Discussion: U.S. 2016 WOC Team Trials Scoring List

The Scoring List for the 2016 Team Trials is available here (PDF download).

U.S. Team members selected automatically by virtue of their placings in the Team Trials races June 3-5 are:

Women

Samantha Saeger (NEOC / OK Linne)
Alex Jospe (CSU)

Men

Eric Bone (COC)
Ross Smith (CSU / OK Linne)

The US Team Executive Steering Committee Team Trials Review Panel will announce the full U.S. team no later than Sunday, June 12.

I don't follow the US runners very closely, but at least on the women's side that looked like a no-brainer, right?

I.e. with or without those trials races you'd still pick Samantha first and then Alex?

Poor old Kseniya had two good runs but a DQ probably didn't help her chances!

Will looks like he might take a spot in that team too.

Wait, why am I commenting on the US selection process?

That's the thing, all threads eventually lead to the US selection process

And all threads eventually have Aussie "input." :-)

All I see are chickens.

were they rubber chickens???

Ahh, I guess I offended someone a little too much a while back.

You will always be chicken-free to me, tRicky

tRicky, I just like chicken.

DQ in urban sprint (which is very loosely related to orienteering) should only count for sprint, IMO, maybe possibly for relay, but definitely not for middle/long.

Well, DQ in the urban sprint counted as DQ in the sprint only, you are correct :)
The issue is the suddent death scenario that removing the 4th yearly ranking score introduced.

The good thing for Kseniya (considered bad if you are Eddie or Randy) is that the Review Panel can actually use their judgement to try and field the strongest team, given the strengths of the athletes and the number of starts in each event available to the US team ...

"The Review Panel will fill in all available starts, preferentially from those who have already been selected automatically. If needed, the Review Panel will select additional runners in order to fill all available starts using the results of the scoring list and taking into consideration race schedule and athlete strengths, versatility, and personal priorities."

They might (or might not) decide that Kseniya deserves selection based on her being the 3rd best forest orienteer (Middle + Long) at the trials. It's likely to be complicated though, based on what Samantha, Alex, Hillary want to run, whether their are strong petitioners in the mix, etc.

+1 bmay

Yes, the women's selection will be interesting with Kseniya's DQ and the razor thin difference between 5th and 6th.

Don't forget Hannah's injury. She is very much in the mix as well.

@bmay, yep, this year's situation with Kseniya and Hannah is exactly why it's nice to have a Review Panel -- not just for the athletes directly affected but for the strength of the team as a whole.

Oh, I didn't know about Hannah.

I'm glad I'm not one of the selectors

I don't want to be at the review panels place. One argument about the objective selection process is that subjectivity and review panel decisions usually decide the last couple positions which are really no going to give us medals US recognition or fame one way or another.
Subjective selection no matter how fair and optimized and considerate will not satisfy all. This will be happening every single year. For what? Whether tis person or that person will be 78 in the middle final?
My argument for selecting those last couple positions is social.
This is family sport and more or less sport for life.We have to live with each other here in US and see each other at 'Aey meeits' year round. Can we just be friends!
From that point of view choosing the objective path makes lots of sence.

I see the bickering in Bulgarian orienteering between some orienteering club's members going for years because of a single incident about an injustice for something or other in the past.

Selection committees are fine - but I'd argue we are making their job much harder but having removed the 4th-score.

Having the backup-score (your normalized ranking) removes the sudden-death aspect on the scoring list, letting transparent, well known numbers do the selection, instead of a committee.

And then you can still have a committee, to change things, if they feel the numbers haven't done someone justice - but the 4th score reduces the rate at which they'd need to jump in - reducing the number of times they risk frustrating someone...

There have been times on the Men's list that things have been a few seconds apart (Boris & Syd, Wyatt & Clem) - and at least with numbers, your frustration is quantifiable w.r.t. exactly how much faster you should've run, and perhaps with the choice of math - and not at a person.

Fortunately this year, things don't seem (to my eye) to be that close, at least w.r.t. the top 5 men/women on the list (though I have no information about possible non-attending petitioners, and/or likely declines, and/or non-5 team sizes, or anything else that might make this harder....) - (and even with that clarity - to my eye - that's my eye... add in the 4th score, and it's easier for all to see...)

So with the US runners, does each runner get picked based on results of all disciplines? Just trying to get an understanding because in Aus they tend to specialise, e.g. one of our JWOC runners qualified for both the sprint individual and sprint relay at WOC based on his sprint results whereas others are going for middle and/or long. This is mainly due to the number of slots available (we only have one middle and long spot for the men) so if you're just trying out for the middle or long, in my view your sprint result at the trials wouldn't matter.

Mind you we must also have some kind of petition process because our middle/long runner doesn't even compete in Aus against the other aspiring WOC runners.

@tRikcy - we don't have many slots either (men 1/1 too), but we still mostly follow an old tradition of ~5+ person teams - in part because most of us (a few women excepted) aren't going to place that high at WOC yet - so we'd rather give several people some WOC-level experience, in hopes that'll inspire setting their training bar a little higher.

"...so we'd rather give several people some WOC-level experience, in hopes that'll inspire setting their training bar a little higher."

So how's that working out? What does the evidence suggest?

FYI, Wyatt isn't currently on the ESC and isn't speaking for the ESC here.

@tRicky - I don't think anyone is Aus is arguing over who our best male orienteer currently is. I'm sure Blair could fill in the details of the selection process.

No I'm not arguing, just saying in all the time he's been competing for us, I don't think I've ever met the guy!

I reckon in future Henry might also become one of these European based athletes if he continues to improve as he's been doing in the last few years and practically living over there anyway.

Wooo Fenry!

I remember when I could beat him... (Not since he turned 16)

I believe you took a one second win over him in a sprint champs event only a few years ago! Surely he was 17 then ;-)

Cristina, are you speaking for the ESC? Is LKohn?

I suppose ESC is an alias of the the infamous shadowy group that is controlling orienteering in America, named so by analogy with ESC button, which eliminates team candidates: press it-- and one is gone.

Nope, not speaking for the ESC, just for me. I don't see any reason for the ESC to get involved in a casual discussion on AP.

Indeed I escaped the ESC several years ago, after several years of service. I've consulted since then on and off. But certainly, the opinions and views I'm expressing in this thread are my own, not endorsed by anyone else or any organization that I know of.

While I don't always agree with every decision these days, I'm fine with the decisions that get made - as at least they are getting made! It's hard work being on the ESC & Selection Committee - organizing events, and scoring, and balancing transparency and quantitative results to create the best team you can, with enough of a sense of fairness to keep the competitors, fans, volunteers & other contributors happy. Thank you!

On a related (official vs. unofficial) note, I do see this thread being place where I first saw the official announcement of the scores, and the announcement that "The US Team Executive Steering Committee will announce the full U.S. team no later than Sunday, June 12." (Thanks for targeting a specific date!) Is it in this thread, or elsewhere that we might see that announcment?

I really want to cheer people on, but I'm not quite... sure... who... yet... ;)

Selections have been sent to the non-Team ESC members. Linda should be posting it all by tomorrow.

The Scoring List was "officially" posted on the OUSA web page and then a link to that information posted (in this very thread) on Attackpoint. Likely that is how the Team Announcement will be done. (Actually the link posted earlier was just to the Scoring List pdf.)

The link to the Announcement should be:
http://www.orienteeringusa.org/news/2016/us-teams/...
(Glen's link got truncated somehow.)