Giving away E's like party favors

[Asibov Sobelo]

This tournament strikes me as a bit odd and not quite right:
http://askfred.net/Results/results.p...ament_id=15713
Am I wrong? This tournament held 4 mixed E & under events in the span of 3 hours resulting in 3 fencers earning their E2011. BTW, all fencers in the tournamnet were local and from one of two clubs.

[Nick]

I agree that tournament looks off, saber is dumb.

[Purple Fencer]

And all 4 rounds had a lot of the same competitors.

I've never seen a sanctioned tournament where the SAME event is held multiple times on the same day. Separate mixed and womens yes....but repeating the same thing 4 times???

[Peach]

And all 4 rounds had a lot of the same competitors.

I've never seen a sanctioned tournament where the SAME event is held multiple times on the same day. Separate mixed and womens yes....but repeating the same thing 4 times???

I just noticed what division it's in.....seems fishy.

Can someone from NJ explain?

Poughkeepsie is in NJ?

[Purple Fencer]

Poughkeepsie is in NJ?

Sorry....misread it...just got up....never mind...carry one....

[cattos]

Absolutely unsanctioned. At 2PM, Connor Rounds earned his E, and then competed as an E at 2:45.

Massoudi earned his E at 2:45, then competed as an E at 4:15.

A fencer may not use a rating that is not reflected by the USFA listing. However, in this case, no event made it higher than an E1 ... probably by design to avoid any real problems.

[Beloit Fencer of Old]

I bet the results of the 3:30 competition pis5ed a few people off.

[shlepzig]

The tournament structure clearly favors getting a few fencers their E Ratings, but it's all on the up and up. Is this some sinister plot to overwhelm the fencing world with a batch of E rated fencers? Or just an opportunity to give people a good bit of fencing and award appropriate ratings for each tournament fenced. If these tournaments were Peter Gustafsons theoretical "198 Fencing Monkeys" the two tournaments with 12 entrants would have been split into 2 individual E1 tournaments.

All in all in the four different tournaments, 12 different fencers competed: 7 Competed in all four, 2 competed in three, and 3 fencers compted in 2 tournaments. Looking at the two schools, Phoenix and CDFS, (according to Google Maps) the CDFS fencers traveled nearly two hours to the site.

Each tournament followed regualtion format, pools then DEs. and were completed in short order. If those tournaments were fenced on different days, the ratings awarded would be no different. I wouldn't characterize the circumstance as giving ratings away like candy, any more than any other E and Under tournament.

[hello?]

The tournament structure clearly favors getting a few fencers their E Ratings, but it's all on the up and up. Is this some sinister plot to overwhelm the fencing world with a batch of E rated fencers? Or just an opportunity to give people a good bit of fencing and award appropriate ratings for each tournament fenced. If these tournaments were Peter Gustafsons theoretical "198 Fencing Monkeys" the two tournaments with 12 entrants would have been split into 2 individual E1 tournaments.

All in all in the four different tournaments, 12 different fencers competed: 7 Competed in all four, 2 competed in three, and 3 fencers compted in 2 tournaments. Looking at the two schools, Phoenix and CDFS, (according to Google Maps) the CDFS fencers traveled nearly two hours to the site.

Each tournament followed regualtion format, pools then DEs. and were completed in short order. If those tournaments were fenced on different days, the ratings awarded would be no different. I wouldn't characterize the circumstance as giving ratings away like candy, any more than any other E and Under tournament.

Basically twelve fencers competed against each other and three E's were awarded instead of one. I don't know if there is a rule against it (as you say, if the same fencers happened to compete against each other on two different tournaments, held on separate days, nobody would raise an eyebrow), but I have a feeling that, now that this happened, a rule will be passed against it.

Was this different "tournaments" or a different tournament "format"? (i.e. the same tournament, but run in four different stages...like the Canadian-whatever, that runs pools several times.) To be honest, it looks more like the latter, in which case only one E should be awarded.

Yes, who cares about a bunch of new E's? But, if this is "sanctioned," what stops people from doing the same thing with events that award As? (Sure, they'd take longer but, so what?)

[fdad]

Absolutely unsanctioned. At 2PM, Connor Rounds earned his E, and then competed as an E at 2:45.

Massoudi earned his E at 2:45, then competed as an E at 4:15.

A fencer may not use a rating that is not reflected by the USFA listing. However, in this case, no event made it higher than an E1 ... probably by design to avoid any real problems.

Fred updates ratings automatically based on previous results. Hopefully, someday Peet can get USFA to feed ratings into FRED and people can stop self asserting and he can stop deriving them.

[shlepzig]

Basically twelve fencers competed against each other and three E's were awarded instead of one. I don't know if there is a rule against it (as you say, if the same fencers happened to compete against each other on two different tournaments, held on separate days, nobody would raise an eyebrow), but I have a feeling that, now that this happened, a rule will be passed against it.

