Mike, I am simply talking about appearance, and how it is interpreted by your fellow competitors. When you come out for an official flight, the first thing you do before starting the motor, is signal the judges. So your claim, that you did not realize the Daily boy was judging in Junior/Senior until later in the contest is difficult for me to believe. Its odd, that you waited until after the contest was over, to discuss a protest with the ED.
The very experienced Judge you are referring to, did the exact same thing my father (another very experienced judge) did. They opted not to judge the finals, so they could watch us fly. Her husband was in the finals that year. Now, as far as Joe Jr. Judging his brother in the contest, especially in Junior, I understand and agree that he shouldn't have been. It was a call made by the head judge, and went unnoticed by Mark and I. Had you made us aware before, or after the first round (before scores were posted) I would have happily removed him from the judging pool. Keep in mind, I was also flying in the top 5 at the same time, so my focus was elsewhere. Let's be clear though, this is not the first time this has happened. In 2010 steve Moon judged his brother in top 5, and nobody made a big stink about it. It wouldn't have been my choice, but that is what the computer program recommended, and it was followed.
As for how judges are distributed, during qualifying specifically. We try to put new judges with veteran judges, and we usually have more than one conflict with judges being related to pilots. We do our best to address this, but with many things happening at once, it is easy to overlook something. If you have an issue with something, its best to speak up early, not after the contest.
What this really comes down to, is something that you have yet to address to my knowledge. The presentation of a plane for appearance judging, then flying a different one in competition. This is a huge infraction and didnt go unnoticed. Some people wanted your son DQed from competition, however, Mark and I couldn't bring ourselves to punish a child for the actions of his father. We removed the appearance points, and moved on. This simple action is why so many people at the Nats seem to watch your every move. You failure (to my knowledge) to address this issue, is the reason for your grief this year. I have nothing personally against you, and certainly nothing against your son's. They are fine young men. My only intention is to add some perspective to this situation. The US Nationals is just that, a major competition, and known around the world as one of the best. The reason people spend thousands of dollars and countless hours preparing for this event, is because they expect it to be run professionally, and fairly. Yes it is a hobby, but people dedicate a lot of time and money to this event, and some take it very seriously.
Derek
OK Derek, I understand better now where some of this comes from.
Addressing your points in the same order:
- I did not start the motor or signal the judges; it was Luca flying and not me. I was standing on the downwind side in bright orange shirt as an intersection marker. But even if I got close enough to the judges to see their faces, I would not have recognized most of them. Most everyone wears sunglasses, and even without those I didn't know most of the judges at the NATS. Remember, that was our first NATS experience.
- On the judge selection. I understand that computer program makes judge selection recommendation. But I'm sure the code is not sophisticated enough to understand things like conflict of interest. We're talking spreadsheet macro, not IBM Watson. When I'm being asked to judge at local contests, the first thing I do is recuse myself from judging events that my kids fly in. This often puts a bind on some contest organizers, since local manpower is hard to come by, but I think avoiding apparent conflict of interest tramples administrative difficulties. And since the NATS has such high profile and visibility, I would think this factor would be given very high consideration -if, as you state, this competition is taken very seriously. It is both on the judges themselves to declare a conflict of interest, and on contest administrators not to allow it to happen.
- OK, finally: "The presentation of a plane for appearance judging, then flying a different one in competition." A newb mistake, let me explain. If someone sat down and wrote a "Rookie's guide to the US Control Line NATS", it would have clearly stated that Juniors don't need to go through the Qualifying rounds on Wed and Thursday to make it to the Jr Finals (why are they called Finals if there is no qualifying required?!). The Guide also would also have spelled out that Appearance Judging actually takes place TWICE during the NATS: on Monday afternoon for Open/Advanced, and on either Friday PM or Saturday AM for the Juniors. [Alas, no one took the time to write such guide. What better use of a keyboard than questioning someone's character and turning a premiere event into a Jerry Springer Show!] And since everyone only talks about the Monday appearance judging (Building 180, the whole ritual with the Concours award ceremony, etc), my assumption then was that this appearance score went towards the Jr Finals, and so that's the plane I told Luca to bring, and since Advanced doesn't have a BOM rule, we could fly whatever we want, right? Wrong, but I didn't know that at the time. No one explained anything or asked any questions, even though they clearly saw new faces at the event. So when you finally approached me and told me about the removal of appearance points, I understood the mistake and didn't argue at all. To think that I concocted an evil scheme with appearance points to... wait, what, boost my kid from the 24th ranking in Qualifying to the 21st?!! (where he actually ended up in 2019)... is ridiculous. When we come to compete, we compete to win.
- General thoughts. I don't know whether people realize how much the ambiguity of the skill class system and the effectively un-enforceable BOM rule (however well intentioned those are) confuse the already subjective, difficult to navigate event. A complete newcomer to the US stunt (not many these days... I wonder why) is bound to make the same mistakes as we did, and perhaps more. And then get chewed out for it, on a public forum nonetheless, based on anonymous complaints.
So I don't want to read anymore of those waxing-nostalgic posts about how this hobby is shrinking and dying, no more young blood, only so many years left before the event is not flown anymore, etc. etc. The stunt community has done it unto itself. It seems to serve those that were already in the room when the doors closed.
Topic: 2020 CLPA Nationals Coverage...... (Read 9886 times)