Discussion: Future WOC qualification

These issues may be transformed with the elimination of qualifications and the potential to see Rankings used for qualification?

well said Bruce

World Rankings are unlikely to help as they will almost certainly be used to give country qualification numbers rather than individuals. And as yet, they have not seperated the different disciplines into their own rankings.

So it will still be up to individual countries to apply subjective or objective criteria. Australia has had subjective criteria for a long time, and it has had a lot of problems over the years including this one.

Of course objective criteria have their own problems too, most particularly when trials are affected by illness, injury or poor course setting, mapping.

I agree with you Bruce.

I also agree that it's pretty clear the same criteria haven't been used for both men and women. At least they are consistent in applying the tough edge of the criteria for the men - a couple of years ago Craig missed out despite his performances in the selection races being similar to yours and Muzza's.

I was a bit surprised that you didn't make it, like most on this thread by the sounds of it. Probably not a lot of consolation at the moment, but you've done remarkably well to get yourself to the point where your omission from the WOC team is controversial - I don't think many of us would have seen it coming six months ago.

Agree with Dave, well said Bruce. I don't want to hijack the post however, the MTBO selections were plagued with the same inconsistencies in application and in both instances athletes have made statements along the lines of 'why bother?'.

I tend to agree.

back to foot orienteering.
well done with your races bruce. you did well.
i agree with you. i dont know why the selectors were willing to take 'chances' with the womens team selection but not with the mens. it was good to see that they were willing to offer an opportunity to some of the girls who have not been to a WOC before, not sure at all why the same opportunities werent offered to you and muzz.

Sorry Ev I have to correct you. It's just called orienteering :)

My two cents worth. And I'm only going to make this one comment - I don't want to be seen as one of those irrelevant former politicians who stick their head in issues where its not wanted or appropriate. And yes, my views are obviously "biased" by being head of selectors for the past 5 years.

I would argue that the selectors this year (as in previous years) have been entirely consistent in application between men and women. If you take the time to read the criteria, you will find that the ability to make an A final is a key component, as it has for many years. Now, we can debate whether this criteria is still relevant, but its in there at the moment and that's the basis upon which decisions need to be made.

Now, its pretty clear from previous experience that "fringe" male selections - when they have been picked (ie usually those 4th or 5th picked) have for the past 8 years or so years, almost without exception, never made the A final. In fact those male standouts who are usually in the first 3 picked often struggle to do so.

And on the other hand, the 'fringe' women selected, usually (although not always) have made the A final.

The bottom line is that on the male side of things, using % behind the winner required to make an A final as the measurement parameter, its a lot tougher to make the A final. That's a fact. Which is unfortunate for guys like Bruce and Murray and, this year, Tom Quayle.

And that is why, given the depth in the sport in Australia at the moment, the men's team has for several years been smaller than the womens. Its entirely consistent in application of the criteria.

I agree that the selectors have taken a bit of a risk with the women this year, but I think that there's a good chance that they will come through with the goods and make some A finals. While on the other hand I don't think there's anywhere near that chance that fringe men would have made it. I may be provem wrong when the results come in, and everything's easy in hindsight, but based on the information we have at the moment, I believe the selectors have done the right thing by the women.

Let's face it, on the shorter courses this year the top male juniors have been matching it with the open men. And yet the junior men's performance in recent JWOCs has, frankly, been absolutely miserable. So if our men can't outperform the juniors, who themselves almost never make JWOC A finals, there is no chance of them doing so at elite level.

And yes Eoin, while objective criteria would be ideal in a perfect world, you just can't apply it to Australian orienteering at the moment.

Fini.

Partly to try and tempt Liggo to break his promise, and partly out of curiosity.. well mostly curiosity.

It looks like WOC quals will soon be history. So what criteria should Australian selectors use then?

Well, history in the middle and long, anyway. I think the answer depends a lot on (a) which new events end up being added and (b) what qualification system gets adopted - for example, if the qualification system ends up being based on previous WOC events, and the system is such that a no-result in the relay is severely damaging, then that would be a strong argument for always sending at least 4, with the 4th effectively being a relay reserve. (Personally, I'd be in favour of a team size of 4 being the default option for this reason anyway, unless the 4th person is clearly uncompetitive, which was true in 2009 but I don't think is true this year).

