Drop a day option for US regionals

Pilots all:

The US rules have for several years had the option of "drop your worst
day" scoring. So far noone has used it, but I for one would like to
give it a try.

Most of all, I think pilots will like it a lot. Yes, in the end
somebody has to win, but that horrible feeling of “now I’m screwed I
might as well go home” after a landout or a bad day will vanish,
making the contest a lot more fun.

I think it can help safety. I think pilots would more quickly give up
on awful days, choosing to take their “drop day” rather than press on
causing the usual landout damage we see on weak days. I think it
would also help pilots to make that hard decision to abandon the task
in thunderstorms or clearly dangerous weather.

There is a bit of a counterargument. Perhpas pilots will strike out
and fly more aggressively knowing they can drop a landout. This might
get worse on the last day, and pilots might feel the need to do more
math and strategizing. I don't think this is true, but that's why we
need to try it in regionals.

I also our team selection also puts too much emphasis on avoiding one
bad day, and thus too much emphasis on flying lots of contests in lots
of different classes. Moving this to nationals and team selection will
take years of course, but if everyone thinks it's great that could
happen eventually.

The rule is rather carefully crafted. If you just “drop your worst
score” you might end up dropping the day you won, if it was devalued
to 500 points. Instead you “get the winner’s score” on whichever day
that helps you the most. And it phases in, as it should for short
contests. The actual text is below.

I'm talking to one CD about trying this at a regional this year, and
will talk to more as the schedule gets finalized. Certainly, a
groundswell from pilots of "hey, could we try the drop a day (or more
accurately, worst day adjustement) at this contest?" would give us
more chances to try it. So, I'm posting this in the hope that lots of
pilots will talk to the CDs of contests they plan to go to and
encourage them to give it a try, or that CDs will see the post
directly and get the bug. In all fairness, the decision to use this
should be made early and well publicized.

John Cochrane
BB



11.4.4 † Worst Day Score Adjustment
If this is declared to be in effect, an adjustment is calculated and
added to the cumulative score of
each entrant.
11.4.4.1 † Worst Day Score Differential
For each entrant, WDSD is the greatest difference on any contest day
between the entrant's score
(before application of a Contest penalty) and the highest score
achieved by any regular entrant in
the class on that day.
11.4.4.2 † A Worst Day Score Adjustment is added to each entrant's
cumulative score, as follows:
After one official day: WDSA = zero
After 2 official days: WDSA = 0.25 * WDSD
After 3 official days: WDSA = 0.5 * WDSD
After 4 official days: WDSA = 0.75 * WDSD
After 5 or more official days: WDSA = WDSD