need to innovate.

[MISkier]

@JeffSurdej, regardless of how mainstream the ability-based approach becomes, I think there could be benefit just by providing some systematic support for those groupings within the USA Water Ski website. That is, even if the ability-based amounts to nothing more than a side competition, having the programming done to crunch the numbers, do the ability-based results, handle the groupings, etc. for a tournament would allow the organizers to offer the ability-based competition without the overhead they currently endure to pore over the data, tally the results by hand or spreadsheet, and maintain the appropriate group assignments/migrations for skiers. If this can be integrated into the current scoring applications programming and overall data published to USA Water Ski, you would have at least enabled the local scene to do these things.

[ALPJr]

I'm with @"Mateo Vargas" why not offer both... A number of amateur sports are moving to ability based. Our local baseball softball league went from age based to a ability based hybrid with expaned age group ranges.

[ALPJr]

@JeffSurdej I really liked your 2:12pm post until I got to ... "Maybe we don't make any changes... :)

[Drago]

Seems like Juniors should stay together.B and G1 should stick to regional competition (no nationals for that young group)

Combining genders... I can't imagine a G3 or W1 wants to compete against /hang out on the dock with M5+

Seems jeffs idea of < level 6(or so) would like the ability based comp., but I saw the chart, the highest level has 8 guys in it.

I just wonder: I thought the "problem" was people don't want to spend all weekend at another lake for 2 sets. Not that they don't win.

[Ralph Lee]

Does INT work together with AWSA? Do they compete to draw skiers from one league to another? Or is it a friendly disagreement of how tournaments should be run?

[skispray]

There are other sports that provide great examples - a good one is amateur motocross. If we adopted a similar structure then we would have some broad age categories (e.g. Keep Boys 1/2 & Girls 1/2, Senior age groups with slower speeds, and Mens/Womens divisions that are going the same speeds) and then within those categories go ability based. You'd end up with something like:

 

Boys 1 & Girls 1

Boys 2 & Girls 2 (break this out into Boys 2 novice & Boys 2 expert if needed, same for girls)

Open Men novice (Under 36 mph)

Open Men (36 mph) 15-28 off skiers

Open Men (36 mph) 28-35 off skiers

Open Men (36 mph) 38 off & above skiers

Open Women (repeat same categories as Open Men but replace 36 mph with 34 mph)

+35 Men novice (Under 34 mph)

+35 Men (34 mph) - 15-28 off skiers

+35 Men (34 mph) 28-35 off skiers

+35 Men (34 mph) 38 off & above skiers

+35 Women (repeat same categories as +35 Men but replace 34 mph with 32 mph)

...

+65 Men novice (under whatever the max speed is)

+65 Men (max speed) 15-28 off skiers

...

 

You get the pattern. Just continue this at whatever age breaks are appropriate. If you made the age breaks 35 years, 65 years, and 75 years then you would have 36 to 38 divisions in theory but in practice you would not have more than 25 divisions at all but the largest tournaments (regionals and nationals). Of course @JeffSurdej can probably make some improvements given the data he is looking at when designing the divisions. One thing to point out here is that you'd basically be collapsing Boys 3, Mens 1, and Mens 2 together and breaking them into ability based divisions. That's because there's no reason I can think of not to do this - if you have two 36 mph skiers who can both get into 35 off, they should be competing. It shouldn't matter if one of them is 32 and the other is 17.

 

Another point is that the divisions are large enough to make sure there are multiple people in each! That means that not everyone is going to be a threat to win. For example, if you can run into 15 off at max speed and are competing with people that run into 28 off, you probably won't win. You could, but probably not. That's okay though - you don't need to have everyone have a legit shot at a win. You just need them to be able to get to the point where they could be threatening for wins in their division in a year or two. That's what hooks people into tournaments!

[ntx]

People see the numbers of collegate skiers and wonder how do we get them to continue to partcipate? The question is why do more than 50% of the collage skiers partcipate in the first place. It has nothing to do with competition. It is 75% social. My daughter has lived on a private site her entire life. Has a older brother that is a accomplished three event skier. Skied some tournaments (less than 5) in g1/g2. From the age of ten till 17 skis once a year. Starts college, and wants to join the ski team.Why??? It is all about the social aspect.

 

Jeff says the collage skier running 3 balls is intimidated by Cole Mccormick in m1. Guess what...... How will they fell when they come out and get smoked by a 7 or 8 year old. We host three tournaments a year and each has a minimum of 35 skiers. About 10 will be b1&2/g1/2. Very few run less than a full pass.