It is undoubtedly true that there is much more international depth in the men's than the women's and it's therefore much harder to make a men's final - you only need to look at how many minutes behind the winner the cut was in the WOC qualification races (Kathryn came close to getting through last year with a 10-minute mistake in her time). Australia's women's depth is rather unusual - if you look at where the N-th ranked Australian women is in the world rankings relative to the N-th ranked woman from all other countries, for most values of N in the 5-15 range we're behind only Norway, Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, and sometimes the Czech Republic.

I still think that the strength of the women's team has dropped and the selectors have not factored this in.

I don't want to make this about any single selection as it is no fault of the athlete and I do not want to criticize them, there is to nothing criticize and they should feel immensely proud to represent their country.

However, look at the results of the last three sprints (easter, aust and WOC trials) and tell me who has the most consistent results and if the same criteria has been applied to box sexes.

A different argument, but I still feel the selection criteria is counter productive, how can our athletes improve against the best when they arent allowed to race them? Robbie didn't make a final last year but came away from WOC so much better for the experience.

At last an admission that our JWOC performances in recent years have been 'absolutely miserable'.

Dave has hit the nail on the head regarding the criteria. Steve Cusworth made exactly the same remark after racing WMTBOC last year (I put that in there just for you ev).

Develop your elites and give them opportunities to grow; don't keep telling them they're not good enough. Or perhaps the beatings will continue until morale improves.

Out of interest. What proportion of typical #4 selected athletes have returned in subsequent years and featured in 'A' finals or dramatically improved in NOL racing?

"Absolutely miserable" - now there is a combination of two very high modality words!!
The challenge with open forums of the kind on AP is that your character is always so severely tested becuase you must remind yourself that all who contribute have the right to an opinion.
Quite frankly, as a supportive parent of a recent/current JWOC runner, watching their son work his arse off to try and make the transition to the enormous depth that is world wide junior Orienteering, and let's be honest, it is getting juniors to hang in and make the tough transition to senior Orienteering that is the real challenge, I find the comments of both Liggo and Simmo really, really disappointing and infuriating.
Recent JWOC results have been disappointing, or not to expectations (though I have seen some positives myself), sure - and I can assure you the JWOC reps, coaches and support staff are aware of that, are feeling the gaze of accountability and are having a go at addressing the situation.
But to engage in discussion about WOC selection policy, then put the boot into JWOC reps - well, that, to me, is absolutely appalling!!

I have a feeling this thread's about to go seriously off-track. I don't think it's unfair to say that many of the JWOC performances in recent years have been below expectations (two notable exceptions being Bridget in 2008 and Josh in 2009), but I'm seriously excited by the prospects of this year's team - history suggests that if juniors reach the level of being able to challenge for places regularly in elite races, as several of this year's crop have, they've got a decent chance of getting a top-10 result at JWOC.

As far as fringe men's WOC team members are concerned, in recent years the ones I can think of who best meet AzMan's description would be Eric (2004 and 2006), Kerrin (2006 and 2008), Reuben (2007) and Rob (last year). Hard to make much of an argument there for the most part, although Rob shows good signs this year. Of this group Eric and Reuben were both arguably picked several years past their peak, having had their paths blocked by the very strong teams around 2000.

@StK66, I 100% agree let us support our juniors and not kick them

OK, one more thing. And sorry for hijacking your blog Bruce.

Of course there is no objective criteria for "absolutely miserable", or "absolutely appalling" for that matter. And I'm not criticising the effort that anybody is putting in. And I guess that's part of my frustration - the efforts and investment that the juniors make, including in travelling to events around the country is great: far more than I ever did at that age. The results in Australia are good too. But I stand by my miserableness comment - we have had 54 individual races by the junior men in the last 3 years (6 per event, 3 events per WOC) and not had a single result in top 25. And I think only 3 in the top 40.

Of course I'm hoping that the team does really well this year. As per Blair's comment, on paper its really good particularly on the men's side and our prospects are, quite frankly, absolutely appealing.

But you didn't answer my question Liggo. Maybe I didn't criticise selectors and you missed me.

One more. To be honest I don't really know the details of the new system (has it been finalised yet?) so i'm not in a position to comment at the moment. I'll find out on the weekend and have a think about it.

Yeah new system hasn't been finalised. But there will be 5 medal events, no qual for middle/long and they may award medals for the top 6 (copper, iron and aliminium perhaps?)

Which means one extra medal event. I think that may mean a sprint relay.

