Comments on: Worst to First and First to Worst http://www.citysolveurbanrace.com/blog/2010/04/06/worst-to-first-and-first-to-worst/ Urban Adventure Race Blog Tue, 02 Aug 2011 00:12:05 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Jason http://www.citysolveurbanrace.com/blog/2010/04/06/worst-to-first-and-first-to-worst/comment-page-1/#comment-4570 Jason Tue, 06 Apr 2010 22:05:14 +0000 http://www.citysolveurbanrace.com/blog/?p=627#comment-4570 Thanks for the input, Kip. We totally agree with you 100% and would never want to "add insult to injury." We probably won't have an 11th place run in the championship race, but we're always looking for new and exciting twists! Thanks for the input, Kip. We totally agree with you 100% and would never want to “add insult to injury.” We probably won’t have an 11th place run in the championship race, but we’re always looking for new and exciting twists!

]]> By: Kipley Fiebig http://www.citysolveurbanrace.com/blog/2010/04/06/worst-to-first-and-first-to-worst/comment-page-1/#comment-4566 Kipley Fiebig Tue, 06 Apr 2010 14:57:26 +0000 http://www.citysolveurbanrace.com/blog/?p=627#comment-4566 "We here at CitySolve Urban Race are thinking of having the top 11 teams in the finale in New Orleans and the 11th team will have to perform an extra task that none of the other teams will have to perform. Thoughts?" My thoughts: The team that crosses the line in 11th place in the preliminary race probably isn't a favorite to win the final race. While it WOULD make an amazing story if they managed to come back to win the finals race after having a (relatively) poor morning race AND having to overcome the handicap of the extra task... a MUCH more likely outcome would be that the extra task would just kind of be "insult to injury"... by penalizing the (relatively) non-competitive team. An alternative suggestion would be to release teams in the finals race in the order they crossed the line in the morning race. This would make the results of the morning race more meaningful to all the 11 teams, as a good result in the morning race would lead to an earlier start for the evening race. This would be better (in my opinion), in that it would "feel like" you were rewarding the GOOD performances in the preliminary race, as opposed to singling out and punishing the WORST performance of the preliminary race. But whatever penalties/bonuses you decide to apply to the start of the finals race... I think by far the MOST important thing to factor into the setup is this: The penalties/bonuses should be SMALL. In my example of releasing teams with staggered times in the finals, I'd only put 30 seconds or a minute between each released team. The key is to keep the differences small. The reason this is important (in my mind), is that if the penalty or bonus you institute for your new format is too large, it runs the very real risk of rendering the rest of your race essentially invalid. When the best teams in the nation show up to compete in your championship event, the difference in their race finish times is often measured in mere minutes, or even seconds. So a penalty or bonus that is too large can essentially become MORE important than the entire rest of the race. Given that the actual CitySolve Urban Race itself is the main focus of the day, and is the main reason we're all showing up, I would like to think that the team's performance in the race(s) should be the main thing that determines who the eventual champion is! -Kip “We here at CitySolve Urban Race are thinking of having the top 11 teams in the finale in New Orleans and the 11th team will have to perform an extra task that none of the other teams will have to perform. Thoughts?”

My thoughts: The team that crosses the line in 11th place in the preliminary race probably isn’t a favorite to win the final race. While it WOULD make an amazing story if they managed to come back to win the finals race after having a (relatively) poor morning race AND having to overcome the handicap of the extra task… a MUCH more likely outcome would be that the extra task would just kind of be “insult to injury”… by penalizing the (relatively) non-competitive team.

An alternative suggestion would be to release teams in the finals race in the order they crossed the line in the morning race. This would make the results of the morning race more meaningful to all the 11 teams, as a good result in the morning race would lead to an earlier start for the evening race. This would be better (in my opinion), in that it would “feel like” you were rewarding the GOOD performances in the preliminary race, as opposed to singling out and punishing the WORST performance of the preliminary race.

But whatever penalties/bonuses you decide to apply to the start of the finals race… I think by far the MOST important thing to factor into the setup is this: The penalties/bonuses should be SMALL. In my example of releasing teams with staggered times in the finals, I’d only put 30 seconds or a minute between each released team. The key is to keep the differences small. The reason this is important (in my mind), is that if the penalty or bonus you institute for your new format is too large, it runs the very real risk of rendering the rest of your race essentially invalid.

When the best teams in the nation show up to compete in your championship event, the difference in their race finish times is often measured in mere minutes, or even seconds. So a penalty or bonus that is too large can essentially become MORE important than the entire rest of the race. Given that the actual CitySolve Urban Race itself is the main focus of the day, and is the main reason we’re all showing up, I would like to think that the team’s performance in the race(s) should be the main thing that determines who the eventual champion is!

-Kip

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