2014 SSA/US Tasking Analysis

Sean, I am a old competition pilot that was raised on assigned tasks, often quite long, and often called hours before the soaring for the day was evaluated by advisors. Charlie Spratt introduced the concept of calling tasks in the air based on feedback from sniffers or already airborne competitors.. That was a significant improvment. Then came POST ( pilot option speed tasks) , then AAT's and MAT's. I have been a competition director or pilot numerous times in all of those formats. At one time the competition directors guide to the rules acutally recommended strliving for 20% land outs. The old way was not better for most pilots and definitely not better for organizers and competition directors. The MAT can do anything that an AT can do but better. The CD just needs to choose enough turnpoints so that the better pilots will run out of time before they run out of turnpoints and you effectively have a AAT while allowing slower or less experienced pilots to come home after any turnpoint and still get speed points.
The best strategy for a CD now, is to Task multi turn MAT's on consistant soaring days, AAT's on strong days with storms in the forecast and one turn MAT's for days when soaring is marginal and a task is needed for a complete contest.
Dale Bush DLB

Intentionally trying to produce landouts was a poor way of stating the objective. I think the real objective was to ensure that the top 50% of competitors were thoroughly tested. Back then (I believe) the gliders were of vastly different performance with no handicaps (correct me if I am wrong here). That is very different from todays pure classes (15, 18, Open, Std, 20m 2 place even Club and 13.5m). On the other hand, the SSA is now trying to absolutely prevent all land outs, even at our National Championships! This is resulting in WAY to many boring, short, luck influenced, OLC like , 0 or 1 turn MAT, wide turn area TAT, non-racing tasks. It is also resulting in, I believe, our best US pilots struggling at the World Championships. I believe that they are not getting enough challenging competition practice (in addition to being less experienced with FAI rules).

The deflating reality (see data) is that most US MATs (2014) have much more in common with OLC than assigned tasks. 50% of all MATs are HATs. That is one or ZERO turn MATS. If you look at all 2014 US MATs, you see that the overall percentage of assigned turnpoints to "unassigned" or "free" turnpoints, is roughly 30% assigned to 70% unassigned. So our modified ASSIGNED TASKS are, in reality, 70% OLC!

The only possible salvation is OUTLAWING short MATs. I agree with you that long MATs (enough turn points to ensure nobody hits all of them) allows assigned "like" tasks varying skill levels and even wide handicap range. When you have had enough you can just head home! I can live with that if assigned tasks were also called 10-20% of the total tasks. The problem is that very few long MATs are being called in the US (2014). Call me selfish, but I am not 100% worried about beginners. Im worried about enjoying competition with the experienced racers and improving as a glider pilot.

I have seen CD's and task advisors do a good job of estimating speed and "wrapping in" the later turnpoints (of a long MAT) closer and closer to the airfield to minimize the chance of landouts. I am fine with this. But again, long MAT's are actually extremely rare in the US. Only 21 of 63 MATS in 2014 had 5 or greater turnpoints! Again, in contrast, 31 of 63 (50%) 2014 MATS had one or zero turnpoints!!! So, 50% OLC MATS, 33% moderate or long MAT's! Sad.

This is damning evidence. Frankly, it is fairly embarrassing. No other country on earth (that I understand) does MAT's. Let alone 50% ZERO or ONE turn (aka OLC, HAT) MATS.

One turn or zero turn MATS should be (out of respect for our country) renamed OLC free turn point tasks. They have about as much to do with assigned tasks as an aerobatics competition. They should only be allowed in regionals. They should be "OUTLAWED" in Nationals just as the AST has been "OUTLAWED" by the RC in Sports class.

I have never heard of POST. Interesting. Thanks for bringing it up and I appreciate your comments. I still very much want 10-20% Pure Assigned Tasking in 2015 US Contests.

