partial credit tricks rule proposal

[eleeski]

AWSA Rules Amendment Request Form

In order to request that the rules be amended you must be a U.S. Citizen and a current member of USA Water Ski with AWSA listed as

your primary sports division. This form must be submitted in electronic format to the Chairman of the Rules Committee by August 31st

to be considered for the upcoming year.

Member Name: _Eric Lee_____________________________________

USAWS Member Number___200008363___________________________

Age Division_M5_______(ex. B1)

U.S. Citizen?_Y___ yes _____ no

AWSA primary sports division? _Y___yes ____no

Rule number to change?____11.12 _____ (ex. 1.08)

Suggested wording:

11.12 B) 1) A clearly recognizable trick shall be credited. Deductions for obvious form breaks shall be limited to 10% per form break.

11.12 E) replace “zero” with “a deduction”

11.12 H) “zero” with “a deduction”

11.12 I) replace “no credit” with “a deduction”

 

 

 

Reason: Regular trick judges are taught to recognize tricks. Regular judges make up the bulk of the judging at most tournaments so most scores are based on the recognition of tricks – not close scrutiny of credit/no credit. Thus it is reasonable to give 90% of the score based on identification of the trick. A 10% cut for a form break is quite reasonable and will improve consistency of scores.

 

 

Background: Trick judging is quite subjective. Unfortunately the subjectivity manifests in an all or nothing score. No other performance based sport gives all or nothing based on subjective assessment of form breaks. A deduction system is reasonable, workable and will enhance the consistency of judging and scoring. A sloppy SLO has much more spectator appeal than a perfectly executed surface O. Let’s remove the random inconsistency for the skiers, make the scoring match what the spectators see, encourage fun exciting tricks and make the skier’s display the focus of tricks – not the judge’s philosophy. Partial credit for tricks will solve the trick judging problem.

 

[Bruce_Butterfield]

Eric, Are you nuts? Sorry, silly question.

 

You want to make trick judging more complicated?

[ToddL]

and everyone gets a trophy!

[ToddL]

@eleeski I think I get where you are coming from, but I kind of agree with Bruce.

 

Right now, trick judges witness a maneuver, determine what it was supposed to have been, then assess if it was performed adequately per the standard, and do this repeatedly within 20 seconds for each successive trick in a run. That's a pretty tall order already. Now, how often do you think those judges are on the fence about a trick meeting the standard? For now, they often swing in the skier's favor and award full credit. If you give them an alternative for 90% of full value, they will start taking away that 10% every time they are on the fence...

 

More often, the judge can see that the trick did not get correctly performed. For those instances, the will still call no credit. They aren't going to give the skier 90% in those cases.

 

About the only times that the 90% might seem applicable are tricks like the opening T7 getting a little hesitation, or a wake trick where the last portion of the rotation was during the landing. Still, I think today unless those error are grossly incorrect, the judges are not cutting those tricks. In my opinopn offering the judges a 90% option will only give them more often a reason to take away 10% from the skier.

[Horton]

Did you hear that? Richelle's head just spun off her neck and hit the floor.

[ToddL]

Who's gonna buy her a case of her favorite beer or wine? She's gonna need it to survive the rules committee meetings.

[eleeski]

@ToddL and @Bruce_Butterfield As a trick judge, the hardest thing is deciding if that trick was enough in conformance to score. Deciding on deductions is a lot easier. I have judged springboard diving a bit. It is a lot easier - when you embrace the subjectivity.

 

Judging will always be an issue - but the all or nothing format in waterskiing is not working and never has. The skier who scored the tricks at every tournament but Nationals might be bitter enough to quit - it happens too often time and again. Structurally, trick judging does not work.

 

@Horton Richelle loves me...

 

Eric

[klindy]

@eleeski said "@Horton Richelle loves me..."

 

...I admire your...um...confidence!

[Horton]

@eleeski Richelle does not think you are as funny as I do

[Edbrazil]

Back in the back-back when, tricks had judging options of 10% off and 20% off. Also had the

Rideout Bonus. And Neophyte tricks, Ramp tricks, and Ski Overhead Bonus.

 

All long gone. I expect it's very unlikely to bring any of them back.

 

With today's trick skis, you sometimes see some humongously slid wake tricks that would

likely have been a fall years back. Like a Wake5 where maybe 180 of it is airborne, if that.

A 10%, 20%, even 30% deduction would still produce a lot of points for a total fail.

[Chef23]

I think the idea has some merit but I don't think 90% credit for a WBB for example that never gets off the water isn't right either. My concern is that this would make trick judging even more inconsistent than it already is.