Was this different "tournaments" or a different tournament "format"? (i.e. the same tournament, but run in four different stages...like the Canadian-whatever, that runs pools several times.) To be honest, it looks more like the latter, in which case only one E should be awarded.

Yes, who cares about a bunch of new E's? But, if this is "sanctioned," what stops people from doing the same thing with events that award As? (Sure, they'd take longer but, so what?)

Not likely, how is this materially different than holding multiple tournaments the same day in multiple weapons, or age groups (like any NAC, ROC, SYC or RYC) tournament. Youth tournmaments often have the same competitors spanning two age groups in the same weapon on the same day. NJ used to hold Div II and Div III qualifiers in the same weapon as seperate tournaments on the same day in which most of the Div III competitors were on both lists.

If I competed in a full tournament in which I earned a rating I would expect to be awarded that rating. If I competed in 3 tournaments on the same day, and I earned a rating one of those tournaments, I would expect to be awarded the rating as such. I don't see the classification of the tournament or the level of ratings awarded being relevant to whether ratings should be awarded or not.

If the tournament organizers have the wearwithall to manage multiple tournaments in the same day, kudos to them. I don't see that it makes a whole lot of difference if the tournaments are of the same type. Unlike Peter Gustafsons theoretical "198 Fencing Monkeys" these are real fencers actually competing to place in a tournament. Whether it is an A or a E awarded the fencers should get the ratings that were earned.

[mrbiggs]

I recall a thread about a tournament where the organizers broke some large number (sixtyish) of U's into several 15-person U tournaments back when those would have each been D1s, and ran them separately. IIRC the USFA wound up not giving the ratings due to the format.

This is different, as each tournament was announced ahead of time and run seperately--it IS four legitimate tournaments. However it's possible that the one-time entry fee and the obvious goal of the tournament will be sufficient for the USFA to invalidate it. The use of ratings earned an hour before certainly won't help them, but may not harm them either. Before internet ratings it was not uncommon for fencers to use ratings that hadn't been updated if they had good evidence that they had earned them.


Here's the thread: splitting events to get more ratings? I linked to the last page where it was announced that the tournament's ratings were not, in fact, given out. However there are several similar tournaments mentioned in the thread that seemed to have either gone by unnoticed or were deemed valid.

[cattos]

The USFA Athlete Handbook, chapter 2, distinctly defines the process of making ratings official and the need for such policy is to reasonably ensure a tournament provides a level paying field as well as minimize mistakes that could strip a fencer of a new rating.

Case in point ... two seasons ago, a young man earned his first E in an unrated event of about 20 competitors. Unfortunately, there was an underage fencer in the mix that went unnoticed due to his height and build. Long story short ... one of the losers reported this presumably honest oversight to the USFA and the event was anulled. Should it have been anulled ... I don't think so. Did the USFA flex its muscle? Absolutely.

The unknown in this Phoenix tournament is the true intent of the organizer. If the sole purpose is to award E ratings, why throw E/Under events which could easily become D1 events given the turn-out? Only 15 entries, four of which are Es, are needed.

While I agree this particular tournament just barely falls into the "up and up" category, I look down on the ethics of organizers. I have often thrown an unrated event followed by a d/under, but have never ... NEVER ... allowed the winner of the unrated event to compete as an E in the next. Integrity of the tournament aside, it only takes one sore loser to screw things up for everyone.

[Asibov Sobelo]

Well then I guess someone could hold a fencing camp where at the end of each day, they hold an A1 and an E1 event, right? That could be a popular camp!

[PeterGustafsson]

Hi!

If the tournament organizers have the wearwithall to manage multiple tournaments in the same day, kudos to them. I don't see that it makes a whole lot of difference if the tournaments are of the same type. Unlike Peter Gustafsons theoretical "198 Fencing Monkeys" these are real fencers actually competing to place in a tournament. Whether it is an A or a E awarded the fencers should get the ratings that were earned.

Er, wrong.

In the scenario that I described in the 2 first posts of that thread, I clearly described that actual fencing competitions would take place. The scenario was hypothetical, but it called for real fencing.

Well then I guess someone could hold a fencing camp where at the end of each day, they hold an A1 and an E1 event, right? That could be a popular camp!

Read the previous thread. To generate an A from nearly 200 U´s will take up to 200 competitions, depending on how the cookies crumble.


Have a nice time!

Peter Gustafsson

[tchwojko]

Thus proving that an E is worth about one piece of candy. Maybe a butterscotch.

[migopod]

Thus proving that an E is worth about one piece of candy. Maybe a butterscotch.

Or perhaps a Tic-Tac.

[D'Art]

So what's a flaming bagel worth?

[migopod]

So what's a flaming bagel worth?

If past is prologue, a black card.

[D'Art]

If past is prologue, a black card.

So flamagels aren't reserved for people with certain ratings?