[NSRCA-discussion] FAI 1/2 points

[John Pavlick]

"No particular reason was given for the rounding up... They preferred it versus rounding down."

 

Well that sounds like a scientific explanation. Since it makes no reference to how floating point numbers and quantization errors actually work, we’ll have to accept it as fact. J

 

John Pavlick

Cell: 203-417-4971

 

idslogo2

Integrated Development Services

 

 

 

From: NSRCA-discussion [mailto:nsrca-discussion-bounces at lists.nsrca.org] On Behalf Of Scott Smith via NSRCA-discussion
Sent: Monday, August 01, 2016 3:43 PM
To: Stuart Chale; General pattern discussion
Subject: Re: [NSRCA-discussion] FAI 1/2 points

 

I asked that same question and was told:

 

"No particular reason was given for the rounding up... They preferred it versus rounding down."

 

On Mon, Aug 1, 2016 at 3:18 PM, Stuart Chale via NSRCA-discussion <nsrca-discussion at lists.nsrca.org> wrote:

Some ideas and changes are just plain stupid!  There I said it :)

I have always hated the fact that some judging criteria and downgrades
were different in FAI and AMA.  Makes judging which is a tough job to do
right even tougher.  You have to know 2 different sets of rules and in
the long run only lowers the accuracy of judging, most likely more so
for the FAI fliers.  But that is another can of worms.

I thought that allowing 1/2 points in FAI sounded like a good idea, we
are used to it in the rest of the classes.  And since the FAI pilots are
in most part the better fliers they are more likely to make the 1/2
point errors as compared to the greater inaccuracies usually seen in the
lower classes.

But wait an 8.5 becomes a 9, and a 9 is still a 9  ??????

So just to prove how silly this idea can be I used Scott's scoring
program and ran a fictitious contest with 2 flyers and 2 rounds.  I used
a couple of friends as contestants so to not offend anyone.  I also had
to use the masters sequence as an example, as the program automatically
rounds up FAI scores.

Hopefully the PDF files are attached.

Each flyer received identical scores in each of their 2 flights. AR
received all 7.5's except one maneuver which was an 8.5,  and DL all 8's
.  In round 1 scores were not rounded up and in round 2 the scores were
rounded up as they would automatically be done in FAI.

Look at the files for AR round 1 and DL  round 1.  It would seem pretty
obvious who should win that round and without rounding up AR gets a
947.75 to DL's 1000.

Note that every maneuver but one was judged higher for DL.

Now look at AR round 2 and DL round 2 rounded up.  The same exact judges
scores with only 1 maneuver scored higher for AR, but due to the
rounding up AR wins the round 1000 to 989.86.

Now this is the extreme and unlikely to actually happen in a contest to
this extent but just the fact that it works this way makes the whole
idea of rounding up ridiculous.

Is there really an argument that this is a good thing?

Stuart C.


_______________________________________________
NSRCA-discussion mailing list
NSRCA-discussion at lists.nsrca.org
http://lists.nsrca.org/mailman/listinfo/nsrca-discussion

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.nsrca.org/pipermail/nsrca-discussion/attachments/20160801/dc678cda/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image001.png
Type: image/png
Size: 735 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.nsrca.org/pipermail/nsrca-discussion/attachments/20160801/dc678cda/attachment.png>