Discussion: Once again, new rules for 2007 World Cup

So here is the latest version.

Maximum 8, minimum 3, extras for the first 15 nations based on WRE points of their top 10 runners.

This is much more reasonable. Though it seems to me that if they want lots of good runners, they should ditch the whole country allocation thing and say, "everyone gets 3, and anyone ranked over xxx gets to come, too", since that's essentially what they're trying to do.

Is that 3 male and 3 female or just a total of 3? The press release doesn't make that clear.

The World Cup qualification rules and the World Champs middle-distance micro-O episode illustrate inadequacies in the way the IOF functions.

In both cases, small groups of representatives have made decisions that appear to have been out of touch with the wishes of many (most?) people affected by those decisions. Two approaches to dealing with this issue are (i) pay more attention to who those representatives are; (ii) reform the rules about how decisions are made to ensure greater consultation prior to any changes in competition rules.

Some stronger mechanisms to better hold representatives to account could include:

* use of the IOF website to publish proposed meetings and meeting agenda of the Foot-O Commission or sub-committees with decision-making powers;

* IOF website publication of any proposed rule changes at least 2 months prior to any discussion and decision by the relevant committees;

* IOF website publication of minutes of Foot-O Commmission meetings and decisions of sub-committees, within 2 weeks of the meeting;

* (possibly) requirement for ratification of rule changes by a majority of federations.

It's hard to get excited about institutional reforms that will create the conditions for better decisions, but they may ultimately be more effective than repeatedly mobilizing to reverse bad decisions.

Well, that takes a lot of pressure off North Americans and other low ranked countries to do well in World Rankings.

I think it is a good compromise. It rewards the top countries and provides incentives for the lower ones, without starting them too far in the hole.

It only takes pressure off the low ranked countries if they are content to not be anything better than token attendees.

I agree, this is great for SA as we always have athletes (some young, some old) who like to run but being so far away, and having absolutely NO WRE there was little or no way we could improve our rankings and thus get more athletes to these events, so this is good for us.

I personally found that my biggest improvements in orienteering (not only in terrain running but also in technical areas) always leaped drastically after a series of such events like WOC or WC's (thats probably because I'm so sh1t anyway *grin*) as it was really the only exposure to high level competition that I could get.

Unfortunately, until such time as the IOF decides to help out with development in these lower ranked countries, I guess we will remain just token attendees (just my 2 cents)