On Sunday, January 25, 2015 at 10:57:05 PM UTC-5, wrote:
Sean, I am a old competition pilot that was raised on assigned tasks, often quite long, and often called hours before the soaring for the day was evaluated by advisors. Charlie Spratt introduced the concept of calling tasks in the air based on feedback from sniffers or already airborne competitors. That was a significant improvment. Then came POST ( pilot option speed tasks) , then AAT's and MAT's. I have been a competition director or pilot numerous times in all of those formats. At one time the competition directors guide to the rules acutally recommended strliving for 20% land outs. The old way was not better for most pilots and definitely not better for organizers and competition directors. The MAT can do anything that an AT can do but better. The CD just needs to choose enough turnpoints so that the better pilots will run out of time before they run out of turnpoints and you effectively have a AAT while allowing slower or less experienced pilots to come home after any turnpoint and still get speed points.
The best strategy for a CD now, is to Task multi turn MAT's on consistant soaring days, AAT's on strong days with storms in the forecast and one turn MAT's for days when soaring is marginal and a task is needed for a complete contest.
Dale Bush DLB

On Sunday, January 25, 2015 at 9:41:34 PM UTC-8, Sean Fidler wrote:
Back then (I believe) the gliders were of vastly different performance with no handicaps (correct me if I am wrong here). That is very different from todays pure classes (15, 18, Open, Std, 20m 2 place even Club and 13.5m)..

Way back before 15M you had Std Cirrus, Libelle, LS-1, then you had ASW-19, LS-4, Discus (a bit later) and LS-3, ASW-20, Ventus (over a window of time). Take a look at the current handicaps for these ships and I believe you'll find a pretty tight handicap range. Yes you had the occasional Austria or Ka-6 or HP-14 turning up but generally with fewer generations of (particularly glass) in existence the spacing of performance felt reasonably tight.


The only possible salvation is OUTLAWING short MATs.

Be careful what you wish for - one potential outcome is more cancelled contest days or VERY short ATs or AATs with more devaluation. With uncertain weather you have to think about what CDs and advisors are going to do if you tie their hands that way. It seems unlikely that they will be able to wish their way to better weather so they will deal with it potentially with more conservative calls. One potential outcome given today's crewless environment is that calling more ATs will translate into fewer on-course hours per contest as CD's compensate for the AT's lack of pilot flexibility with more grid squatting waiting for conditions to improve and shorter tasks - especially should AT's be mandated in some way.

You might be well advised to reach out to CD's and/or advisors for a sample of contests where lots of TATs or no-turn MATs were called. I'm thinking it might be rather difficult to recreate the richness of information that was available to those calling tasks at the time and even spending several hours per contest day reviewing whatever data was available prior to launch (not after) might yield an incomplete or distorted version of the information that was used to make the task call. I didn't fall into either category (CD or advisor) last year but I'd be happy to review what actually happened each day at Montague and Nephi last year. There was a fair amount of weather uncertainty in both cases and at least for Montague an explicit goal of calling 1/3 AT's if the weather cooperated. It didn't cooperate except on a couple of days, including the last where we had an exquisitely called (drum roll) Long MAT.

Could more AT's be called - sure. I'm reasonably sure that pushing it hard will result in shorter races on average. That may be okay as a break from the longer days and will also have more leeching and tight finishes/speeds/scores. In the end, the contests will likely be decided on the days when pilot have to judge the weather too and the points spreads are greater. The AT days will be the days where excellent tactics can pick up a few points but mostly they will be days to play it safe and not stray away from the pack.

Also keep in mind that pushing the landout dimension too hard as part of implementing more ATs may result in more pilots elect to go to the OLC events like Nephi and Ionia are doing in 2015.

9B

On Sunday, January 25, 2015 at 11:50:03 PM UTC-8, Andy Blackburn wrote:
On Sunday, January 25, 2015 at 9:41:34 PM UTC-8, Sean Fidler wrote:
Back then (I believe) the gliders were of vastly different performance with no handicaps (correct me if I am wrong here). That is very different from todays pure classes (15, 18, Open, Std, 20m 2 place even Club and 13.5m).