 

There are systems in place that allows the host site to set up the skier groups any way they see fit. Ability groups can be done now.

 

What does the winner of a ability base tournament accomplish??? Bragging rights that allow you to say that you were the best skier of 3 skiers that can't run 22 off???

 

I have seen score books with as few as ten skiers. How many ability divisions do you want?

 

Ability based divisions will not grow the sport. More people on the shore that moon the jumper if he lands a jump might. Good luck with that. No one wants to see my BIG white butt.

[skispray]

@ntx you make some fair points but my take away from @JeffSurdej is:

 

(1) AWSA membership is declining at 5% per year

(2) Member surveys show that non-participation in tournaments is due to feelings of intimidation, presumably due to our class structure

(3) Member surveys show that the #1 response in terms of what skiers want is ability based divisions

 

If true, then we have to move to ability based divisions for the sake of the sport. I simply don't understand how anyone can see the above facts and resist trying ability based divisions.

 

Yeah, they won't help with every tournament. There are plenty of tournaments that are too small for ability based divisions to matter, but there are tournaments where they would make a difference. And people that experience that difference might ski more tournaments as a result. That's growth. It doesn't help at every tournament, every city, every state, maybe not every region. But if it helps anywhere, then that is progress. Why resist that possibility?

[ntx]

@skispray. I don't know the answer to this question....but I wonder if INT is seeing the same rate of loss of membership. I think in my area, it is nonexistent. I don't resist good change. I resist change that won't effect what it was intended to do.

 

How about changes in the structure that allows the host site of nationals to to retain more money from hosting a event. Right now, I don't think we have a site for next years nationals. Lets get that long time problem fixed. Who wants to host the event next year when we have this huge new influx of ability based skiers?

 

The sport will only continue to exist with skiers who have passion for it. Passion won't be developed by ability based division. You have it, or you don't.

[sunvalleylaw]

In either case, I am in the lower classes. And I do intend on trying my first tournament next year. I am both old, and without cred. For me, in a sense, I think having the class I am skiing in consist of a variety of ages working on their skills rather than a bunch of old white guys sounds better to me.

[ToddL]

If you want to know why the membership rates are down, you need to ask those people who once were members and are not now. Polling current membership about decline is just 2nd-hand insight about other people's opinions/reasons.

[ToddL]

My local club has done ability group awards for years. We overlay our structure on-top of the score books. For Slalom, we would normalize buoy counts to a 34 MPH equivalent and have divisions based upon line length.

3 to 4 passes under Max

1 to 2 passes under Max

Max Speed

-22

-28, etc.

 

Just FYI - This year's experiment with junior Class C zero-based scoring messed our method up. If we adopt zero based scoring, our solution would need to re-think how to handle skiers and scores where the rope gets shorter before max speed. It would have been nice for there to be a data flag in the score books when a skier is getting credit for line shortening buoys prior to reaching max speed.

[ToddL]

Another division method:

Juniors B/G

Adults M/W

Senior M/W

by Novice/Competitive/Expert

3 age groups by 3 ability groups by gender = 18 divisions.

 

[ToddL]

Another consideration -

Please realize that the number of skiers per division is influenced by the passage of the baby boomers and the waves of boomer kids and boomer grand-kids.

Just because M4/5 divisions are huge doesn't mean that they always will be.

 

If decisions are to be made based upon skier numbers, please take several snapshots over time to get an average % of total skiers by current divisions. By using average % of total for each division, and sampling many years (1960 to present in 5 year increments?), you will control for the boomer waves' influence.

 

[John Brooks]

I witnessed something this year during the Queens Cup I guess I knew but never focused on. The QC was a women's tournament and what I saw was a lot of comradery between all of the women. Some had never skied in a tournament, some are regular tournament skiers, but all seemed to enjoy the event. There was a sort of energy full of fun by all that I could see. After this experience, I feel like more of the focus needs to be on people working, playing, spending time together than just on the competition (probably a lot like the Collegiate events.)

 

My other thought is that we need fewer record tournaments, more C and F, and the focus by the event organizers be more making the event enjoyable for the participants. Instead of LOC's spending all their energy and manpower on meeting record requirements, spend it on being creative and making events that all enjoy. I would be an advocate of AWSA placing a limit on record level events.

[ntx]

@"Mateo Vargas" your comment about "two ways to win" What exactly are you winning?

With the exception of regional and nationals, what is the prize?