There was long, middle, sprint, relay, chasing middle with prologue and mixed relay. So 5 from them. Can't see them getting rid of any of the original 4

Strange how JWOC performances crept into this thread. The point is that JWOC has to be seen as developmental -- if good results ensue such as in 2007 (and hopefully 2011), then that's great; if not then at least a group of 12 kids have learnt about European orienteering, and we hope they will go onto bigger and better things.

We all love to criticise the selectors (after all, that's why LIggo took the job, right?), but I agree with Liggo that the criteria have been applied correctly this year. Of course, this was the criteria devised in our heyday of the early 2000s when we expected all the men to qualify. Like Dave says, it would be good to have a criteria which explicitly included future potential, say, to reach A finals. Such a criteria would have at least had Muzza in the team.

For Bruce: bad luck, but I think you had a good crack at it and I would be proud of that if I were you.

Bad luck Bruce. I would have picked you...And Tom and Murray...But I guess I may not have the ruthlessness to be a selector! You did what you needed to do so well done.

liggo and others, the selection criteria is:
"The WOC team will consist of at least four men and four women, provided that
these athletes clearly demonstrate their potential to reach the final in the races in
which they compete. Additional team members will only be selected based on
their potential to meet the international benchmark performance of a top 16
result, up to a maximum of six men and six women"

To me, this reads that the selectors made the decision that the final two woman selected for the womens team both have more of a chance of making the top 16 in their respective A finals than a fourth male would have had of making his A final. I dont think this is the case.
The selection of the womens team was consistent with the criteria and the selection of the mens team was consistent with criteria. Its just that the selection of the mens team was not consistent with the selection of the womens team.

If it's not inappropriate for me to make a comment, I would suggest that any apparent discrepancy may result from differences in the composition of the men's and women's selection panels. Also, others may not be aware that Tom withdrew his own nomination. And yes, the selection criteria could be revisited now that we are not dependent on 'benchmark' performances for ASC funding, and will take into account the changes to future WOC formats.

good point ev, about the top 16 thing. that's a pretty crazy criteria -- when has our 5th place male or female ever had a chance of top 16?

Hoggster, I'd argue that when it was Tom, Rob, Troy, BJ, Shep, Jules and me going for spots in the team we all thought we had a good chance at top 16.
Not saying its not time to reconsider the criteria though. Times have changed.

Apologies StK - my comment was more a reflection on the type of report that ends up in OA News such as 'Impressive performance' by an Aussie at JWOC who finishes about half-way down the field. I do hope to see some really 'impressive' results at JWOC this year, but if not let's tone down the domestic hype please.

I take your point about domestic hype Simmo. I'm not sure if those that engage are being realistic. For example, Josh is now friends with a potential star from Norway named Eskil Kinneburg, thanks to a Newcastle contact and opportunities arranged in 2010. The Norwegian trials are on in two weeks, and despite a 4th in the long and gold in relay 2010, his first JWOC, he is not yet in their team for 2011. Just recently he returned from Poland - the 3rd time the Norwegian junior squad has been to Poland since JWOC 2010!!!
That's the raw talent out there, and that is the depth of European preparation. I wonder how informed some are at times.

If the 'benchmark performance' funding criterion is gone and if it's possible to allow people to go WOC without funding, I don't see what anyone has to lose by selecting a full team regardless of how well they are expected to perform. It's unmotivating to have to beat not only everyone else at the trials but (the selectors' ideas of) top-16 performance as well.

can you really say that the juniors have had appalling (international) results while being comfortably and commonly beaten by them (particularly in sprints) and then have a whinge about not being selected for WOC?

Lachy i think you will find Bruce never commented on the quality of the juniors.

called my bluff ;)

Lazydave, Why does Muzz (or any athlete) need to be in the WOC team to gain experience
"how can our athletes improve against the best when they arent allowed to race them?"
Thats a load of rubbish, if he is willing to go to Europe for 1 or 2 qualification races against 1/3 of the best in that type of race, he would be better to spend the same amount, go and race several big races at the same total entry cost and gain a tonne more experience against the same quality fields.
That agruement has never been a good one for selection of teams going to the World Champs (dont forget you were just critizing AR on Robbies log for having low entry standards)

And yes your juniors have been shit, effort and trying hard may get them gold stars on the fridge but only your Mummy gives a toss about your gold stars