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#1
August 31st 04, 06:56 PM
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#2
September 1st 04, 02:47 AM
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#3
September 1st 04, 03:03 PM
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#4
September 2nd 04, 09:29 AM
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Jonathan Gere wrote:
It did not count for a finish, because you didn't announce it on the radio. If you did call a finish, you are done after one lap and can't go on later. I'm not speaking of what WinScore will say, only of what the rules require. No, this is what the rules requi 11.2.2.4.4 If all claimed turnpoints are valid, and the pilot obtained a scored start time, a finish time prior to finish closing and landed at the contest site, then the pilot has completed the task. Please notice that this rule does NOT contain the phrase "and announced his start and finish on the radio". It is unambiguous that S's and F's "shall" be announced on the radio. No, it is unambiguous that start *times* shall be reported within 15 minutes of a start, and it does not have to be on the radio (see rule 10.8.8.3). Finishes are announced by the pilot only when a finish cylinder is used. With a finish line, the pilot only announces his approach: "(Contest ID) four miles". Maybe it can be a finish, but you take a penalty for not announcing. Now you are getting closer. It *is* a valid finish, and *maybe* you will get a penalty for not announcing it on the radio. If a pilot repeatedly refused to follow the radio procedures defined in the rules, the Contest Director could make a good case for awarding a penalty for unsafe flying or unsportsmanlike conduct. But I would have a low opinion of any CD that handed out such a penalty automatically on first offense without considering the circumstances. On day 7 of the 2002 USA 15m Nats at Tonopah, Bill Bartell experienced a double battery failure while on task: his primary battery became unplugged, and his backup battery had a low charge. He turned off his radio, his only vario, and his flight computer, saving his few remaining electrons for the flight recorder. Bill finished and landed silently, winning the day and moving into first place overall. Would you have given him distance points only, or a penalty for not calling "four miles"? One day at the 2001 USA 15m Nats at Uvalde, the finish was so crowded that the radio was squealing constantly from multiple pilots stepping on each other trying to call "four miles", and Charlie Lite trying to acknowledge each call. During the less than 2 minutes it took me to fly at redline from "four miles out" to the finish line, there was not one moment of clear frequency in which to announce my approach, and I chose not to step on some other pilot's announcement. Would you have given me a penalty? Suppose S(tart)=F(inish)=TP C. No designated turn MAT. You fly S-A-B-(FSC)-A-B-(FSC)-A-B-(FSC)-A-B-F (i.e. 11 TPs - 4 times around a triangle) then after landing claim the best scoring of any one of 10 combinations of consecutive laps: 1,1+2,1+2+3,1+2+3+4,2,2+3,2+3+4,3,3+4,or 4. Will this work? Can you openly announce all 4 S's and all 4 F's on the radio to avoid the penalties for not doing so, and choose which to discard by leaving them off your landing card? There is nothing in the rules to prevent this scheme, but practical considerations make it a useless strategy. Firstly, any of the lap combinations that took significantly less than the minimum task time would likely score very low. And since maximum start altitude and minimum finish altitude are never the same, in order to make an efficient finish and an efficient start between each lap, you would have to finish at minimum finish altitude and immediately pull up into a good thermal, climbing to maximum start altitude before exiting the start cylinder, all without wasting time searching for lift. It is therefore unlikely that any combination of laps other than 1+2+3+4 would have both an efficient start and an efficient finish. And if any number of laps less than four is sufficient to use up the minimum task time, you will be beaten by the pilot who did a better job of "bracketing" the day by not flying as far as your four laps. If so, why do so many pilots go undertime on no turn MAT's, when they could easily bank insurance laps during the start gate roulette? Perhaps those pilots are not as adept as you are at mis-interpreting the rules or devising poor racing strategies. Gary Ittner P7 "Have glider, will race"
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#5
September 3rd 04, 01:02 PM
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Gary Ittner wrote in message ...