[ntx]

@John Brooks Ding. Ding. Ding. You are right SOCIAL events.

[Mateo_Vargas]

@ntx bragging rights, cash, cool trophies or whatever the LOC decides. Time to bring the competition back to waterski competitions.

 

 

[klindy]

I still don't understand what problem we are trying to fix? Are we trying to get more people to Regionals/Nationals? More members in general? Are we trying to find ways to add (reinvigorate) competition at the local level?

 

Or are we trying to encourage participation across the board? Trying to make things like the 'ole days'?

 

Except for some of the more innovative "leagues", handicap tournaments, and series events that have popped up, a class C or local tournament (even class E/L/R) are simply ways to improve the score used to calculate a skiers average on either the World or AWSA ranking list. They are not "competitions" per se but rather a place to ski where a set of rules are followed to post a score.

 

The current system of age groups and ranking list is in fact an ability based system. We just sort by age FIRST then ability (Level 9, level 8, level 7, etc). The way we score slalom or tricks or jump is precisely the same whether we "rank" a group by ability or age. So the actual score isn't going to change. You want ability based scoring just sort the scores differently.

 

OM/OW and MM/MW are ability based divisions which are a combination of groups of ages groups. Saying "Level 8 qualifies for Nationals" is an ability based threshold (adjusted by individual age groups).

 

Nothing in our current system prevents ability based divisions at a local (even class E/L/R) level. You can sort skiers that way now. Nothing in our current system prevents us from putting a new face on the ranking list database to juggle up the skiers into ability based levels. Nothing in our current system prevents a site/club from putting on a handicapped tournament (except it's difficult to get unaltered averages from the ranking list). Nothing prevents setting up a league system where groups or mixed groups of skiers ski against each other over several tournaments to declare a winner or series champion, etc. All of these examples are some form of competition. However, except for the pure slalom score that hits the ranking list, nothing helps advancing to the Regionals or Nationals (maybe they shouldn't). The BOS tournament format is ability based all the way to the top - make it into the top 'half' and you ski head to head for the win. Bottom 'half' still skis but against a handicap.

 

Also, nothing prevents a tournament from including Novice/Grassroots, or using just a boat judge or a 4 pass minimum. You might need to sanction as a Class F (free if also sanctioning as a class C) to do it however. Class F scores DO go on the ranking list up to level 5 assuming they are included in the scorebook AND the skiers are properly flagged as class F. All that can be done today.

 

So why aren't all these things done today? First I believe that the template for a basic class C tournament is simple and well know. Alternative formats are typically home grown and require manual scoring or are some how confusing/more difficult to organize and run. Second, there are still enough skiers that attend the tournaments who are simply looking for a score to boost their ranking average. We've drifted so far away from the competitive nature of a local tournament (C/E/L) that they're just practice with an official now. Spend some effort on creating the templates (scoring ability) and leagues (developed and coming soon). Find a way to grab scores/averages out of the ranking list in such a way that some of the handicap systems can work more efficiently. Refine the NOPS system to better "equate" scores over different age groups/ability levels and events. Encourage 3-event again.

 

Third, I think our published ranking list is the de facto replacement for competition. Climb the list and you can "compete" constantly. Ironically I also think it's effectively killed the competitiveness of the local tournament and I think it significantly hurts participation at the Regionals and Nationals. Why go to the "big" tournaments when you have a pretty good idea where you're going to place anyway, plus or minus. If it wasn't published, perhaps people would show up to actually compete. One idea, just post the top 10 or top 5% scores and log in to see your own score - keep the rest of the list hidden.

 

Fourth, focus on the things that make starting out less intimidating. Legitimize the inner buoys by defining how to score them. Establish rules/standards around how to handle grassroots skier - mulligans, 4 pass minimums, etc. Find ways to include the entire family.

 

A great friend of mine reminded me that some people are passionate about waterskiing with no competitive spirit. It takes both to be a tournament skier. We have no shortage of passionate skiers (even many who are not USAWS members). Passionate skiers want to ski as much as possible regardless of competition and, as said in a previous post, tournaments are an expensive, inefficient way to get those "practice" rounds. Competitive skiers certainly have passion for the sport but the local tournament experience has little to offer to feed that competitive bug.

 

So what change are we really trying to make and, as importantly, how is it measured to know if we're succeeding? If a year today we discussed whether any change is working, how will we know?

[klindy]

@John Brooks I had the fortune of being the chief judge of the Queens Cup this year. What John described is completely accurate. I think to a participant (skier and official) folks really liked it and it was exciting.