Way back before 15M you had Std Cirrus, Libelle, LS-1, then you had ASW-19, LS-4, Discus (a bit later) and LS-3, ASW-20, Ventus (over a window of time). Take a look at the current handicaps for these ships and I believe you'll find a pretty tight handicap range. Yes you had the occasional Austria or Ka-6 or HP-14 turning up but generally with fewer generations of (particularly glass) in existence the spacing of performance felt reasonably tight..


The only possible salvation is OUTLAWING short MATs.

Be careful what you wish for - one potential outcome is more cancelled contest days or VERY short ATs or AATs with more devaluation. With uncertain weather you have to think about what CDs and advisors are going to do if you tie their hands that way. It seems unlikely that they will be able to wish their way to better weather so they will deal with it potentially with more conservative calls. One potential outcome given today's crewless environment is that calling more ATs will translate into fewer on-course hours per contest as CD's compensate for the AT's lack of pilot flexibility with more grid squatting waiting for conditions to improve and shorter tasks - especially should AT's be mandated in some way.

You might be well advised to reach out to CD's and/or advisors for a sample of contests where lots of TATs or no-turn MATs were called. I'm thinking it might be rather difficult to recreate the richness of information that was available to those calling tasks at the time and even spending several hours per contest day reviewing whatever data was available prior to launch (not after) might yield an incomplete or distorted version of the information that was used to make the task call. I didn't fall into either category (CD or advisor) last year but I'd be happy to review what actually happened each day at Montague and Nephi last year. There was a fair amount of weather uncertainty in both cases and at least for Montague an explicit goal of calling 1/3 AT's if the weather cooperated. It didn't cooperate except on a couple of days, including the last where we had an exquisitely called (drum roll) Long MAT.

Could more AT's be called - sure. I'm reasonably sure that pushing it hard will result in shorter races on average. That may be okay as a break from the longer days and will also have more leeching and tight finishes/speeds/scores. In the end, the contests will likely be decided on the days when pilot have to judge the weather too and the points spreads are greater. The AT days will be the days where excellent tactics can pick up a few points but mostly they will be days to play it safe and not stray away from the pack.

Also keep in mind that pushing the landout dimension too hard as part of implementing more ATs may result in more pilots elect to go to the OLC events like Nephi and Ionia are doing in 2015.

9B

More pilots are all ready electing to go to OLC events.

Richard

More pilots are all ready electing to go to OLC events.

Richard

Location, Location, Location... (Sorry, not intended to hijack this thread)
Utah is an incredible place to fly AND vacation. It has consistently had huge success in drawing pilots from around the country over the past 10 years.. The OLC format allows a broader range of pilot skills and interests than a pure contest, ala Sports Class Nationals. Hence, large turnouts. I am very curious how the Ionia and Moriarty events will turn out.

On Monday, January 26, 2015 at 8:04:46 AM UTC-8, Craig Reinholt wrote:
More pilots are all ready electing to go to OLC events.

Richard

Location, Location, Location... (Sorry, not intended to hijack this thread)
Utah is an incredible place to fly AND vacation. It has consistently had huge success in drawing pilots from around the country over the past 10 years. The OLC format allows a broader range of pilot skills and interests than a pure contest, ala Sports Class Nationals. Hence, large turnouts. I am very curious how the Ionia and Moriarty events will turn out.

Format Format Format

Richard

Craig,

You did not Hijack the threads. I think OLC has something in common with AST tasks. Here is my logic...

I am all for OLC gatherings, events, vacations (whatever we call them). I am the one hosting the Ionia OLC event. Obviously, I fully support OLC events.

We had fairly poor turnout for our Ionia sanctioned contests (3) although 2 of the 3 had over 30 pilots (excellent turnout). Actually, I think one had 40. Anyway... Weather was uncharacteristically poor for those events unfortunately (as it was for many east coast contests those years). I think the main attraction to trying OLC is that it is "not a contest." It is a soaring vacation and you can basically do whatever you want. You don't have to wait for the CD to tell you whether or not you are going to fly on a given day, etc. You can stay home a day or two (something many did anyway at the contests...work, etc). Another benefit is that beginners are free to learn in OLC vacations. The OLC environment (I imagine) actually encourages teaching and learning (for more than contests do). Pilots can freely talk on the radio and latch on to (leech) experienced pilots (who will help pull them along), etc. I think an OLC event is absolutely the right thing for Ionia to try as we have few serious contest pilots and a large amount of beginners. It is going to be great fun and I hope it is well attended. I am guessing 20. That is about the same that we had (on average) for the recent contests.