Jonathan Gere wrote: Please notice that this rule does NOT contain the phrase "and announced his start and finish on the radio". Is this a good argument?. I would guess there are quite a few important rules that affect getting a speed score which are NOT referenced in 11.2.2.4.4 or the narrow hierarchy of rules defining the terms 11.2.2.4.4 references. If not, and 11.2.2.4.4 is the all important master root of all rules that count, congratulations, but why is it buried 5 levels deep in section 11? I am not in favor of radio procedure penalties or radio procedure violations invalidating "normal" starts or finishes. I am only clutching at straws to see how the rules might prohibit pre-pending or appending TPs between multiple provisional starts and finishes. I find the ability to be on multiple provisional starts / finishes / tasks simultaneously an absurd consequence of the rules. It is little comfort to me to have your assurance that it is strategically useless. On day 7 of the 2002 USA 15m Nats at Tonopah, Bill Bartell experienced a double battery failure while on task: his primary battery became unplugged, and his backup battery had a low charge. He turned off his radio, his only vario, and his flight computer, saving his few remaining electrons for the flight recorder. Bill finished and landed silently, winning the day and moving into first place overall. Would you have given him distance points only, or a penalty for not calling "four miles"? One day at the 2001 USA 15m Nats at Uvalde, the finish was so crowded that the radio was squealing constantly from multiple pilots stepping on each other trying to call "four miles", and Charlie Lite trying to acknowledge each call. During the less than 2 minutes it took me to fly at redline from "four miles out" to the finish line, there was not one moment of clear frequency in which to announce my approach, and I chose not to step on some other pilot's announcement. Would you have given me a penalty? Good arguments for CD discretion. Suppose S(tart)=F(inish)=TP C. No designated turn MAT. You fly S-A-B-(FSC)-A-B-(FSC)-A-B-(FSC)-A-B-F (i.e. 11 TPs - 4 times around a triangle) then after landing claim the best scoring of any one of 10 combinations of consecutive laps: 1,1+2,1+2+3,1+2+3+4,2,2+3,2+3+4,3,3+4,or 4. Will this work? Can you openly announce all 4 S's and all 4 F's on the radio to avoid the penalties for not doing so, and choose which to discard by leaving them off your landing card? There is nothing in the rules to prevent this scheme, but practical considerations make it a useless strategy. Firstly, any of the lap combinations that took significantly less than the minimum task time would likely score very low. I'm shocked. This is weird. I don't believe that all variations of this loophole are strategically useless. The 4 times around example is just a good example of the absurdity of the loophole. Operational exploitations can be much more profitable. And since maximum start altitude and minimum finish altitude are never the same, in order to make an efficient finish and an efficient start between each lap, you would have to finish at minimum finish altitude and immediately pull up into a good thermal, climbing to maximum start altitude before exiting the start cylinder, all without wasting time searching for lift. It is therefore unlikely that any combination of laps other than 1+2+3+4 would have both an efficient start and an efficient finish. In practice, one could just prepend optionally claimable S-one or more TPs- Home TP-S combinations without going low to finish. Cheap insurance against gross or possibly even minor undertime. And if any number of laps less than four is sufficient to use up the minimum task time, you will be beaten by the pilot who did a better job of "bracketing" the day by not flying as far as your four laps. The insurance excursions would occur before the final start intended to bracket the *expected* day. The insurance excursions would absorb any inefficiency in getting ready for the "perfect" optimized start. If not claimed, the excursions imperfect efficiency wouldn't matter. On the other hand, 1hr at even 80% efficiency is a lot better than nothing, when everyone else finished an hour undertime due to an *unexpected* thunderstorm. 30 minutes at 90% efficiency might be worth claiming to avoid a routine 5-10 minute undertime (at 0% efficiency). If so, why do so many pilots go undertime on no turn MAT's, when they could easily bank insurance laps during the start gate roulette? Perhaps those pilots are not as adept as you are at mis-interpreting the rules or devising poor racing strategies. Thanks. You admit the loophole. I leave it to better pilots to work out the operationally sound strategies. Gary Ittner P7 "Have glider, will race"
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#6
September 4th 04, 01:25 AM
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Jonathan Gere wrote:
