What, no Olympics thread?

[johnsemlak]

Yeah, less than a tenth of a second amongst all of the top five racers.

I do wish Mo Green would have won, though. Gatlin comes across as unsufferably arrogant.

Well, I know nothing about Gatlin, but the article I read about his victory commented on his grace in winning (compared with the infamous celebrations of the USA's 4x100 team in Sydney).

 

[Hypersmurf]

The problem with consistency in this is that rules for each sport (including disputes with officials) are mostly handled by the federations governing each sport (the FIG in the case of Gymnastics). I'm not familiar with the exact rules in either case, but the FIG could have different procedures for how to dispute (and correct) an judge's decision, than say in Equestrian.

Yeah - the FIG basically said "Protests regarding scoring will not be entered into, by FIG regulations", even though they admitted the scoring was incorrect, as I understand it.

I haven't seen any of the gymnastics this Olympics (It's about the only gymnastics coverage we get here in New Zealand, ever, and this year I haven't caught any of it...) ... but I hear a rumour that in the apparatus finals today, the judges changed their scores for a high bar routine based on crowd reaction...?

-Hyp.

 

[Tallok]

I was watching said high bar competition, and even the raised score was too low, imho. great routine, nearly flawless, to my untrained eyes. one step at the landing. the entire crowd, and the announcers were schocked to see a score much lower than expected. lower, in fact, than other people with routines less impressive, granted, slightly smaller steps on the landing. anyway, it was clearly unfair, and so the people yelled about it in the crowd, and the guy overseeing judging went over and talked with the judges who had given very very low scores, inconsistently low, in fact, and they changed them. that's how I remember it, at least.

 

[Dogbrain]

Any so-called "sport" wherein the results are determined by "scores" handed out by judges rather than an objective measure should be eliminated from the olympics, as it is not really a sport.

 

[Maerdwyn]

I was watching said high bar competition, and even the raised score was too low, imho. great routine, nearly flawless, to my untrained eyes. one step at the landing. the entire crowd, and the announcers were schocked to see a score much lower than expected. lower, in fact, than other people with routines less impressive, granted, slightly smaller steps on the landing. anyway, it was clearly unfair, and so the people yelled about it in the crowd, and the guy overseeing judging went over and talked with the judges who had given very very low scores, inconsistently low, in fact, and they changed them. that's how I remember it, at least.

The scoring that whole night - not just regarding Alexi Nemov, who you're talking about, was just awful. I think four gymnasts did routines of varying difficulty, completing them with varying proficiency, and received the exact same score, down to the thousandth of a point. The crowd had been booing the judging all evening, and when Nemov, who had done a supremely difficult routine better than the four 9.762 gymnasts, save for a step on the end (two of the 9.762 gymnasts had steps on the end as well), received a 9.732, they went nuts. The booed the judges, loudly, for upwards of ten minutes. The judge's supervisor reviewd the scores and got one of the judeges to up his score, but the crowd kept going. Only when Nemov went out and tries to calm the crowd down was the next gymnast - Paul Hamm - able to go. The judges proceeded to over-inflate his score, IMO, just to prove they weren't being overyly harsh anymore. And yet when the final gymnast clearly outshined Hamm, he received the same score as Hamm did, winning only on a technical tie-breaker. Judging is always subjective - I'd never seen it so awful before.

 

[Ferret]

They are measured. They have a system of scoring so that say a handstand for less then 3 seconds is a two point penlty where as some flipping out on the Floor could give two points. It isn't based on whether the judges like them, it's based on the skill.

Any of you following Paula radcliffs progress?

 

[Maerdwyn]

They are measured. They have a system of scoring so that say a handstand for less then 3 seconds is a two point penlty where as some flipping out on the Floor could give two points. It isn't based on whether the judges like them, it's based on the skill.

Ideally, of course - in actuality, reputation (personal or national) factors in. Order of competition factors in (those who go late generaly receive higher marks, because judges need to leave room for improvement over what early competitors do. Last night (or whenever what I saw last night was taped), evidently, randomness factored in.

 

[Iuz]

Don't get me start on the men's vault . . .

Evidently I could get a 9 in the Olympics because totally messing up is worth that much.

 

[Ferret]

Maybe they start at 9 and doing nothing can't incure penalties?

 

[Maerdwyn]

For gymnastics, they assign point values to each skill involved in a routine. They total all the points that could be gained from completeing those skills flawlessly. That's the highest value you could possibly get, usually in the 9.7-10.0 range at the olympics.

For everyflaw in the skills you demonstrate, or fail to include, you lose points from that maximum score, down to a minimum of zero if you fail to attempt the routine. Things like completely falling over and off to the side after a vault that starts at a 9.8 difficulty should *not* net you a score over 9.0.