Scoring System for Big Events

by Cesar Travado

(Photo courtesy of Matias Capizzano)

A new scoring system was used for the 2016 Europeans and the Worlds 2017. It consists, as most of you know, on a Qualifying Series and Final Series.

For the Final Series, each competitor carries his/her Overall position of the Qualifying Serie as Race #1 of the Final Series. This Race #1 is not excluded as discard.

When César Sans and I wrote the Sailing Instructions for the Europeans 2016, we spent a lot of time on the phone (and emails) discussing how to write them to be the most clear and understandable for competitors, specially in the point about the Fleets and Scoring System. We put special care on finding the exact words to not let space to doubts. No modifications to the Sailing Instructions during the Europeans, so I guess we made a good job.

…

Some controversy about this system and some claims about the fairness. So I took my time to compare with the Old System (11 races – 2 races excluded, orange colored) and the Add System (Some one propossed to carry the net points in the Qualifying Series as Race #1 instead of the Overall Position, Green colored). I added the average points per race column on each just for information.
The result is as follows (Points for calculating AVG are Nett Points):

	PRUEBAS	FINAL	Net Points	AVG	OLD	Net Points	AVG	ADD	Net Points	AVG
Country	Skipper	FINAL	Net Points	AVG	OLD	Net Points	AVG	ADD	Net Points	AVG
PUR	Raúl Rios	1	36	6,0	1	52	5,8	1	52	8,7
ESP	Gustavo del Castillo	2	41	6,8	2	54	6,0	2	54	9,0
ESP	Rayco Tabares	3	42	7,0	3	60	6,7	3	60	10,0
ESP	Alfredo González	4	52	8,7	4	67	7,4	6	74	12,3
BRA	Mario Tinoco	5	56	9,3	6	70	7,8	4	70	11,7
BRA	Alexandre Tinoco	6	57	9,5	8	76	8,4	7	76	12,7
ESP	Álvaro Martínez	7	59	9,8	5	68	7,6	5	72	12,0
ESP	Raúl de Valenzuela	8	62	10,3	9	79	8,8	9	79	13,2
BRA	Bruno Bethlem	9	64	10,7	10	81	9,0	10	81	13,5
ESP	Damián Borrás	10	70	11,7	7	75	8,3	8	77	12,8
BRA	Alexandre Paradeda	11	73	12,2	11	90	10,0	11	90	15,0
USA	Ernesto Rodríguez	12	75	12,5	12	92	10,2	12	92	15,3
BRA	Rafael Gagliotti	13	75	12,5	13	92	10,2	13	92	15,3
POR	Mafalda Pires	14	77	12,8	14	95	10,6	14	95	15,8
BRA	Juliana Duque	15	88	14,7	17	106	11,8	15	106	17,7
BRA	Breno Bianchi	16	95	15,8	20	114	12,7	17	114	19,0
JPN	Tetsuo Watanabe	17	97	16,2	16	105	11,7	16	113	18,8
ESP	José María Guerrero	18	98	16,3	15	101	11,2	18	115	19,2
BRA	Tiago Brito	19	102	17,0	21	120	13,3	19	120	20,0
BRA	Mario Sergio de Jesús	20	103	17,2	18	106	11,8	20	121	20,2
USA	Augie Díaz	21	107	17,8	19	112	12,4	21	124	20,7
ESP	Jordi Triay	22	117	19,5	22	124	13,8	22	133	22,2
BRA	Gabriel Kieling	23	130	21,7	24	133	14,8	23	149	24,8
JPN	Yuichi Ohi	24	136	22,7	26	152	16,9	24	154	25,7
JPN	Junichiro Shiraish	25	136	22,7	23	131	14,6	25	155	25,8
USA	Doug Hart	26	142	23,7	27	155	17,2	26	160	26,7
BRA	Leonardo Lombardi	27	147	24,5	25	150	16,7	28	168	28,0
ESP	Marcos Míguez	28	148	24,7	28	155	17,2	27	165	27,5
JPN	Yuta Kunimi	29	148	24,7	31	170	18,9	29	170	28,3
JPN	Koji Kamiya	30	154	25,7	30	165	18,3	30	173	28,8
USA	Randy Lake	31	155	25,8	33	174	19,3	32	178	29,7
BRA	Mateus Tavares	32	155	25,8	29	160	17,8	31	177	29,5
BRA	Luis Soubie	33	157	26,2	32	172	19,1	33	184	30,7
BRA	Adriano Santos	34	168	28,0	34	186	20,7	34	196	32,7
NOR	Nicholas Pelicano Grael	35	174	29,0	35	193	21,4	35	196	32,7

I took the top 35 from Final Series and compare the Final Position depending on the Scoring System used. As we can see, no changes on the Top 4 between the Old and the New Systems.

From the table, we can draw some conclusions:

a) The Scoring System used (any one of them) does not affect extremely the Final Results. Minor changes of 1 or 2 positions, but no dramatic changes.

b) The New Scoring System does not require the best average points to be World Champion what it means that the top 35 in the Qualifying Series has a chance to win. Raúl Ríos would win the Championsip in any case but using the Old System, an average of 5,8 points in each race could be enough to be World Champion.

I think the New Scoring System (when using Blue and Yellow fleets) is really good because nobody can say who will win until the last race is finished. All of us have seen regattas where the winner is known before the last race or even in the last two races. With this system, emotion and uncertainty keep the regatta alive, adding that, if you want to win, you have to reduce your average positions and to be the very best.

On the other hand, compressing the fleet after the Qualifying Series by carrying the Overal Position only, opens the door to more competitors that may be the winner during the Finals. For instance, Rayco Tabares coming from 15th in Qualifying to 3rd or Alfredo Gonzalez coming from 30th to 4th. So we can assure that, even when you do not get a good position in Qualifying, the regatta is not over for you, what, again, is good for the entire fleet.

I like the Blue System (Worlds and European 2016) because it compresses the fleet. Maybe competitors do not see their effort in the first 5 races in the points (only 1 point between positions) but this is an opinion from the top 10. I think it is good to conserve your options to win until at least the middle of the regatta.

Don´t you think that 30 boats conserving their options to win after the first 6 races is good for the competition? It estimulates competitors and grows emotions.

Raúl Ríos and Marc Agnese deserved to be, regardless on the Scoring System, and they are, the fairest World Champions.