The Caste System

Back in the old days, a kid or an old man could show up at any contest with a Junior Ringmaster and enter Stunt, Combat, or Rat. There weren't any rules other than age, and Seniors were 21 or more.

Can someone explain to me in plain English how the new system works? If I go to the Nats with a Junior Ringmaster, claim to be an "Expert", is that the class in which I fly? Or do you win points and work your way up the ladder to change classes? Can you downgrade yourself like golf pros do, and revert to a lower class? Do you have to fly that silly beginner pattern in some number of contests to qualify for a higher rating? Is there a profile class that overlaps the others?

I am confident that the wizards have a better system today, but it seems a little complicated to me.

So a Junior or Senior can fly in his age class (Junior or Senior) and also fly in Beginner, Intermediate or Advanced, but not Expert (or Open). The Open flyers, even though they are flying an age class, cannot compete in Beginner or Intermediate or Advanced which are experience classes because Open is also the experience class for "Experts". Sound confusing? It is to me.

Anybody flying Expert and cleaning up at the local level can choose to fly in Advanced, if he wishes, at the Nats, and many do simply because they know they aren't going to win in Expert at the Nats. And they want to win. If they ever do win in Advanced, however, then they cannot come back except to compete in Open (or "Expert") where they usually end up in the top ten because they were good engough to compete there in the first place. Yes, there is sandbagging going on.

Those who started the Intermediate class did put rules in that if you have competed at any contest at the local level in Advanced, then you cannot compete in Intermediate at the Nats, and that is the way I think it should be. It is hard to set levels--say if you score 500 at a local contest you have to fly Expert, and if you score 400 at a local contest you have to fly Advanced--because there is simply too much difference in the way judges score. I have been to contests where the Intermediates were getting 530 scores by the judges. Now, as long as they are consistent between flyers, the best flyer still wins, but there needs to be some recognition of actual ability. Still, at the Nats the judges are "reasonably" consistent, and, where several years ago it took a 500+ score to win the Advanced (the same score that would seat you comfortably in the top 20 of Expert) it now takes a 530 to win the Advanced.

I think we need to make some changes simply because a true Advanced flyer has no chance of even being competitive so long as some of these Expert level flyers are moving down. (We don't all have to win. Only one flyer can win, and someone always will come in last, but it would be nice to know you were flying in your "category.")

OK, I have opened a can of worms and I don't mean to single anyone out. I just feel this has become a problem which others also have addressed but to which no one seems to find a solution.

We need some way to let people choose the level at which they wish to compete (and then if they get good enough, we can and should "kick them out" and "move them up".) And we need some way to say, "if you have flown in a certain category at the local level--in, say, the last 5 years--that you cannot move back just for the Nationals." Hey, I haven't personally competed in the last 5 years. Can I come and fly Beginner and win one of those neat prizes??

You are right, Beginner is a "silly" pattern. It was designed to allow people to fly who don't even know how to fly inverted. I think we should learn the basic skills before we go out to compete, and, in fact, those who compete do. (Nobody competes in Beginner at the Nats without knowing how to fly inverted). I would like to see the Beginner pattern changed to the same as the "regular" pattern with the elimination of the maneuvers above 45 degrees. No vertical eights, no hourglass, no overhead eight, no clover. Leave everything else there. Then the beginner could learn the first basic maneuvers, start competition, and work on the rest of the pattern when he is ready. It would help everyone move along a little faster, but keep them out of trouble while they are still the "greenest".

The forum is open to opposing viewpoints.

We need an age class for people who fly on 60' lines because they cannot see 70'.

Now, if we just had something to refresh our memory so we wouldn't forget the square eights....

Actually, might be better to leave them all in, and just expect a beginner to chicken out and get a low score on those two.

That's an interesting idea. How would this work? Like a sprint-car race? Top 20 makes the A-Main, second 20 the B-Main, etc? What are the advantages?

{snip some for brevity}

>I think we need to make
>some changes simply because a
>true Advanced flyer has no
>chance of even being competitive
>so long as some of
>these Expert level flyers are
>moving down. (We don't
>all have to win.
>Only one flyer can win,
>and someone always will come
>in last, but it would
>be nice to know you
>were flying in your "category.")