Please notice that this rule does NOT contain the phrase "and announced his start and finish on the radio". Is this a good argument?. It is difficult to prove a negative, isn't it? Perhaps I should not have attempted to make things easier for you and instead simply said, "There is no rule that invalidates a start or a finish due to lack of a radio call", and put the burden of proof on you to support your opposing statement. I would guess there are quite a few important rules that affect getting a speed score which are NOT referenced in 11.2.2.4.4 or the narrow hierarchy of rules defining the terms 11.2.2.4.4 references. If not, and 11.2.2.4.4 is the all important master root of all rules that count, congratulations, but why is it buried 5 levels deep in section 11? All the rules count, but they cannot all be front and center in paragraph one. And while some rules may be more important than others for running a safe and fair contest, the importance of a rule is not intended to be proportional to its subparagraph level in the rule book. I am not in favor of radio procedure penalties or radio procedure violations invalidating "normal" starts or finishes. I am only clutching at straws to see how the rules might prohibit pre-pending or appending TPs between multiple provisional starts and finishes. So, did you deliberately prevaricate when you stated that, according to the rules, a start or finish is invalidated by the lack of a radio announcement? I find the ability to be on multiple provisional starts / finishes / tasks simultaneously an absurd consequence of the rules. And I do not. It is little comfort to me to have your assurance that it is strategically useless. It is of great comfort to me. I believe there may an infinite number of useless strategies for flying any of the tasks. One of the main purposes of the rules is to ensure fair competition, but I see no benefit in making our rulebook infinitely longer by specifically prohibiting every strategy in which a pilot cannot gain an unfair advantage, or indeed any advantage at all. I'm shocked. This is weird. I don't believe that all variations of this loophole are strategically useless. The 4 times around example is just a good example of the absurdity of the loophole. Operational exploitations can be much more profitable. In practice, one could just prepend optionally claimable S-one or more TPs- Home TP-S combinations without going low to finish. Cheap insurance against gross or possibly even minor undertime. The insurance excursions would occur before the final start intended to bracket the *expected* day. The insurance excursions would absorb any inefficiency in getting ready for the "perfect" optimized start. If not claimed, the excursions imperfect efficiency wouldn't matter. On the other hand, 1hr at even 80% efficiency is a lot better than nothing, when everyone else finished an hour undertime due to an *unexpected* thunderstorm. 30 minutes at 90% efficiency might be worth claiming to avoid a routine 5-10 minute undertime (at 0% efficiency). I will admit that it is not entirely impossible that you could gain by this strategy, but the phrase "extremely unlikely" does not seem powerful enough to describe it. To recap, your insurance lap would only be useful with a no turn MAT (rare nowadays), called on a day with no expected weather problems (when other, less flexible tasks are *far* more likely to be called; no turn MATs are usually called specifically because there are expected weather problems), all of your competitors start (what turns out to be) too late, and along comes a weather problem too severe for the flexibility of the MAT to deal with. I'd call it a one in a million chance. And I don't agree that this insurance is cheap; you simply haven't calculated the cost. You might have to try this insurance lap trick many times before the proper conditions arise to make it useful, and: 1. You might land out while your competitors are safely back near the contest site playing start gate roulette. Believe me, I know what it feels like to land out before one's expected start. 2. The conditions could change while you are on your insurance lap, causing everyone else to start en masse before you get back for your expected start. Even on a no turn MAT, there is often only one obvious direction to go. Your competitors will have thermal markers, and you will have none. 3. Even when the proper combination of conditions comes along, you cannot be sure all of your competitors will start late. If one starts early, he will have the advantage over you of being able to place a higher proportion of his flight in the area of best lift. Your insurance lap will necessarily be close to home, and, in my experience, that is rarely where the best soaring conditions are located. The premium you pay for your insurance lap is much higher than the potential claim payout. Thanks. You admit the loophole. I leave it to better pilots to work out the operationally sound strategies. And if there are no operationally sound strategies, is it still a loophole? Gary Ittner P7 "Have glider, will race"
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#7
September 6th 04, 01:42 AM
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Gary Ittner wrote in message ...
