In response to Pat Washburn's questioning whether or not his 8th place
trophy is just as good, makes him feel as proud, as an 8th place finish that
didn't award a trophy, I say, good for him. The number "8" isn't so
impressive as the fact that he finished close to the top and had a good
battle.
Pat, it's the trophies that keep people coming back for more. Those who
have tried 10 times but never successfully trophied -- do you think they
come because they think they can get gold? Some may, but most are looking
for a more realistic goal: just take home a trophy. If you narrow that to
only 3, enough people will think their goals are unrealistic and will stay
home. IMHO.
Which brings me back to the discussion I started after Nationals a few years
ago. Katie Kelly was running in BSPL, had an incredibly hard-fought battle
for the win (as I remember it), but ended up just a tick out of the trophies
because the class was so small that not enough trophies were awarded.
Meanwhile, people in large open classes received trophies despite finishing
well over 2 seconds behind the leader in their class. It just seemed
unfair. In my teensy little brain (I don't got no 202 IQ either), it struck
me that Katie absolutely deserved a trophy that year, and was robbed of one
because of the rules structure. Meanwhile, some people got trophies for
doing considerably less impressively, but at least they did beat many
people.
The answer is to award trophies based on how close you finish to the class
winner. I can't remember the amount I came up with, but you can find a
number which will typically award just as many trophies as we do now (reduce
if you want to reduce the duration of the banquet), but will distribute
them, in my mind, more fairly (oh, there's that word again.)
The (potentially major) downside is that you don't know how many trophies
will be awarded in a given class until the whole thing is done.
Josh
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