[Horton]

I can trick a lot more points if I do not have to do the tricks right. if I do not have to get air and the rope can be I the water I bet I can do SL5. hell I do it on the surface easy.

 

think how easy T7F would be if you only lost 10% for stopping in the middle

[Horton]

oooo and RTWBB could be do much safer with a hitch and a slide

[Than_Bogan]

It's not much of an exaggeration to say that I design scoring metrics for a living. One of the core methods for finding and inspecting things in machine vision is to assign a match score. And one of the strongest things you learn very early and repeatedly is:

 

Thresholding is bad.

 

Thresholding is a short-hand for an all-or-nothing decision. Currently, every trick is thresholded: Either you give them full credit or you give them no credit.

 

Thresholding leads to tremendous instability of the score. Any time it's possible to use a continuous score, in which better always gets a higher score, the stability will be much better. It's easy to see why: Suppose I have three sub-scores. Each time I see about a 50% match. If I sum these up, I'll get a total score of 50%. If I must threshold each one (i.e. slam it to either 0 or 100% match), then my final score will almost-randomly be any of 0%, 33%, 66%, and 100%. So not only do a I have a gigantic spread of possible scores, but the correct score (50%) isn't even possible!

 

Eric's proposal may have problems (and I know nothing about trick skiing so I couldn't spot them), but the implied math behind it is correct: If you allow fuzzy scoring, the scoring will become significant more consistent.

[eleeski]

@Horton You don't trick anymore at all! The system already failed you.

 

A T7F is not easy no matter what. Losing it all to a picky judge when you slow down in front sucks (especially when a video frame counter would show that the ski is still moving - technically legal but ugly). @mlusa 's T7 is one of the prettiest out there but because mine is not just like his should I score zero? Or worse, I don't even try it because of the judging randomness. The spectators don't get to see the exciting tricks, the skiers are stuck stressing on their WBB air instead of experimenting with SLBB.

 

@Chef23 Trick recognition is the focus. If the trick truly has zero air, it is easy to see that it is not a wake trick. But if the landing is slid, that is a recognizable trick with a form break. If the skier goes early and slides the takeoff and landing, now you have two deductions - but the trick still is recognizable as a WBB. When the scores are down a bit the spectators and skiers know it was sloppy, if the scores are zero the spectators and the kid who thought it was OK are just confused. Too many skilled skiers lost their WBB at Nationals this year - and only at Nationals.

 

@Than_Bogan Thanks for putting a technical basis on this issue. The randomness of trick judging has done more damage to the sport of tricking and waterskiing as a whole than any other factor.

 

Eric

[Horton]

So …

T5B

TBB

RTBB

TF

TB

RTF

RTB

T5F

TO

RTO

Is only a little better than

Tb

TF

Tb

TF

Tb

TF

Tb

TF

Tb

TF

Tb

TF

Tb

TF

Tb

TF

?

[Horton]

I forgot to add T5F but you get the idea

[Nason]

There will never be a judging system that pleases all skiers.

[Than_Bogan]

@Nason Certainly true, but also doesn't imply we should give up on making it better.

[Nason]

Wit the deduction system described above, we might as well just decrease the point values of all tricks by 10% and say you can slide/hitch them (this is an exaggeration). Also, I feel that if this new system is put to use, we would have to go pack to declared trick runs. Otherwise, how would the judges know the intent of the skier? Did he mean to do a TO, TB or a T5B? Most people do not hesitate on SLB before coming front, so would that be a SLO with a bit of a slide? I do however appreciate my good ski buddy (and mogul connoisseur) Eric pushing for change.

[wski1831]

I like the deduction system, but with a few specific parameters. Like a W5 would need at least 360 degrees, and a T7 maybe allowed a slight hesitation. I also think it should be more than a 10% penalty, to keep the incentive to be doing it right. I think Eric's point is that judging is inconsistent, this may make it easier. The key is implementing a training system.

[klindy]

A T7F with a hesitation is called at TO, TO today. So instead of 450 points you only get 200pts. And if you're cognizant enough to know you missed the T7, then you may change your run farther down the lake. In the declared trick days I routinely wrote my list T5B, TO, TB, TBB, R......so if I heistated the T5B I got credit for the TO, TB and only lost 50 points instead of 350.

 

Obviously you can't do that with all tricks and you *may* be able to note some simplistic form deductions - rope in the water on a ski line or toe line turn, not touching your free foot in the water on line turns, even windshield wiper side slides and alike,

 

But how do I know if I'm a judge whether you intended to do a T5B or you intended to do a TO, TB? I don't see the need for a deduction in that case, it's two different trick sequences. In the case of sloppy wake turns- say a slid W5B - you have to call a W5B N/C currently and you couldn't have called it a WO, B because there is no hesitation between the two tricks. So fine let's call that a form deduction, who defines whether its a 90% good trick or a 30% good trick with more of a deduction? Still a LOT of subjectivity in that system!