In my view, OLC is not a truly meaningful form of soaring competition. It is way to unstructured. One can simply grid first every day and move halfway up the scores on that alone! It is a soaring VACATION or potentially a naturally occurring "soaring school." Anyone who thinks these OLC events are soaring competitions is kidding themselves! We are calling the Ionia event the "midwest OLC championships." (www.r6n.org) For anyone who doesn't get it, that is completely tongue and cheek. Sure, we are going to have prizes and reward the longest flights, etc. But we all know it is not an objective test like a contest task. Maybe it will evolve into something bigger than this, but I doubt it. Real contest results will always be the prized goal of the best soaring pilots.

I think one problem we had in the USA is that the only option to fly "events" was SSA sanctioned contests. In most sports 80-90% of the activity is coaching, training and learning. Only 10-20% is actual competition. In soaring (US, can't speak for Europe) 100% of the events (until recently) was SSA sanctioned competition (rules, structure, etc). I can understand (and lived it) how difficult that could be for some. Now with OLC vacations (events) we have another option. I think this is why it is so popular. Kudos to the originator of the OLC event idea!!!

Again, I believe that OLC events make great sense. One benefit of OLC events is that they should take the pressure off the real contest CD's having to run so many watered down OLC tasks. One can hope! That is to say that the number of zero and one turn MATs (and wide turn area TATs) run in real contests should be much less as the OLC soaring vacation events grow. This is great! Contests should be for the serious, intermediate or advanced pilot. OLC is for the soaring vacationer or beginner. Contest pilots can (and will) certainly choose to unwind and attend an OLC vacation event. But most OLC pilots (mostly) are likely not ready for real contests. Now they have somewhere to fly and "event" without complaining about the tasks being too hard. They can accept that real tasks are run in contests and can choose to prepare for those in OLC events before attending the real contest. The competitive OLC pilots will eventually want to test themselves at real contests. This is much better scenario then contests having to accommodate the wishes of everyone including the soaring vacationers with their tasking....

I miss long distance tasks, of course, since I don't fly anymore, I miss any kind of task.

It seems to me every winter we get a whole rush of adrenaline: yeah, we gotta go fly them long assigned takss with lots of landouts, and so what if the first turn is in a storm!

Then, every spring, as the armchair gives way to the cockpit and the question becomes, yeah, but do you really want to fly that hard assigned task today, in the iffy weather we have today, with the pilots and gliders and muddy fields we have today, at this contest, all that enthusiasm evaporates.

Again and again and again. This is not a rules question. The assigned task is a legitimate task. If there is any strong demand by pilots to fly assigned tasks, just tell the CD, don't rant about it on RAS.

I can't wait for spring.

John Cochrane

John,

ASTs are not (IMO) necessarily "synonymous" with landouts. That is not the goal of the task. That said, ASTs equal landouts is the narrative that is being pushed in the U.S. leadership. This narrative is working well. It has almost succeeded. We are down to only 4 (and a brand new rule US rule "OUTLAWING" ASTs in Sports class).

ASTs (IMO) should be called on all good to great weather forecast days. No task can guarantee no landouts and we should not be trying to absolutely prevent all landouts.

If your narrative that "ASTs equal landouts" is accurate, shouldn't we also stop calling long MATs? Is that what you would like to see? Last I checked, US pilots are still strongly incentivized by US MAT rules to try and get to all of the assigned MAT turnpoint. Even if a weather issue is present.

Is this element of the (long) MAT causing too many landouts as well (just like ASTs)?

I think those are very fair questions.

;-)