Always Small Groups U15 and 15+ at Unicons
This discussion has an associated proposal. View Proposal Details here.Comments about this discussion:
Started
At a Unicon we don't have that many groups that we have large U15 groups and large 15+ groups. Therefore I would suggest, that at Unicon only large groups will be offered by the host regardless of the age.
But we should write, that at Unicons small groups U15 and small goups 15+ have to be offered. There will always be enough riders for that competition.
Comment
I would be okay with this idea as long as the country qualifications were more strict. Otherwise the group competition will take way too much time. I would say only 2 per country for the small groups.
And just to clarify, are you proposing:
Large Group (all ages)
Small Group 15+
Small Group 0-14
?
Comment
at the Unicon 17 we had 9 Large Groups and 9 Small Groups if we would have in addition Small groups U15 , we will probably have 9 more performances. If they ride 5 min. and the judging time would be 5 minutes, we are talking about 90 minutes more. That's not too much time! And we do not have the county limits in the rulebook, as far as I know.
Comment
The proposing would be:
5.14.3 Minimum Age Groups
Big Group none
Small Group 0-14 and 15 +
Comment
Sorry but I'm against this proposal as freestyle already is too long in my humble opinion. If a group of under 15's want to create a group routine, big or small, they can with the current rules. Will they have a chance to win? Possibly if they are really good. I'm not sure I understand the reason as to why you want to add this? To give young kids a better chance to win a medal?
Comment
Yes, that's what we do with Pairs and Individuals. We do have Age-Groups in these categories. Why shouldn't we give younger rider in small groups the same possibility?
Comment
Cause of the time it takes. Unicons are already tight on schedules with many things having to overlap. This would just make it worse and harder for organizers.
Comment
I think that if you had stricter country qualifications then it wouldn't add time. I'm for adding a category for younger riders. It's the Jr. Expert of Small Groups.
Kirsten, there are qualification rules in the rulebook:
5.14.9 Maximum Number of Competitors for Jr. Expert and Expert
Non-Unicon: Organizers of non-Unicon events can choose to limit the number of small/big groups using the guidelines below or have no limit.
Unicon: Each country can submit a maximum of three groups to compete at Unicon in each of the following categories: Expert Small Group, Jr. Expert Small Group, Expert Big Group, and Jr. Expert Big Group.
I think that if it was 3 per country for Large Group, 2 per country for Small Group 15+, and 2 per country for Small Group 0-14 then it would add hardly any time.
Comment
ok we had higher Limits for the groups at the Unicon in Kanada. 5 large and 5 small. But we did not have Jr. Expert Big Groups.
We should delete Jr. Expert Big Groups, since we probably won't habe enough large groups U15 at Unicons.
As it is written above for Unicon - is it a guideline? Because we in Germany would like to keep 5/5. And we only had 9 large groups at a Unicon. It is important to have competition and groups are easy to judge and for the audiance nice to look at and a highlight of the freestyle part. So as long as we have only a few countries, we should find an other description to allow higher limits at Unicon. If we only allow 2 small groups U15 it might be possilbe that we end up with 2 Japan, 2 German, 2 USA routines or even less.
So let's delete Non-Unicon and Unicon and replace
Orgainzer of events can choose to limit the number of small/large groups.
The limits for Unicons should be anounced one year in advance.
Comment
The higher limits for the groups in Canada was a misinterpretation of the rules. It should have been, as the rulebook states, 3 large and 3 small.
I think if we follow this rule, then it's okay to split small groups. Perhaps we should limit U15 small group to 2 per country.
I do think it is important to have the Unicon limitations defined in the rulebook. I think the Freestyle committee is more knowledgeable about freestyle than most hosts, and thus we should be the ones determining the limits. The limits should stay in the rulebook as is.
Comment
I agree that the limitations for freestyle should be in the rulebook.
So it would be:
Large Group (All Ages - 3 per country)
Small Group (15+ - 3 per country)
Jr. Small Group (0-14 - 2 per country)
Also, how is the group age determined? Is it an average of the ages? Or if one person is 15+ then the whole group has to be in the older age category?
Comment
Patricia , it is much better to have a flexibility and the IUF can rise the limits as they did for Kanada and Brixen. We had 5 in both years 5 per country. Even if it was a mistake, we did not have that many groups.
It would be awful, if a group practice a whole year for the UNICON competition and at the Unicon there are only a few groups. Presently we have 4 nations, which are at the Unicon with groups. We normally know in advance how many groups are going to be at the Unicon and it is easy to guess / to calculate. Even if we would rise the limits to 5 per country we would never ever have 20 performances, cause not every country will send 5.