 

Call me old school I guess. I get @Than_Bogan's comment about thresholding, it makes perfect sense and I agree that fuzzy scoring would be better, but this needs to be much better defined before I'm comfortable supporting it.

[eleeski]

@Nason @klindy Recognition of the trick is the threshold. Call what you see. Then if you see a hesitation or some sliding after recognizing the trick, then apply a deduction. This is not an effort to define points for an ugly T7 or a sloppy W5F. That is way too complex. If you clearly recognize a trick, that's worth a lot - and it's what the spectators see.

 

Our regular judges have no problem recognizing tricks. Perhaps they are less skilled at identifying form breaks and assessing if that falls outside the rules or not. Senior judges may be better at that (I might disagree but...) - that difference causes a wide enough swing in scores to be very damaging to the sport. The 90% credit associated with merely recognizing the trick is my experienced feel for the difference between regular and senior judges.

 

There will be resistance to a change like this. Many of the established trickers have spent a lot of time making their tricks perfect. Perhaps at the expense of learning some of the bigger but more judging exposed tricks. It will affect the elite skiers and international competition. Maybe for the better if the spectators and judges are on the same page.

 

Eric

[elr]

@eleeski said: "Many of the established trickers have spent a lot of time making their tricks perfect. Perhaps at the expense of learning some of the bigger but more judging exposed tricks." That in my opinion is the beauty of trick skiing - it is extremely difficult and the skier decides the level of risk they want to take based on established trick values - yes different then wakeboarding. In my experience well executed tricks do not get cut. Tricks that are not properly executed get zeroed - it really is binary. The trick values provide the "fuzzy" aspect and spectator appeal. If you want to put "spectators and judges on the same page" eliminate reconciling scores - separate the judges so they can't hear one another and average the 3 or 5 scores. Don't make things more difficult by adding a additional subjective factor.

[eleeski]

Trick judging is broken. It's not a crisis - it's been broken for a long time. The sport is dying a slow death despite really fun and spectator friendly new tricks. I blame the judging.

 

I disagree with @elr . Tricks are absolutely NOT binary. There are no tolerances specified in the rule book. 180 degrees plus or minus what on that B? If the ski slows to 1mm of movement between frames of a T7 does it count as T7 or TO TO repeat? (A smooth T7 may be harder than a jerky one but it is a long way from a string of @Horton 's feared TB TFs.) Is 1mm of air enough? Defining tolerances will be extremely difficult (a solid cut at the wake is 45 degrees at the wake and clearly scoring while a surface B that is 45 short is sketchy). No, it takes subjective judgement.

 

Many incremental improvements have happened to judging. Video eliminated the incompetence missed calls (note that a missed call results in a zero score) (but as video has become more common, certain tricks have extra scrutiny and are subject to different judging standards). Fast tracking elite skiers to a senior judgeship gives skiers with a true understanding of the tricks a say (but jury selection can offset this - like at Nationals this year). Training has gotten much better - trick recognition is quite good now. With all the improvements, judging inconsistency from tournament to tournament is still a problem.

 

Some skiers get an advantage from the current judging system (perhaps I am one of those). Mostly established skiers. The developing skiers who haven't perfected their style are at best held back and at worse discouraged from the sport. The format for judging provides a barrier to new tricks in the run.

 

There are risks to my proposal. @Nason 's worry that we will all lose 10% of our points is a quite scary downside. Judges becoming so lost in the subjective assessment that they miss recognizing tricks is possible (but I find it actually makes calling the run easier for me). Skiers might get so sloppy in execution to take some of the beauty out of the sport (is a sloppy SLO really worse than a perfect WO?). But the real risk is that we will end up with so many enthusiastic trickers that we won't be able to accommodate them all.

 

IWSF will never change unless AWSA does first.

 

Eric

 

@Nason Instead of an across the board cut, perhaps we should give a bonus to tricks done in a spectacular manner. Gymnastics reward Risk, Originality and Virtuosity. Hmmm

[Nason]

@eleeski I like your last suggestion. For example, any body overs done with the rope out of the water have a different value (or bonus) than body overs with the rope laying in the water. Either way the turning portion of the trick is still done in the air. It is difficult to do such tricks in any manner, so one should not lose complete credit just because the rope was in the wrong spot even though the ski cleared the rope and rotated in the air.

 

[elr]

@eleeski said "The format for judging provides a barrier to new tricks in the run." How? And, how does adding an extra layer of subjectivity in judging help?