[JeffSurdej]

@ToddL here is the survey that went out to members that did not renew in the last 5 years. https://www.surveymonkey.com/results/SM-WYKYMPRJ/

[ToddL]

Good target audience! Thanks, @JeffSurdej

[RazorRoss3]

I think ability level would be an improvement since in all of the tournaments I went to this year I won every single one, I was the only M1 competitor. That is not saying there weren't 36mph skiers putting up scores, they were just either B3 or M2+. I would certainly not mind having some friendly competition across age ranges at a class C just for the fun of it.

 

for anyone referencing collegiate skiing in regards to growth, there are some pieces of collegiate skiing that don't necessarily correlate to AWSA skiing, primarily the boats off the water 4th event participation (drinking to excess with 160 of your closest friends Friday and Saturday night of 3-5 fall and 2-3 spring tournaments) but the social aspect is the key. There are a lot of collegiate skiers who stick with the teams and become reasonably talented novice skiers by accident because they like the social side and happen to ski enough in the process to figure out what they are doing. @JeffSurdej, I have not been able to make it to Alumni regionals events yet but could you speak to how successful those have been with school teams cheering for each other and the reunion of old ski friends? The pics I've seen have put it on my near term list of things I'd like to do.

 

 

My point is that ability divisions might make it more FUN, and that is what will keep people playing.

[ALPJr]

I like ability based - just need to sort out the groupings.

[ntx]

@Mateo Vargas That is really great that you have so many awards.

 

I guess over the years with my kids, they got so many, that after awhile, most of them became meaningless. Some never made it into the house. The important ones did. Regional and National for sure. Local ones not so much. I guess that is the result of a everyone gets a medal society. When the reward is cold hard cash........

[SkiRV]

I'm a long time AWSA member, have skied many different formats and have also skied one INT tournament. Can't really say that any of them felt different. Most tournament don't have enough skiers per division already and all you're doing is competing with yourself and getting a score for the Rankings List. I actually had more interest in attending Reg/Nationals when we had to get 2 EP Ratings and didn't know where you were seeded until you showed up and saw the starting list.

 

In this new era of shorter attention spans and busier schedules is more skiers the objective? If we add more rounds to Reg/Nationals, results should normalize and end up just where I was ranked on the list to begin with.

 

I do agree with @klindy I'm not sure what problem this is trying to solve.

 

 

[unksskis]

I'm liking it the more I think about it, but with some tweaks. The problem it can solve is participation and competition at the local level, and aiming at the roots level. Have local tournaments go ability based; Adult Slalom 36mph, 34mph, Intermediate, Novice, etc. People really attend tournaments for the points towards the ranking system, so these local scores are still getting scores towards your National ranking, which I would expect at least Nationals would remain age division, possibly Regionals.

[disland]

Better figure out how it works for 3 eventers. This seems to be one of the problems that has messed up MM/MW because they never figured out how you can ski slalom MM and age divisions for the others and still compete in overall. I have thought it would be easy, just let folks ski both if your qualified, but no one ever asked me lol

[skispray]

@ntx thanks for the reply. Again, I think you're right in that it's possible that ability based divisions may not help as much as we hope they might. That being said, I think there are a couple points to add in favor of them.

 

First, I don't think INT participation is too relevant here. Thy structured their tournaments about ability based divisions but even if that's better than age based divisions I think INT had too much to overcome. INT was a beginner-friendly tournament but if you cared about your scores being "legit" you needed to go to an AWSA tournament. And for advanced skiers who had been going to AWSA tournaments for years, who cared about regionals and nationals, and wanted quality judging & driving there just wasn't a large enough incentive to move to INT. I never went to an INT tournament because no one I skied with ever went to them. Having two competing tournament organizations isn't really feasible in a sport this small. In this kind of sport only one org will thrive and it'd be hard for a new organization to come in and compete with an incumbent organization.

 

I agree with your other points but those are separate arguments. Why not change those things and change the division structure too? Again, I'm advocating for ability based divisions for all the reasons that @JeffSurdej has mentioned, there is merit to his concerns and I don't see much harm in trying it out.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Than_Bogan]

I feel that a well-thought-out handicapping system (and I'll recommend @MikeT's which is adapted from golf or @Horton's which is basically adapted from @MikeT's) is preferable to arbitrarily binning people based on their ability.

 

A well-designed handicapping system gives anyone who skis well (for themselves) a chance to win. Binning just means that whoever happens to be at the top of their bin wins.

