The European WaterSki Council conducted a large number of reviews of End Course videos

[Horton]

Source: http://iwwfeatc.com/entries/general/ranking-list-scores-downgraded

Ranking List Scores Downgraded

November 28, 2019

Removal of Scores from Ranking List (November 27, 2019)

The European WaterSki Council conducted a large number of reviews of End Course videos from Tournaments in 2019.

These included:

All tournaments where a 10.75 pass was completed.

All Elite and Titled Tournaments

Other – random – tournaments.

This review found that:

The Boat Path for a number of passes was not in tolerance.

As a result of technical problems in some rounds of some Tournaments it was not possible to supply End Course video to the WaterSki Council.

See full information here (corrected/updated information). ⇐ ⇐ ⇐ ⇐ ⇐ ⇐ Click the blue link for the details

[thager]

Yet another conspiracy put forth by the auto drive industry to get waterskiing into the Olympics. Ha!

[jayski]

 

[Horton]

I have not done a deep dive yet but at least one complete 41 has been thrown out.

[Kelvin]

Several scores were reduced to 6@38off. Heavy scrutiny of 39 and 41off passes. Some tournaments without endcourse video had all scores above 35off reduced to 6@35off.

 

[aupatking]

6 @ 35 is harsh. Hopefully that’s enough to get all the BS to stop. When it hurts your ranking to ski at a tournament, you stop skiing that tournament. Or country

[Horton]

wonder if affected skiers will get entry fees back

[Than_Bogan]

From a few thousand miles away, this is certainly a much better look. Gives the impression of being a serious investigation with serious plans to do better in the future.

 

Hopefully my impression from afar is accurate!

[thager]

NBC

[bishop8950]

I am glad there was a review and follow up. It’s good to see organizing bodies working to ensure the integrity of events and the resulting scores.

I remember how muck flack @Horton got for questioning scores that summer. I remember posting this, and hope others find that it’s ok to be in camp 2.

 

Post July 2018

Upon learning of extraordinary scores from any event, I expect most peoples responses to fall in one of the following three camps:

1) Great Job and congrats!

2) Really? Are we sure?

3) No way, I don’t buy it, didn’t happen, I don't need evidence

Of course we all have the right to choose our camp. Debating which camp is the right one is futile. The part about this that bothers me is those that insist 1) is right 2) is rude and 3) is just flat out wrong. I am in camp 2) and think about it like this:

Were the scores possible? Yes.

Were the scores exceptional? Yes.

Did they happen in sanctioned events? Yes.

Is it still possible something was amiss? Yes.

Are the scores valid unless proven otherwise? Absolutely.

Is it reasonable to question the exceptional results? I think yes.

This said, we should be carefull from keyboards thousands of miles away and leave it to the hardworking officials of the events. But, if we as members of the community don’t maintain a culture where its ok to question results, the integrity of scores and records will be at risk.

[Bill22]

Is this going to change the Elite rankings list?

 

I thought the list was finalized each October but at http://www.iwsfranking.com/ I didn't see a 2019 list. I am talking about the the list used for Masters invitations.

[Horton]

@bill22

That is a super interesting question.

I think at least 2 of the 11 events that had scores pulled had Elite points.

[drew]

This is a very difficult issue--as there are many critical tolerances that combine for a legitimate score. And driving is certainly one of them--but lets not forget rope lengths, the survey, buoy sizes, and boat times. It certainly takes leadership for the European Council to review and apply the sanctions that they have... and there will always be some controversy.

The boat path is extremely critical at the highest levels as the margins for error are so small. This is due to the delta between (deficiency of) the rope length and the width of the course. A wider slalom course would (albeit slightly) reduce the role of the boat path, and skier height--back to the comments in the 42 off thread:

 

https://www.ballofspray.com/forum#/discussion/21136/42-off/p2

[Horton]

Digging deeper into this for the next DFC. Holy Shit 500+/- scores have been pulled or down graded.