So, did you deliberately prevaricate when you stated that, according to the rules, a start or finish is invalidated by the lack of a radio announcement? No, I sincerely misunderstood how the rules committee intends the rules to be read. There is an outline level heading for each type of start and finish. In the same hierarchical position for each type are a paragraph *requiring* certain communications and a paragraph *requiring* certain flight paths. It is natural to me to assume they are both essential parts of the procedure to get a start or finish. Especially, if the consequence of assuming the opposite is a goofy loophole, blocked only by a top pilot's assurance that it is unprofitable! If I understand the rules of construction correctly, based on your clarifications, not making required communications is against the rules, but has no bearing on being scored for speed points, and only might/may be penalized at CD discretion. Apologies to anyone I ignorantly misled into following the rules unnecessarily. I think all this falls into the category of an "oral tradition" rather than a "tight" racing rule. Leaving out the deliberate prevarication you suspect of me, see that eager racer 711 quite misunderstands the rules as you see them regarding my useless loophole. Luckily, not understanding (or reading) the rules is traditional in soaring. My impression is that to arrive at the "accepted" interpretation of our rules requires in turn both mind boggling chains of logic and literal reading in some places and the ignoring of loopholes and literal contradictions in other places in favor of common sense. I cited some examples in earlier posts. And no I don't think I could write them better, if you are tempted to reply with the standard "why don't you volunteer to write the rules if you think they aren't perfect". When the rules introduced this multi-task in progress possibility, it would have been nice had it been noticed, and the theoretical possibility discussed, along with how useless the best pilots find it. But it seems to me that it was overlooked. I think that if you rule writing, contest winning experts had considered and ruled out this stuff as harmless in advance, such a seemingly important, but inconsequential, major change would have been explicitly covered in the explanatory material. I find the ability to be on multiple provisional starts / finishes / tasks simultaneously an absurd consequence of the rules. And I do not. It is little comfort to me to have your assurance that it is strategically useless. It is of great comfort to me. I believe there may an infinite number of useless strategies for flying any of the tasks. One of the main purposes of the rules is to ensure fair competition, but I see no benefit in making our rulebook infinitely longer by specifically prohibiting every strategy in which a pilot cannot gain an unfair advantage, or indeed any advantage at all. I'm shocked. This is weird. I don't believe that all variations of this loophole are strategically useless. The 4 times around example is just a good example of the absurdity of the loophole. Operational exploitations can be much more profitable. In practice, one could just prepend optionally claimable S-one or more TPs- Home TP-S combinations without going low to finish. Cheap insurance against gross or possibly even minor undertime. The insurance excursions would occur before the final start intended to bracket the *expected* day. The insurance excursions would absorb any inefficiency in getting ready for the "perfect" optimized start. If not claimed, the excursions imperfect efficiency wouldn't matter. On the other hand, 1hr at even 80% efficiency is a lot better than nothing, when everyone else finished an hour undertime due to an *unexpected* thunderstorm. 30 minutes at 90% efficiency might be worth claiming to avoid a routine 5-10 minute undertime (at 0% efficiency). I will admit that it is not entirely impossible that you could gain by this strategy, but the phrase "extremely unlikely" does not seem powerful enough to describe it. To recap, your insurance lap would only be useful with a no turn MAT (rare nowadays), called on a day with no expected weather problems (when other, less flexible tasks are *far* more likely to be called; no turn MATs are usually called specifically because there are expected weather problems), all of your competitors start (what turns out to be) too late, and along comes a weather problem too severe for the flexibility of the MAT to deal with. I'd call it a one in a million chance. And I don't agree that this insurance is cheap; you simply haven't calculated the cost. You might have to try this insurance lap trick many times before the proper conditions arise to make it useful, and: 1. You might land out while your competitors are safely back near the contest site playing start gate roulette. Believe me, I know what it feels like to land out before one's expected start. 2. The conditions could change while you are on your insurance lap, causing everyone else to start en masse before you get back for your expected start. Even on a no turn MAT, there is often only one obvious direction to go. Your competitors will have thermal markers, and you will have none. 3. Even when the proper combination of conditions comes along, you cannot be sure all of your competitors will start late. If one starts early, he will have the advantage over you of being able to place a higher proportion of his flight in the area of best lift. Your insurance lap will necessarily be close to home, and, in my experience, that is rarely where the best soaring conditions are located. The premium you pay for your insurance lap is much higher than the potential claim payout. Thanks. You admit the loophole. I leave it to better pilots to work out the operationally sound strategies. And if there are no operationally sound strategies, is it still a loophole? Gary Ittner P7 "Have glider, will race" Yes. Because the long shot pilot whose "policy" pays off does not have to have good long term prospects to screw up a day's scoring (his outstanding performance effectively further devaluing the day by reducing the point spread between the contending, undertime top dogs following good strategy.) Yes. Because pilots should understand what the rules permit and either come to their own conclusions about what to do, or just sensibly accept the experts' advice on the subject. Thanks for sharing your keen racing strategizing, and for responding to the issues I raised. I feel that many racers would not be as comfortable as you are with this "non-loophole" (if they knew it existed). Like JJ they might think anyone that did it was cheating. Me to! But I also believe that like the illusion of the witch and the beautiful woman, log files show both the "cheating" and the normal racing re-starts, and the two are not always objectively distinquishable. Jonathan Gere 34
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