 

Handicapping is already being used to make individual tournaments fun, but I believe it would be oh-so-much-better if it were fully integrated with AWSA.

 

Shouldn't every skier be able to state their handicap value?

 

Shouldn't setting up a handicap tournament be trivial so that everyone can do them? (It is currently rather challenging because the ranking score penalizes for lack of tournaments, which is the exact opposite of what you want to do for handicapping.)

 

Shouldn't skiers demand that every tournament has handicapping and announces the handicapped standings along the way and the handicapped winners at the end?

 

Shouldn't there be a standard team handicapping method to allow clubs to compete against each other? (And there's no reason the teams even have to be the same size to make it work. Amazing math like averaging and/or using the top 3 can be done.)

 

All those leading questions out of the way, I will say I'm strongly opposed to having anything like a Regionals or a Nationals be handicapped, because that can create bizarre incentives to sandbag, and anyhow the point of those events is for the top skiers to compete against each other straight up. (For the same reason I am opposed to MM/MW/OM/OW separated at those events.)

 

It's at the local level where there needs to be some sense of participating in a fun league.

[jwroblew]

I don't get ability based nor does my 13 year old daughter when I asked her about it. So your the best 22 off skier, great. She doesn't go to tournaments to try to be best of the mediocre, she goes to try and be the best that she can be, and looking at the scores of the girls that are better and higher on the ranking list pushes her to try even harder.

 

Why not have handicapped tournaments at the State level, I know Ohio does this and their tournaments seem to have a decent turn out, this seems to make things more interesting and competitive.

 

Is it the ability based brackets that make INT more enjoyable to attend, I would say no? Everyone on shore is cheering for the person on the water. Some of the AWSA tournaments I have been to, people show up, ski and leave, no cheering for anyone else, no support, they get their score and leave. Seems like the social aspect needs to change. Not how we score.

 

There is also a ton of bureaucratic B.S. you have to go through to get involved as a judge, scorer, driver etc in AWSA. INT, if you can count to 6, good, get in the boat and score. I know this might be oversimplified but it seems like we could make it easier for new people to get involved and not feel intimidated about all the B.S. that goes on to having a tournament.

[Than_Bogan]

Oh yeah. @jwroblew reminded me of another reason that handicapping is superior to ability divisions. Everyone is chasing the same thing: A lower handicap value. So you get the best of both worlds: competing against your own past and measuring yourself against the entire field.

[ToddL]

Oh crap... Good point, @disland

 

What do you do for that skier who is in:

Slalom ability division 4 out of 19,

Trick ability division 7 out of 10,

Jump ability division 2 out of 15.

Overall = ???

 

I am just assuming that ability break out divisions will not be the same for all three events...

 

The only other way I can think about it is some form of NOPS-based ability divisions:

NOPS 0-250 group

NOPS 251-500 group

etc.

At least then, it would be possible to have the same number of groups for each event.

 

Still how would you do overall? I guess scores or rankings could be weighted by division in order to calculate an overall score/ranking...

 

[klindy]

@ToddL no one has forgotten about Overall. It's just important to focus on one event first and then see if something similar works for the other two and find a solution for overall.

 

@disland Initially I was opposed to allowing elite division skiers to ski twice but then I realized that the only skiers that would actually ski twice are those who are registered to ski overall. So that significantly reduces the potential number.

 

In our CURRENT system, I agree that the best and simplest solution is to let elite skiers who are also competing in overall to ski twice. I'd add that if you are qualified in an elite division in one event you ski a second time in your age group and your overall score is calculated in the age group. If you are qualified in an elite division in two events you ski an additional time in the elite division in your 'third event' and your overall score is calculated in that elite division.

[Kelvin]

How about recognizing the top 2 or 3 handicap winners at Regionals/Nationals in addition to scratch winners that already get on the podium. Seems like a good way to add some incentive to attend Regionals/Nationals.

[Ralph Lee]

I've competed in one INT and one AWSA tournament. Both times the organizers agreed to start me out in the novice division having no prior competition history, or no one to back up my ability. Day two at the INT tournament I was bumped up to the accurate division, which was really fun!! Round two at AWSA I was put into my correct age bracket and had nobody to ski against, which was extremely boring!! Since then, I've leaned toward ability level divisions. (In theory...)

[RazorRoss3]

I was at one tournament this year that did the run order as never run -XX, I thought that was fun. With the run order at least by ability it was fun to be on the dock with a bunch of skiers, men, women, older, younger, who were all going to ski within a few buoys of each other.

