Establishing Club Class/Too Many Nationals/Not Enough Competitors

In our discussions here on whether or not too add Club Class to the
list of competitions held in the U.S., the main sticking point seems
to be the effect on adding a burden to place yet another contest at
dwindling contest sites. This should be a real concern for all
classes, not just if we add Club Class to the mix. Just finding sites
to hsot the current 7 classes is tricky and often fraught with
overtones of snobbery (i.e. why would Open 's ever fly with World
Class...)

If it makes sense to burden the Contest Site Comittee with placing an
Open Class and World Class National Championship that generally
average between 5-15 truely in-class gliders, then why is Club Class
being discriminated against when it may only have 11 or more gliders?
Maybe Club would attract more than that - maybe much more. Then which
classes look untennable?

The facts are this: There are fewer and fewer contest sites willing
and able to host a nationals, fewer and fewer contest organizers who
are willing to put in the effort to continue sites or establish new
sites, and fewer and fewer new contest pilots being attracted to
competition, let alone higher competion. We need to change the current
paradigm.

If may offer the Rules Committee a proposal for consideration in
future years: I beleive we need to re-structure the US contest scene
to make it possible to nurture the new contest pilot at the regional
level, add to the luster of some large, already largely established
super-regionals, and provide for better/more attractive racing at the
highest levels. Here are my thoughts - fire away, my flame shields are
up and running...

1) Consider the mandatory siting of two contests per contest site each
year (i.e. Open/18-m, 15-m/Std, Sports/Club, 1-26/World) 4 contest
sites needed each year - down from a possible 7 or 8, if we add Club
Class

- Yes, the "farmer and rancher" may not get along, but wouldn't
completely full contests go a long way to making the organizers view
the immense effort as more justified AND toward getting a true
national champion from pilots who have had to truely qualify to get
in? Contests need a large enough critical mass for success, both $-
wise and competition-wise, THis may be one way to assure that going
forward.
- Along with this, possibly increase the number of pilots at any one
site from 65 to 70, and then give priority entry to 35/35 of each
class until the priority deadline, then take those on the waiting list
from the highest ranked competitors?
- Even if we add Club Class, we actually decrease the numbers of
nationals that have to find homes each year from 7 now to 4.
- Plus, it would mean that the top 35 pilots (more or less) in any one
class must be ranked high enough to gain entry into Nationals, which
after all is a prestige event, and deliver a true national champion
(i.e. there are no more "scrubs" because those pilots have other
venues open to them for high-level competition (i.e. Super Regional
Championships - see below)

2) Consider establishing an official Eastern Regional Championship and
a Western Regional Championship.

- Two super regionals like this already exist (Parowan (West) and
Perry (East) and you could throw in some bids by Mifflin, Montague,
etc. to move the super-regional around the regions.
- For ease of scoring and organizing: These super-regionals might have
the same combined classes as are sited at nationals, only run them
handicapped such as may happen with 15-Std regional classes now.
- The numbers become a little tricky with a 65 (or even a little
higher) glider cap, but I bet this concept would ensure chock-full
contests of whatever size for the two sites named each year.

3) On top of sacctioning the above two concepts of nationals or
national-type competitions, consider awarding contest sites the right
to hold all four nationals each four year period (for example). I.e.
if the next four year cycle awarded contest to Mifflin, Montague,
Uvalde, and Albert Lea, the organizers of these contest sites would
commit to hosting all four nationals over the next four years.

- This might encourage new organizations to get in the game if they
know their huge efforts to get in the game inthe first place would be
rewarded with multiple, ongoing nationals.
- For existing contest organizers this might provide some certainty
that they will be able to host a nationals for the next four years and
encourage contest organizations to hold together for mor ethan one
year.
- The concpet here is to make our racing a circuit that is fixed in
four year (or whtever is palatable) increments.

4) Restrict existing Regional Contests to in-region competitors, or at
a minimum give super priority to in-region comeptitors regardless of
pilot ranking in all classes. AND then maybe give regionals organizers
the opportunity to test new concepts like multiple weekends or
multiple contest sites to name a regional champion.

- The regional level is where the many classes we alrady have makes
things tricky. What classes are organizers going to host? It might
just be left to the contest organizers to determine as entries come
in. Or organizers can host what they want. Or they could mimick super
regionsl type-classes (i.e. two merged with handicapped scoring ine
ach of the merged classes).

RC, please give the current structure of our Nationals, Super-
Regionals, Regionals a good look and see if we can't tweak or make
wholesale changes in the structure to acehieve what I think we all
want:

1) Good Fun, Comraderie and Racing
2) Rationale contest options (i.e. Montague is not a good option for
most east coast pilots, nor is MIfflin for Western pilots)
3) Opportunity for Newbies and clear ladder to higher level
competition for newbies
4) Truely meaningful races for National Championships
5) The best National Team selections possible - hopefully leading to a
new US World Champion

Sincerely and respectfully submitted,
Tim McAllister EY