We've gone down this road before. The same problems are still present. The essence is that the NATS represents such a large concentration of talent compared to local contests that direct comparison is not valid. I would estimate based on what I've observed, that winning NATS Advanced flights would place in the mid-upper twenties in Open. That seems about right to me. The ability to win something against similar capability pilots is the entire point of having skill classes.

I would also claim that "true advanced flier" is very definitely in the eye of the beholder. One possible (albiet unlikely) solution would be to get NATS qualifying level pilots to seed people on a local level. For instance, get whoever the national hotshots are in a particular area to simply proclaim someone "Advanced" or "Expert" based on their own assesment. Claim that the goal would be to more-or-less balance the entry at the NATS. So if Mr Hotshot thinks flier X would finish in the mid-30's or below in Open at the NATS, he's in Advanced, above, he's in Expert. The problem with this is that the locals would really get annoyed, because the Steve Millets and Jeff Andersons of the world would clean everybodies clock on a regular basis, because the density of quality pilots at a local level is so low.

I think it would be easy for the experienced pilots to seed the classes. For instance, I called the top 4 in Advanced (excluding Millet (which was obviously an abberation due to the weather - that's why they actually fly the flights!)) this year on Monday after casually watching tiny fractions of the practice flights. It's really easy to tell. There's a few factors that leap out at you. I could have made an argument that a few people over the last few years could have been in a gray area between Advanced and Open, but it would have been a close call. I don't see it as a serious problem if a handful of people were misplaced.

While I don't necessarily agree with it, here is a very good argument to be made that there shouldn't be skill classes at the NATS (as there wasn't for most of the history of the event). The contest is supposed to choose the National Champion. Breaking it up into skill levels does not advance that cause in the least. The positive thing skill classes to provide is to allow an milepost along the road. It definitely increases the participation of those who otherwise wouldn't go. It could be pretty tough to go back to your buddies after the NATS and tell them that you finished 49th, when you're a local hotshot. Much better to say you just missed out on qualifying for the Advanced Finals.

Or, maybe, if we do have them, we should drop the age classes altogether. As some have suggested, put all the flyers together and give a trophy to the highest placing Junior and highest placing Senior, and let it be that.

Or maybe we should fly skill clases one day and age classes another, and let the national chamption be determined by the age class competition only. That way we could all fly two events and not just the Juniors and Seniors (unless, of course, they win in Advanced, and then they can no longer compete except in their age class).

One area where you and I disagree (and we are allowed to do that) is in where the cut off should be between Advanced and "Expert" (or Open, or whatever we choose to call it. Is it a skill class or an age class??) Where you would place the cutoff at a 530 score, a point where one could easily make the top ten in Open, I would limit it (if it were possible) to 500 or below. I don't think the Advanced winner should even be able to make the top 20 in Expert, or, if he is able, just barely. Remember, we now have about 40 people in Expert competing for the top 20 positions. Half of those already willing to fly in this classification will not make the cut (and that is as it should be.) Should we then say it is alright to remain in Advanced if you are obviously capable (I didn't even say you were going to do it, just capable) of making the cut to top 20?. A person able to make the top 20 in expert is an expert level flyer. His participation in Advanced merely hurts the true Advanced flyers who have no chance to compete "at their level" because they are still fying against Expert level contestants.

My opinion. Anyone is free to agree or disagree. And again, please, I am not trying to single anyone out. No one in the past broke any rules. I am merely stating what I feel should be done in the future for the benefit of all who compete.

For those who missed the previous incarnation of this thread, I had previously suggested 530 instead of 500 as a break point. But it's clear the comparing scores won't work, for the reasons belabored at length previously.

But if not quite making the top 20 is the standard, I think we're pretty much there right now. I would guess that maybe the top 1 or 2 over the last few years would have had an outside chance at qualifying in Open. I'll pick on him since I'm his buddy, plus he's not looking. Jeff "Joey" Anderson as he flew at the NATS is pretty much where I would draw the line between Advanced and Expert. And he finished 3rd. I would guess that only Mike Scott (and maybe Millet) would have had a remote chance of qualifying in Open, and that would have been a big push. That's not intended as a criticism at all. Qualifying in Open is one tough task, and getting tougher all the time. This can easily be illustrated by seeing who didn't make it!

