On Jan 23, 6:15*am, John Sinclair wrote:
I just re-scored my last 2 regionals with "drop a day" rules and I moved
from 2nd to 1st at Minden and from 4th to 1st at Air Sailing. Wow, I like
this rule, but to be honest would we be acknowledging the best
performance? The last day at Minden we flew in a 30 knot wind and I was
afraid to get on the rocks with the conditions I was experiencing, so I
came in slow in a close race and dropped to second place. Didn't the
winner show superior skill or balls by accurately assessing the conditions
and doing what it took to win? At Air Sailing I failed to go deep enough
into the Serrias and therefore didn't contact the lift feeding a ragged
line of Q's, ended up landing out on a 1000 point day. Didn't the guy
that correctly read the lift, deserve to win the contest?
JJ

The interesting thing for me is how much the final standings are
locked in by the morning of the final day. This is because on the last
day you can only catch up on another pilot by the largest number of
points they were out of first on any prior day less the number of
points you are out of first on the last day. If you beat them by more
than this they will simply drop the last day by rule.

I re-scored R9 2007 and 2008 for 15-meter. In 2008 there were only two
pilots in the running to catch up with Gary Ittner going into the last
day and the second of these would have had to beat Gary by 158 points
AND score within 21 points of the winner on the final day to do it. In
2007 there were three pilots in the running to challenge next-to-last
day leader John Seaborn and one would have had to score at least 979
points on a 1000 point day to do it. You can imagine a circumstance
where the leader would have the option not to fly on the last day - or
simply have to follow a single pilot around on the final day.

As a practical matter it's not all that different from today - it just
takes circumstances from a strong probability to a mathematical
certainty.

9B