Re: Roller Coaster B
Posted: June 6th, 2019, 8:06 pm
As a competitor which has competed in this event throughout the year, I just have some suggestions. Hopefully some others agree, but I'm sure some others may not disagree as well:
Next time when roller comes around, time should be weighted a lot more heavily. Something like a 3:5 or 1:2 ratio for gap:time seems pretty good, because in this national tournament's case, the top 6 were easily ranked by just their gap. In addition - the penalty for the time going longer than the target time should be just a tiny bit more severe; in my case, I generally aim "over" on my first run, then go right for the target on the 2nd. If going over was weighted more heavily, it would allow those which adjustable timers to be ranked more easily over those with one, long nonadjustable 60 second timer.
I also suggest clarifying the rules about leveling the device a fair bit more. In general, depending on the competition, the device was measured during impound, before the 8 mins, or right before each run. Personally, I prefer right before each run - this allows the competitor to readjust and relevel the roller coaster between runs. However, at nats, they allowed us to level at impound, but not at competition - this was run quite nicely, and I loved the non-rushed feel of my last div B event I would compete in. Moreover, not allowing competitors to run the ball at impound was a fantastic idea - it allowed those which practiced with their device to have an advantage to those which didn't know their device as well.
Start Line/Finish Line: At Garnet Valley, I still maintain that I was unfairly tiered for my "unclear" start line. In any build event, or rather any event whatsoever, no more than 1/2, or even 1/3 of the teams competing should be tiered, penalized, or disqualified. Teams placing 1st-9th were placed under tier 1, the rest, placements 10th-33rd, were given either tier 3 or tier 4. Obviously, many tiers like this indicate one of few things: 1) The test or prompt was too difficult for competitors (this mainly applies to mystery). 2) The lead supervisor was too strict. Garnet was by far one of my worst experiences with any build event - 2nd to only mystery architecture, 2019 regionals. (Just want to note, "Officials are encouraged to apply the least restrictive penalty for rules infractions - see examples in the Scoring Guidelines. Event supervisors must provide prompt notification of any penalty, disqualification or tier ranking." When 2/3 of all teams which participated were placed under a non-tier one tier, this simply shows the amount of unfair strictness placed under these events. So I'll repeat - If a building event like this were to have an abnormal amount of tiers, simply trial the event. Not trialing an event simply skews the results - and at Garnet, roller represented a full 1/6 of my team score.
In addition: competitors should know if they got tiered RIGHT AFTER EACH RUN. Since there are two runs, competitors should be able to know, then be given a fair chance to solve the problem or issue with the device before the 2nd run. At garnet, the supervisor simply told me and my partner - "So, good news or bad news", after the 2nd run - not allowing us to alter or fix the issue at all. (Thinking back on it, it was kind of cruel - seriously, who turns a fun science competition into a bad news good news thing?)
"Funnel" rule: Since the 2018 season, the funnel rule was removed - it them became Rule 3.c: "The ball/sphere must be visible at all times." This change was by far, in my opinion, one of the best changes between the 2018 and 2019 season for roller coaster. Contrary to some teams thoughts, having tubes for jumps are not useful - they're inconsistent, and are simply not the optimal option for most parts of the device.
Finally, I still to this point do not understand rule 3.j: The beginning and the end of each Gap must be at least 0.5 cm above the next surface(s) below them. How would that be an issue, and why would that be an issue?
Next time when roller comes around, time should be weighted a lot more heavily. Something like a 3:5 or 1:2 ratio for gap:time seems pretty good, because in this national tournament's case, the top 6 were easily ranked by just their gap. In addition - the penalty for the time going longer than the target time should be just a tiny bit more severe; in my case, I generally aim "over" on my first run, then go right for the target on the 2nd. If going over was weighted more heavily, it would allow those which adjustable timers to be ranked more easily over those with one, long nonadjustable 60 second timer.
I also suggest clarifying the rules about leveling the device a fair bit more. In general, depending on the competition, the device was measured during impound, before the 8 mins, or right before each run. Personally, I prefer right before each run - this allows the competitor to readjust and relevel the roller coaster between runs. However, at nats, they allowed us to level at impound, but not at competition - this was run quite nicely, and I loved the non-rushed feel of my last div B event I would compete in. Moreover, not allowing competitors to run the ball at impound was a fantastic idea - it allowed those which practiced with their device to have an advantage to those which didn't know their device as well.
Start Line/Finish Line: At Garnet Valley, I still maintain that I was unfairly tiered for my "unclear" start line. In any build event, or rather any event whatsoever, no more than 1/2, or even 1/3 of the teams competing should be tiered, penalized, or disqualified. Teams placing 1st-9th were placed under tier 1, the rest, placements 10th-33rd, were given either tier 3 or tier 4. Obviously, many tiers like this indicate one of few things: 1) The test or prompt was too difficult for competitors (this mainly applies to mystery). 2) The lead supervisor was too strict. Garnet was by far one of my worst experiences with any build event - 2nd to only mystery architecture, 2019 regionals. (Just want to note, "Officials are encouraged to apply the least restrictive penalty for rules infractions - see examples in the Scoring Guidelines. Event supervisors must provide prompt notification of any penalty, disqualification or tier ranking." When 2/3 of all teams which participated were placed under a non-tier one tier, this simply shows the amount of unfair strictness placed under these events. So I'll repeat - If a building event like this were to have an abnormal amount of tiers, simply trial the event. Not trialing an event simply skews the results - and at Garnet, roller represented a full 1/6 of my team score.
In addition: competitors should know if they got tiered RIGHT AFTER EACH RUN. Since there are two runs, competitors should be able to know, then be given a fair chance to solve the problem or issue with the device before the 2nd run. At garnet, the supervisor simply told me and my partner - "So, good news or bad news", after the 2nd run - not allowing us to alter or fix the issue at all. (Thinking back on it, it was kind of cruel - seriously, who turns a fun science competition into a bad news good news thing?)
"Funnel" rule: Since the 2018 season, the funnel rule was removed - it them became Rule 3.c: "The ball/sphere must be visible at all times." This change was by far, in my opinion, one of the best changes between the 2018 and 2019 season for roller coaster. Contrary to some teams thoughts, having tubes for jumps are not useful - they're inconsistent, and are simply not the optimal option for most parts of the device.
Finally, I still to this point do not understand rule 3.j: The beginning and the end of each Gap must be at least 0.5 cm above the next surface(s) below them. How would that be an issue, and why would that be an issue?