I really don't think that maybe 2-3 people being in the gray area constitutes a serious problem. I also think that you and I may have different ideas as to what it takes to qualify. To me it's pretty clear who has the extra bit of polish required to make it, and who doesn't. When I see guys who are undeniable experts, like Jim Young, Gino, Frank Williams, etc. *not make it*, it illustrates how extremely difficult it is. And I don't see many Advanced fliers beating Gene Martine on a regular basis, even the winners.

>A person able to make
>the top 20 in expert
>is an expert level flyer.
> His participation in Advanced
>merely hurts the true Advanced
>flyers who have no chance
>to compete "at their level"
>because they are still fying
>against Expert level contestants.

Define "true Advanced Flier", with examples, and how those who are "expert level" would stack up against the 21st-30th guys in Open. I think you will be surprised at the result.

Ha, Leonard. Not only has Larry been to the Nats before, he won combat at the 1965 Nats. He and I are both former Hoosiers, too. We lived around Lafayette.

Curiously, Larry, the stunt folks let you fly in Expert if you want to. This was most agreeable to me when I took up stunt. Stunt had always been something I intended to do someday. Fortunately, stunt planes and the pattern changed little over the years. I wanted to have it be the way it was in the old days before there were skill classes, so I entered Expert from the start. I feel welcome flying Expert, and I've had fun doing so. I came in last at most contests for a year or so, but not by a really humiliating margin.

Howard, thanks for your support, but I think Leonard used the word "you" as a generic "any of you" and was not referring to me personally.

Brett, I agree. Seems like skill levels make a lot of sense at local competitions, but at the Nats? If you are national champion, you beat everyone else. If you are national champion in Advanced, that means you were only good enough to beat everyone who wasn't good enough to compete for the "real" national championship. I don't know the folks involved, but winning Advanced at the Nats seems to me like a hollow victory. Just means you were fairly decent and smart enough to not compete with the fliers better than you. It is a meaningless trophy. If they have beginner at the Nats (do they?) that would be even more meaningless.

Oh, yeah, the guy who came in second in combat at the '65 Nats was a lot better than me. I got lucky. Anyone know who that was?

On your comment about yourself, I don't think it is humiliating to come in last--unless you have made greater expectations about yourself or expect the acolades from the local flyers when you return. Our whole purpose in entering should be to have fun, to fly our best, and to learn. And in that order. (My opinion, again.) And you have done quite well for yourself.

I remember reading an article in Stunt News a few years back by a modeler who wrote about his "first Nats experience." In reading the article you could see that here was a modeler who really had fun.

---

And he came in last.

---

In Beginner, yet.

But he had fun.
And he flew his best.
And he learned.
What more could one ask?

The winning trophy only goes to one person. But we can all have fun...even if we come in last.

If there are 40 Experts and 40 Advanced (and the rankings are right), 41st place in Expert is first place in Advanced. That is not winning! That is 41st place! That is a goofy rule. I refuse to play by those rules. Y'all can do what you want, but I don't want trophies that say "First Place Among Those Who Aren't Good Enough For Prime Time."

At that time, in the upper Midwest, there was a group of a half-dozen or so flyers who moved through the classes together. Bill Zimmer and his students were judging most of the contests, so the judging was quite consistant. I would fly and when I finished I could estimate my score, and be within 20 points. (That is no longer the case.) There were many contests where first and third in my skill class would be separated by 5 points or less. You knew that first through third would be three of the half-dozen, but you couldn't predict which three. That was really enjoyable competition. Most of those guys eventually passed me up as I reached the limits of my ability.

I've never liked the idea of skill classes at the nationals. We have them, and they do serve a purpose. However, the persons who win Jr. Sr. and Open deserve to be called "National Champions"; but, the persons who win Beginner, Intermediate, and advanced at the nationals should be referred to as "First place in Beginner", etc, and let it go at that. There is a difference between a national champion and the winner of a contest that happens to occur in conjunction with the National Championship.

I'll put you down for one vote against skill classes at the NATS. I tend to agree, but I will also freely admit that my perspective is obviously not the same as someone who was going to finish 55th every year. It's not really a sad situation - as you indicated, you can just ignore it and enter Open (like many do).

The skill classes are a great idea at a local level, but I do not necesarily think they are a great idea at the NATS. And trying to compare the two is apples and oranges as far as depth of skill and the quality of the pilots, and the judging.

