Refereeing at NAC D Denver

[Joe biebel]

I was really impressed with the refereeing at the NAC in Denver. I only fenced in the Veteran Men's foil, but immediately noticed something extraordinary. They were enforcing the rules! Even directors that I had previously had "run-ins" with for "swallowing their whistle" when an infraction occured, made full use of their cards. Being on the small end of the spectrum size-wise and playing fairly clean myself, I loved it. I did receive several cards myself and they were probably deserved. I really think this is long overdue and my thanks and appreciation to Gerri Baumgart (FOC person in charge for the tournament) for making this happen.

I think the old "see no evil" culture that our referees have had is bad on so many levels. Bad for the competetitors, and certainly bad for any referee with the intention of refereeing internationally. Our referees need to be very vigilant about rules infractions. I felt there were a number of errors on rules infractions at this competition, but I believe that is due in some small measure, to not enforcing them on a regular basis. In any case, the refereeing I witnessed was "across the board" strict and even-handed. Well done all.

I would love to hear other opinions.

Joe Biebel

[DJ Apostrophe]

Joe,

I wasn't in Denver, so I can't say for myself. But I'm curious... what kinds of cards did you see being thrown often? Covering, Bend, etc?

-w

[edew]

Well, I stepped off the side of the strip once and Atilio Tass didn't see it, Heik then hit me square on the chest when I thought the bout should have stopped. At least Tass didn't put me back one meter after I got back on the on guard line.

[achilleus]

Originally Posted by Joe biebel

I think the old "see no evil" culture that our referees have had is bad on so many levels. Bad for the competetitors, and certainly bad for any referee with the intention of refereeing internationally. Our referees need to be very vigilant about rules infractions. I felt there were a number of errors on rules infractions at this competition, but I believe that is due in some small measure, to not enforcing them on a regular basis. In any case, the refereeing I witnessed was "across the board" strict and even-handed. Well done all.

I would love to hear other opinions.

The common argument, and yours seems similar although maybe not the same, is the age old complaint of 'That's how it's called in Europe!'

Refs not penalizing certain infractions, giving a wide lattitude on the attack (during the mid 90's), etc... George K. wrote this article in American Fencing about how refs should not follow this practice, and how it's bad for US fencers.

The next issue was a rebuttal from Buckie Leach. It made an impression on me, and it made sense. The point was that Europe is where the majority of the top fencers are. The FIE operates and runs the big events, and the US being so far from the center of the fencing world is out of touch.

To compete at the highest levels, we need to train, practice, and compete according to the same interpretation of the rules. Which means, we are putting our fencers at a disadvantage by enforcing the rules to the letter as opposed to how it's commonly done. A great analogy that I see in my everyday life is playing pick up games of basketball, the guys are always arguing calls, and one of the lines I always hear is, 'It got called that way at last night's Bulls game!' In other words, that's how the top guys call it, so we here on the playground should do the same...

Currently (from everything I've heard), the FIE refs are enforcing certain rules more strictly. For example, covering target is going to get called a lot more with these new times.

Either way, I just hope that our officials are applying the rules in a way that follows the current interpretations.

[Joe biebel]

Originally Posted by DJ Apostrophe

Joe,

I wasn't in Denver, so I can't say for myself. But I'm curious... what kinds of cards did you see being thrown often? Covering, Bend, etc?

-w

Certainly corps-a-corps was called, but I also saw cards for covering target with arm and mask as well. The bend rule, or as I like to call it "the when I'm good and ready and rested rule" I did not see come into play. I don't think it was ignored, I just think people took care of it at the appropriate time. I also used the phrase "even handed" in my original post because I saw (in one of my bouts) an injustice having to do with the clock rectified as well. It would have been a rather unfair result to see a clock malfunction change the outcome of a bout and the referee realized the error and allowed an estimated time to be used.

[Ferrethater]

I thought the directing was very good at the Denver NAC. I put calls into 3 categories:

A. I know exactly why the call was made and I agree with it totally. (Usually when I get the point ( ) )

B. I disagree with the call but I at least understand why the director made the call.

C. Calls that I disagree with and have no clue as to why the director called it they way that they did. IMO - the director has missed the action or is misinterpreting the rules.

In Denver, almost all of the calls were A's with a few B's mixed in. I don't remember any C calls so I was pretty happy.

[annacattiva]

I ran into some referee behavior which I was very unhappy with- multiple and confusing calls I disagreed with compounded by the feeling, created by the referee, that the ref was friends with my opponent. Is there any official channel for complaining about seeming violations of the Ethics Code?

[Peach]

I had some C calls in my last bout, though I have heard it was a reasonably good referee. I hate being confused. I've looked at the video, but unfortunately the angle isn't good for figuring out what I was doing so I could tell what the referee was calling.

[Schiavona]

Originally Posted by annacattiva

I ran into some referee behavior which I was very unhappy with- multiple and confusing calls I disagreed with compounded by the feeling, created by the referee, that the ref was friends with my opponent. Is there any official channel for complaining about seeming violations of the Ethics Code?

Achilleus should be happy to hear this-American refs acting like Europeans!

[achilleus]

Originally Posted by Schiavona

Achilleus should be happy to hear this-American refs acting like Europeans!

Only if they were paid off, or showing bias to certain countries...

[Damon Scaggs]

Joe, I think you are absolutely correct. There has been a greater emphasis placed on certain penalties this season. I know you and I have discussed some of these in the past and you'll be happy to hear I am carding more people for these infractions.

Most of this is due to the changed timing of the boxes and the legalization of reversal of the shoulders. What happened in the past was that if a person charged in or ducked the head down they were usually just hit on the back. As a result there wasn't as much emphasis on the corp-a-corp to avoid the reposte type of penalty and the covering target with the mask. Both of those situations have a much greater impact on the ability of the defender to get the touch and referees are adjusting to watch for them more. I know I pay much closer attention to it and carded it a number of times this last weekend at NCAAs.