For Spain it will probably be with a limit of 3:
1 large Group USA, max. 2 groups Denmark, max. 2 groups Japan, 3 groups Gemany = max. 8 groups or less
In Brixen, we had 7 groups (0-14) and 5 of them were from Germany, so if we only allow 2 per country, there might be no loser or maybe just 4 small groups. What a bitty.
The groups are the highlight of the Unicon. Please let us have a lot of groups. With more competition the reputation of our sport will increase and the performance of a group is so different and therefor the judging is easy even with 20 groups.
I would suggest if you want to have a number:
Large Group - 5 per Country
small 15+ - 4 per country
small group 0-14 - 4 per country
Comment
I'm still against adding a under 15 group and think we should leave it as is.
Comment
Question: Do we want to have fixed limitations of how many groups/competitors per country, regardless of the competition location? I thought these limitations were designed for situations where we didn't want one or a few conuntries to overwhelm the competition. But if we're not worried about having too many entries, must we stick with the same limitations?
That's a little off-topic, but related. The main topic seems to be whether we should *require* two age groups for Small Group Freestyle at Unicon. I don't have a strong opinion about that, and would rather leave such things to the flexibility of choice based on the expected attendance. For example, Unicon XVIII is in Western Europe so will likely draw a very large crowd; the hosts may choose to have these categories even without it being required.
Comment
I think that if we want to discuss country limitations then that is a separate discussion. This discussion is talking about whether or not to mandate a U15 and 15+ group competition.
Comment
Group overview and limitations must be looked at together, therefore I would like to discuss the following, before I create a proposal, I like to hear your opinion. Maybe we should give the small groups lower limits, because we can expect that each country will send 5 small groups. This won't happen with large groups.
Background: at the Unicon in Brixen and at the Unicon in Montral - Groups already had higher limits, than stated in the rulebook. That was an enrichment :)
Old:
5.14.1 Small Group
Minimum of three riders, maximum of eight.
5.14.2 Big Group
Minimum of nine riders, no maximum number of riders.
5.14.3 Minimum Age Groups
None.
New:
5.14.1 Small Group
Minimum of three riders, maximum of eight.
5.14.2 Large Group
Minimum of nine riders, no maximum number of riders.
5.14.3 Minimum Age Groups
Small Group: 0-14, 15+
Large Group: none
++++++++++++++++++++++
Old:
5.14.9 Maximum Number of Competitors for Jr. Expert and Expert
Non-Unicon: Organizers of non-Unicon events can choose to limit the number of
small/big groups using the guidelines below or have no limit.
Unicon: Each country can submit a maximum of three groups to compete at Unicon in
each of the following categories: Expert Small Group, Jr. Expert Small Group, Expert
Big Group, and Jr. Expert Big Group.
New:
5.14.9 Maximum Number of Competitors for Jr. Expert and Expert
Non-Unicon: Organizers of non-Unicon events can choose to limit the number of
small/big groups using the guidelines below or have no limit.
Unicon: Each country can submit a maximum of five groups to compete at Unicon in
each of the following categories: Expert Small Group, Jr. Expert Small Group and Expert
Big Group Jr. Expert Big Group.
Comment
the red "Jr. Expert Big Group" should be deleted
Comment
I actually think that they are very different rules and would be different proposals.
For example, I would vote yes to the first half of the proposal where it discusses the groups, but I would vote no to the second half of the proposal where it discusses maximum numbers. I feel like these belong in separate discussions.
Comment
Dear Patricia, we already had higher Group Limits at the Unicon 16 and at the Unicon 17 and it was good, so I can't understand why you are against higher limits - it is much more of a competition, when you have more competitors. It is difficult to make two proposals, since we only need max limits for Jr. Expert Small groups , if we allow Jr. small groups. Do I have enough time to look if the first proposal will be voted before I put in the second proposal and bothj before closing of the rulebook discussions.
Comment
Kirsten, can you please make your proposal for this discussion into two separate ones? There are two different rules involved here and they need to be voted on separately. I'm not comfortable approving the proposal until then, not because of my personal opinions about the rules but because they are listed as two different rules and need to be voted upon as such.
Comment
Dear Patricia,
it does not make sense to separate them, because we don't have to vote that small groups U15 and small Groups 15+ can submit max 4 groups, if we don't have Small groups U15 and 15 +. And that is the change in section 5.14.3.