[GAJ0004]

I entered a few tournaments back in the 1990's and remember having to turn in a trick list. When did they stop doing that? I think it would be easier to judge if the judges had a list. Even though it is not required I still turn in a list just to make it easier on everyone..

[klindy]

@GAJ0004 its been at least 10 years since declared lists were mandatory. IMHO They were far more trouble than the "problems" they were supposed to solve. Some skiers still will provide a list especially if the run is unusual some way.

[eleeski]

@elr The new tricks not in my run due to the "barrier" of judging randomness: T7F T5F TWLF TWLO RTS SLO SL5F SLB RSLB W7B. Every one of those tricks is quite recognizable, cool looking no matter how I do them but completely random on scoring. If the randomness was limited to 10% on those tricks for me, they would be in the run. Keeping those tricks out of my run is a pretty good barrier to showing some fun tricks and inspiring the kids.

 

@Nason I was really thinking of your huge against the grain W5B as one of those tricks deserving a ROV bonus.

 

@GAJ0004 and @klindy Declared trick lists were one of those great ideas that did not work. The judges were not allowed to see the lists - so they did no help at all for the judging. Scoring had a nightmare reconciling all the possible combinations (and we wrote everything down). Had they been a checklist for the judges and offering some flexibility, they could have been great. Video at least ended the lost judge scenario that a declared list kind of helped. Still I always submit a trick list whenever I can. Nationals should allow that.

 

Eric

[elr]

@eleeski - very enviable list of new tricks. Also extremely difficult and time consuming to get scoring. Toe turns have a lot of potential stopping points - so lots of potential lesser included tricks. Ski lines need the line to be out of the water. W7B needs a lot of rotation. Good luck!

[eleeski]

@elr With the exception of just a couple of these tricks, I have scored every trick in a major tournament. They have been available to me for years (decades?) - not new tricks. They get rotated in depending on how the feel of the judging is going (which of the Lees will be there?). Does a slowdown get judged as a hitch? Is the rope in the water or is it a touch timed nowhere near the execution of the trick? Not that clear - either for the judge or the planning of the skier. And an ancient skier doesn't seem to get the benefit of the doubt - or maybe it's my reputation as a ... (ask Richelle).

 

Good luck is mostly in the jury selection. That's what my proposal hopes to change.

 

Eric

[elr]

@eleeski - partial credit for tricks does nothing to address jury selection, it just adds another subjective element . . .

[eleeski]

@elr Sorry if I'm not eloquent or concise enough to explain it right. Removing so much of the variation between juries is the ENTIRE reason to consider partial credit.

 

As long as the deductions are limited, the different juries will have similar scores. Most judges agree on trick recognition. When credit/no credit results in all or nothing scoring the philosophy of the jury drastically changes the final scores and results. Different judges are likely to see a form break - one may think that makes the trick score zero another thinks the trick is in tolerance. With partial credit, agreement on the deduction is more likely. If not the difference is limited to a less heinous swing.

 

Training, clinics, videos - nothing in decades has removed this issue. The only thing removed has been participants - making tricks a tiny sideshow with the talent leaving for wakeboarding.

 

Eric

[eleeski]

@elr Sorry if I'm not eloquent or concise enough to explain it right. Removing so much of the variation between juries is the ENTIRE reason to consider partial credit.

 

As long as the deductions are limited, the different juries will have similar scores. Most judges agree on trick recognition. When credit/no credit results in all or nothing scoring the philosophy of the jury drastically changes the final scores and results. Different judges are likely to see a form break - one may think that makes the trick score zero another thinks the trick is in tolerance. With partial credit, agreement on the deduction is more likely. If not the difference is limited to a less heinous swing.

 

Training, clinics, videos - nothing in decades has removed this issue. The only thing removed has been participants - making tricks a tiny sideshow with the talent leaving for wakeboarding.

 

Eric

[eleeski]

@elr Sorry if I'm not eloquent or concise enough to explain it right. Removing so much of the variation between juries is the ENTIRE reason to consider partial credit.

 

As long as the deductions are limited, the different juries will have similar scores. Most judges agree on trick recognition. When credit/no credit results in all or nothing scoring the philosophy of the jury drastically changes the final scores and results. Different judges are likely to see a form break - one may think that makes the trick score zero another thinks the trick is in tolerance. With partial credit, agreement on the deduction is more likely. If not the difference is limited to a less heinous swing.

 

Training, clinics, videos - nothing in decades has removed this issue. The only thing removed has been participants - making tricks a tiny sideshow with the talent leaving for wakeboarding.

 

Eric