Many fencers are now reversing the shoulders to in-fight, but haven't quite gotten the hang of keeping the unarmed hand away from the body, thus resulting in quite a few covering target calls.



annacativa, your best route is to talk to the FOC rep at the competition if you feel a referee is being inappropriate. The biggest problem is that most of the referees and the fencers we see regularly at national competitions know each other and it might appear that we are friends. In many ways, fencing it really a pretty closely knit community. I'm not saying it's an impossible thing, but I find referees in the US to be a pretty honest group of people.

[Mr Epee]

Originally Posted by achilleus

Only if they were paid off, or showing bias to certain countries...

Or firing up a cig while in the middle of directing...

[annacattiva]

Yeah- would have talked to the FOC rep except that I wound up having to make a rather hasty and unforeseen exit from the venue.

I totally understand the problems involved in knowing the entire fencing community; I've been around for a while, know quite a few refs, many many fencers. My complaint is less that they know each other and more that it's totally unprofessional (and possibly an Ethics Code violation) for a referee to just sit there chatting with one of the fencers before the DE bout starts. Whether future disagreements about calls are valid or not, it makes the referee look bad, and opens them up to complaints about bias.

[Inquartata]

I found the sabre refereeing quite good overall. Christine Griffith and John Fuhro were particulary good IMO, both for my bouts and those I watched them direct.

There was one ref whose calls left more than one fencer perplexed. And I did see some infractions overlooked ( more than one crossover was missed, for instance, in bouts I watched ). But in general it was indeed of pleasantly high quality and consistency.

Attilio Tass seems to have claimed one rule for his own. He was tireless in wandering around shooing everyone who wasn't fencing out of the enclosures, including other fencers in the table. No one else ever seems to bother with this.

I was astonished to have one ref actually check blades to ensure that they bore the S2000 stamp. Kudos to him...

[Peach]

Christie and John are coming along quite nicely. I had John for some of my bouts, and he was clear and correct, plus he managed the strip well, with courtesy and firmness.

Brad, as usual, was excellent, but he can't ref my bouts any more since he joined my club.

Who were the referees for the final rounds in the Vet MS?

[oso97]

Originally Posted by Inquartata

Attilio Tass seems to have claimed one rule for his own. He was tireless in wandering around shooing everyone who wasn't fencing out of the enclosures, including other fencers in the table. No one else ever seems to bother with this.

The reason that Attilio has to go around doing that is that certain high level coach's simply won't listen to anyone of a high enough stature with respect to this rule. So it takes an FOC member to shoo them out until they start realizing this rule is going to be applied, and the FOC will back up any ref who applies the rule.

[Inquartata]

Originally Posted by Peach

Who were the referees for the final rounds in the Vet MS?

I only recall that I had Fuhro for my swan song.

And yes, I managed to forget Brad somehow. Though I don't think I had him for any of my bouts.

[Mauler]

After a long hiatus from fencing and refereeing, when I returned in the recent years I was very surprised and pleased to find the current state of referee development in the United States. It was quite evident that a great deal of effort has been made by the FOC to promote continuous re-education and re-evaluation of the working referees.

I was pleased to discover that once a strong potential candidate is identified from a pool of apprentice referees, an amazing amount of peer-support is made available to him/her as well as a well-focused education by the senior referees and FOC's on duty. A great care is put into providing an environment that is challenging enough to motivate growth and at the same time forgiving enough to control attrition.

Not only is it a policy to hire less experienced referees at national events (for economic reasons as well), but it's also done in practice by the FOC assigneurs. And they take a full advantage of this by making sure those referees are given the best chance to grow as soon as possible. Current body of FOC takes this process very seriously and they do it very well.

This is a huge leap compared to what it was like, say, 10 or 20 years ago. It was by no accident that there was a lot of headbutting and clashing of opinions by directors, and lot of "personality" being added into their performance over time. Inconsitencies not only between various "regular" directors, but also by the same individual director (even the really good ones) because they were forced into a working condition where they really had no back ups even when they knew they weren't in a shape to perform at their normal level. Many of them were forced to develop a defensive mechanism as a trade which not only irritated the fencers and coaches so much, but in fact severely hindered the growth of American fencing and refereeing. All the while the FOC's were forced to cope with neverending and unfair challenge of having to "manage with what they have," knowing all too well that they were working with a pool of directors with an extremely high attrition. And those who remained had an agenda/opinions of their own, and reputation to protect.

In contrast, the current relationship between FOC's and referees are analogous to that of a coach and a fencer who are genuinely honest about the performance. This attitude, I'm glad to have observed, starts from the very beginning of referee development these days. Good performance is encouraged as a habit, rather than something you display when you're up for evaluation.

Definitely an improvement from past decades.

[Mr Epee]

Originally Posted by Mauler

In contrast, the current relationship between FOC's and referees are analogous to that of a coach and a fencer who are genuinely honest about the performance. This attitude, I'm glad to have observed, starts from the very beginning of referee development these days. Good performance is encouraged as a habit, rather than something you display when you're up for evaluation.

Definitely an improvement from past decades.

Good points made by Mauler!

Congrats to the FOC and their vision (small pun intended)

Honestly, if I were pressed into 4 days of directing Div 2/3, I would start looking around for a boatfull of Greeks with flaming pokers to gouge out my eye.

For those who don't know, after several days of directing, your eyes are pulled to the center of your head, where they come together to form one single eye. This is well documented.

[DJ Apostrophe]

The best part about Fuhro's refereeing is watching the faces he makes while watching actions... I find them quite amusing.

-w