In very populous areas like my own (Pacific Coast), where we frequently have 6-7 Open Top-5 participants and a very large pool of potential Open qualifiers and Advanced guys, along with NATS judges, peer pressure makes the skill classes work out pretty close to the NATS.

The exception to this rule are those people moved to Expert under the mandatory-advancement-when-you-get-a-500 rule in WAM. I think this clearly proves the mandatory 500 point idea to be unworkable.

In less populous areas, where there may only be one Open qualifier likely to show up, the peer pressure to fill the Expert ranks is such that people who wouldn't make the top 20 in Advanced end up flying Expert at locals.

I don't claim to know the answer to any of this. I am far from convinced that in practice there is a real problem that needs to be solved. The lack of any workable standard is one of the arguments made against making the skill classes official events, particularly at the NATS.

My understanding of Scott's idea is one possible solution. Fly everybody together and just divide the field in half - top flies Open/Expert and the lower half flies Advanced. Just ignore what anyone flies at local contests. I think the main reason not to do it is that I would think you would need to fly at least one extra day (but probably two). But it's my considered opinion that the results would be that only a few people would end up differently than they already do.

Before Advanced came in in the mid-80s(?) that's pretty much exactly how it worked. Early on, it was two flights on the same day. The best flight chose the top 20 from that flew for the Open Championship. Later, it was best flight from two consecutive days to get the top 20, then top 20 add two flights to pick the top 5, then 3 flighrs with a throw-away fly-off for the win. If you ignore Advanced, it's still like that.

At present, Open works like described above. In Advanced, the same two first qualifying rounds (on different circles from Open - the two are never intermingled) of two flights each of two days.High Wednesday flight+High Thursday flight = top 20. Then, on Friday, the Top 20 Advanced fly, and sum of two scores determine the winner.

On Friday, both the Top 20 from Open and from Advanced have two flights, both of which count. There have been proposals to add a way to get a throw-away flight, but so far none have been adopted due to a variety of reasons. I have done stupid things on at least 3 separate Top 20 days that grotesquely affected my final placing, but I still think that its a good way to go. One flame-out and you're 20th. It certainly affected the results this year, where the air got bad about halfway through the first round.

If Advanced were eliminated, we'd probably do something very similar to Open now, except with everybody mixed together. This would be feasible, although it would make the seeding a little more difficult.

Not everyone is aware of this, but the pilots are seeded into circle assignments in qualifying based on judges and pilots prior performance. A random draw would raise the possibility of all the contenders being on the same circle. With 4 groups, only the top 5 from each circle would make the top 20. If one circle wound up with Ted, Paul, Windy, Billy, David, me, Bill Rich, and Frank, it wouldn't be very fair. The way it is now is bad enough, with David, Ted, and I usually ending up together and at least other 2 potential top-5ers for a group of 10 qualifiers per circle. It was a little like that in Advanced this year, but Advanced is pretty difficult to seed.

Folks, that makes no sense, and you all know it. There is no way to make the current system fair.

What would be different if we just let everyone fly in the same class, and gave first prize in Advanced to 41st place? It is the same game, folks! You are all trying to do that artificially, but it is a number scam. You can't make it work. Mathematically, it will not work!

You all just drove a wooden stake through the heart of skill classes at the major competition level. Locally, it still makes sense, but any major event cannot have skill levels.

Seeing the success of skill classes in stunt, we thought about adopting them for combat. Having two rookies fly each other causes some messy matches, though.

What's really wrong with the Nat's as currently flown?

I fly Advanced class and have for years. I am beginning to think that I've reached my limit as to my ability. I hope not, perhaps it's more my equipment, or time to train, but I've noticed my scores have seemed to stabilize at a level that usually puts me in 4th. place or lower at local contests.

I competed at the 95 Nat's, my first time ever, and had a great time. Flying in Advanced class allowed me to fly against my peers while still enjoying the Nat's experience. I had fun, I learned a lot, and wasn't even interested in becoming the National Champion. Sure there were Experts flying in Advanced class, so what? Either I flew well enough to beat a few of them, or not. Not a problem for me as I was having fun.

Where I had a problem was having the Jrs and Srs, expert class fliers, flying in advanced as well as for the National Championships. I understand that it's common and breaks no rules, so I just accept it, bu, if I was to make a change, it would be to allow Advanced class pilots the option of also flying open if they are old enough. In fact, I'm not sure that it would be against the rules to do so under the current guidlines.