[ForrestGump]

@ToddL Who here thought I'd be one of the ones who that question about why you left waterskiing would be directed to? Level 8, Regular Driver, Regular Scorer, Regular Judge. Driven Big Dogs half way through 41 and pro skiers halfway through 41. I've donated hundreds, maybe thousands of hours to waterskiing. Now nothing. Nada. I let it all go. It's not that road bike racing and BMX racing did anything special to lure me in. It's just that they foster competition between like ability people. So I could go into both as a rookie and not feel like I was beating my head against the wall. Not to mention, it IS competition there. Every single race or every single round I'm giving my all against other people. It might be me against 7 other guys on the BMX gate, or me against 60 other guys in a peloton. But he who's smartest and he who's most prepared or he who's just flat out strongest comes out on top. I still ask the question that's never been answered to me.......... who am I competing against in 99% of waterski tournaments? Answer? No one. If I want to compete against myself I'll go spend a relaxing day on the golf course. Of course, there's now Horton's tournaments, and the California ProAm(which was fun as hell). But other than those and nationals, there's not a competitive tournament I'm capable of entering. At best I'm good for 2@38. So why donate $200 to Big Dog? Waterskiing had me for 10 years. And then it lost me.

 

The shame of it is, I love waterskiing. And I consider a few of you some of my best friends in the world. I've crashed on my road bike and bmx bike. I've shattered my collarbone. I've ruptured my acl. I've torn ligaments in my ankle. I've bruised my kidney. And a lot of other things. All in the last year. And yet I picked myself up, got back on my bikes in order to race another national event. In fact, I'm training for Grand Nationals now with a titanium bar in my shoulder and no ACL in my right knee. Road bike racing and BMX are challenging me to set aside my pride and my pain in order to COMPETE. I challenge USA Waterski to lure me back from USA Cycling and USA BMX. I'm still here. But I'm not waiting forever.

[skispray]

@BoneHead exactly! Look, I skied collegiate several years ago and as far as the skiing goes my best memories are all related to competing against other people of like ability. I have three specific examples that stand out in my mind.

 

In one case, there was one other guy who was pretty much the same level as me in trick - about 1300 points in one pass. There were a lot of people I could beat with a crap run and tons of people that could destroy me blindfolded but having just one guy who I knew would be at every tournament and I could only beat him if I put up a good score, that was awesome. It led to fun trash talk, me taking an interest in his skiing at the tournaments, and was definitely motivation during the week. Our rivalry lasted a year or two and it's my best competition skiing memories.

 

Another memory I have is when I PB'ed in trick at a tournament and placed much better than typical. It wasn't my only tournament trick PB but it's literally the only one I specifically remember because I ended up in like 3rd or 5th place in the tournament and got a medal. I'd usually be like a 10-15th place tricker but not all the top skiers showed up (I think it was a spring tournament) and I skied really well. So I'm not level 8 and compared to everyone across the country it wasn't shit but it was a pretty cool feeling to think that on this day, with all the skiers who went to that tournament, I was one of the top trickers. For people like @Than_Bogan and @jwroblew who think winning a low class ability division wouldn't provide any joy, I hope you take this story to heart. And on the same note, consider a hypothetical scenario where someone started tournament skiing in college, worked their butt off, and by the time they graduate they place top 5 or top 10 in NCWSA division 2 nationals. Do you think that person is going to feel no pride because they were only in D2? Come on!

 

The fact that people like to compete with people of similar ability is the reason so many other sports do it like this. Furthermore, I know a lot of golfers and none of them play in tournaments. Because what's the point? Also, @Than_Bogan this one is for you: the winners of this years nobel prize in economics did work that, when applied to this discussion, would show that ability based divisions are the optimal structure! :-)

 

And one more memory from my college skiing career that was related to ability based competition. The first time I ran 28 off there was another guy on my team who missed it, but they are capable of getting into 38. I don't hold a candle to this guy but because we were competing that weekend, our teammates (and him) compared us and for that tournament I had the better score. Call it lame, but that felt good.

 

Maybe I'm just motivated by competition more than others but those are some of my best skiing memories, even compared to PBs. That's what I think our potential can be, and I hope @JeffSurdej makes it happen.

 

 

[ToddL]

Well said, Shane.

 

Anyone: If there you had a blank slate and no existing rule book or divisions, how would you lure someone like Shane back to water skiing?