Having skill classes at the Nat's could actually have an additional benifit. Such as, Qualifying for the top 20 in Advanced, at the Nat's, equals an automatic upgrade to Expert at local contests. It would lessen the sandbagging that is occurring in Advanced. The idea that a Nat's win in Advanced equals no future Nat's competition in Advanced is a good one and I support it.

Getting away from the Nat's, and looking at the local contests, and also to try and shed some light on the original posters questions, we find the following guidlines generally accepted.

The competitor has the resposibillity to place themselves in the proper class at their first contest. The most often used guidline for beginner is simply, the competitor does not have the ability to fly the entire pattern. A relativly new and unofficial class being flown at some contests is Basic, a class for those just learning to fly.

Why would we have such classes? I believe they have a real benifit for the sport/hobby. It allows true beginners to experience competition, and better yet, exposes them to others who can provide answers and help. This early experience and flying agianst their peers is therefore a more positive experience. Say what you want about trophy hunting, but many other sports have classes and have found them to be benificial to the continued growth of the sport.

If you can fly the entire pattern, under current guidlines you should place yourself in one of the other classes. No one will make you fly in a lower class than the one you want to, if you really feel that you want to compete at the highest level.

Moving up in classes is a rather subjective subject. there are guidlines that sometimes work and other times people tend to sandbag. A score based system is in place, but not real workable as there is too much difference, locally, with judging, being subjective as it is. Generally what happens is people move up when they realize they are ready, or they are moved up by their peers, one way or the other.

So, back to the Nat's. Performance at the Nat's is one contest where the best of the best judges are working. Much less subjective when compared to local contests. It would seem to me that perhaps one of the best services provided by Nat's skill classes, would be to use performance there as a guage determining advancement.

Do I feel that a win in Advanced is less than an admirable accomplishment? No way. "Tain't easy. I would say that a win in any skill class at the Nat's has a very real and necessary function for the health of the sport. Let Open determine the true National Champ as it has always done, but let anyone who can fly the entire pattern enter open also should they wish to.

John,

>>Say what you want about trophy hunting, but many other sports have classes and have found them to be benificial to the continued growth of the sport.<<

I think this is a good point. When I was a kid, I used to go to the local drag strip and "brakett" race. We would run down the strip and were clocked. We were then placed in a brakett with with others with similar times. Then it was a race. Wouldn't be much fun to show up with momma's grocery getter and have to race against a top fuel rig. Must have worked since the placed was absolutely packed every weekend. Sure was fun and if you sandbagged in your clocking run and then ran more than a certain percentage (3%, as I remember. Coulda been more) faster during any heat race or final, you were disqualified.

I think the same principle applies with skill classes. Wouldn't be much fun to go to every contest just to get slaughtered by the top guns. At least until you can at least give the appearence of making it interesting. I'm not even at the appearence level yet.

This was kind of my opinion of the people flying expert moving down to Advanced at the Nats. Anyone flying 500 or above is an expert, or, at least is in my opinion. Realistically, if 500-507 makes the cut for the top 20 at the Nats, then maybe even 480 should be the cut off. (Should we be flying expert only if we can make the cut? What, then, is the purpose of the cut?)

If those with greater ability fly advanced only because they don't have the "greatest" ability, then the true advanced flyers still have no chance because they are no longer flying against their peers.

Maybe we should just let the top three guys fly expert. Let the next three guys fly Advanced. Let the next three guys fly Intermediate. If we have more flyers, we can create more classes. That way everybody will at least get a third place trophy at every contest he enters. We don't have to say we came in last. We can say we came in third.

Problem of course being that to get a realistic idea of how you would score at the NATS requires flying at the NATS. A "500" means very little at a local contest, except from experienced NATS judges, which are in short supply. I've seen a lot of 500 point floghts at local contests that wouldn't get 400 at the NATS. Besides, if you look at the score at the NATS only a few advanced scores exceeded 500 even under perfect conditions (disregarding Friday).

Until you solve this problem, scores won't work.

What would be wrong with saying that if you score 480--or at most 490 in Advanced at the Nationals that you should not come back? To say we have to wait (or can wait) until we win before we "move up" is bordering on the ridiculous. This does not make the event competitive or offer the true Advanced class flyer the opportunity to fly against his peers.