Posted: Mon Nov 20, 2006 12:35 am
The major business of this year’s Slalom ACM seems to be to consider a series of interconnected propositions designed to slow down rates of promotion.
I do not propose to discuss the detail of the proposals, because in my humble opinion the whole set of proposals is based on a series of misapprehensions about individual paddlers within the ranking system; about the means whereby slalom paddlers learn and progress; and, indeed, about what a ranking system is for! This opinion is based on the justifications for the proposals contained in the agenda; and on my knowledge and experience of bringing paddlers - particularly young paddlers - through the system.
Some of the problems quoted do not, in my opinion, exist; some do exist, but putting them right has to be the responsibility of Clubs and Club Coaches, because they relate to judgements of individual paddlers that can surely only be made by Coaches, preferably their own coaches, but certainly by coaches with current experience of bringing relatively large numbers of paddlers through the Divisions: and sadly for the sport there are not more than a dozen or so Coaches to whom that description could apply.
Tendentious Statement 1:
‘fills Division 1 with paddlers who are not yet ready for the courses Division 1 offers’
a) I do not see how an observer of Division 1 races - particularly the most difficult end-of-season races, the McConkey and Llangollen - could conclude that it is the recent promotees who ‘are not yet ready for the courses Division 1 offers’.
b) Coaches clearly think differently: which is why almost without exception they recommend their Division 2 paddlers to take Judges’ runs at Division 1 (and Premier) races! And it is a nonsense to suggest that doing a Div 1 course as a Judge is somehow ‘easier’: like when you have sat on the bank at Tully for 3 hours freezing you wotsits off, and then have ten minutes to make the start?
c) A paddler is ready to paddle a Div 1 course when he/she is ready to benefit from doing so: and that is a call which a Coach makes on an individual paddler: a ranking system cannot decide it.
‘the promotion system strips the lower divisions of ability’
a) That comment could only be true if we assumed a static model - that paddlers do not improve during an eight-month season. But in many cases that eight-month season is a third or a quarter of the whole slalom career to date of a paddler who advances from Div 4 to Div 1 in two seasons or not much more: if paddlers were not improving radically, what is all that coaching and practice for?
b) Examination of results would suggest the opposite: that paddlers who are promoted to Div 1 or Div 2 in September/October are better in September/October than paddlers promoted in March were in March i.e. by comparing their results against the paddlers who are static - who have been in the bottom half of Division 1 or Division 2 for a year or two.
c) Therefore I would argue that if we had a system like the French one whereby all results are compared to ‘M.Base’ it would tell us that the overall standard of each Division is actually as high, if not higher at the end of the season than at the beginning of the season.
‘to give developing paddlers a slightly longer apprenticeship’
a) Which Coaches feel that their paddlers need even longer racing on flat or easy water before they get onto Division 1 courses? Has anybody asked them? Clearly not those Coaches who send their paddlers to Division 1 or Prem races while they are still in Division 2.
b) That would indicate that Coaches on the contrary think that the present apprenticeship is too long: there is plenty of research out there to indicate that too much lower-level practice can be counter-productive (French Rugby coaches never train young players at half-speed, for instance, as English Rugby coaches always used to do).
c) Paddling and racing on rough water depends on the development of kinaesthetic sport-specific motor-skills; the principles of Long-Term Athlete Development say that the window of opportunity for this development closes with the onset of the growth spurt. On that basis our paddlers are already being delayed too long - or would be if they abided by the restrictions imposed by the ranking system even at present.
d) Only a paddler’s Coach (or an adult and experienced paddler in situations where there is no coach) is in a position to decide how long a developing paddler’s apprenticeship should be, and what form it should take.
e) No major Slalom nation restricts paddlers in this way - not even France, which is more restrictive than most.
My suggestion is, therefore, that we should reject this package - or rather, send it back to the Competitions Review Committee with the suggestions that:
(i) No proposals should be brought forward until there is a clear consensus as to what our Divisional system is for (on the basis of our masthead ‘Putting Paddlers First’).
ii) That consensus should also be clear on the distinction between what a Ranking System can (and therefore should be allowed to) decide about an individuals programme, and what decisions should be made by paddlers and their Club coaches - and in the case of Juniors, their families.
iii) That consensus should also deal openly with questions involving potential conflicts of interest between paddlers and organisers, so that it could never be said that the sport is slowing down promotions in order to guarantee more numbers and therefore financial viability at lower division events, and a supply of judges at higher division events ...
I do not propose to discuss the detail of the proposals, because in my humble opinion the whole set of proposals is based on a series of misapprehensions about individual paddlers within the ranking system; about the means whereby slalom paddlers learn and progress; and, indeed, about what a ranking system is for! This opinion is based on the justifications for the proposals contained in the agenda; and on my knowledge and experience of bringing paddlers - particularly young paddlers - through the system.
Some of the problems quoted do not, in my opinion, exist; some do exist, but putting them right has to be the responsibility of Clubs and Club Coaches, because they relate to judgements of individual paddlers that can surely only be made by Coaches, preferably their own coaches, but certainly by coaches with current experience of bringing relatively large numbers of paddlers through the Divisions: and sadly for the sport there are not more than a dozen or so Coaches to whom that description could apply.
Tendentious Statement 1:
‘fills Division 1 with paddlers who are not yet ready for the courses Division 1 offers’
a) I do not see how an observer of Division 1 races - particularly the most difficult end-of-season races, the McConkey and Llangollen - could conclude that it is the recent promotees who ‘are not yet ready for the courses Division 1 offers’.
b) Coaches clearly think differently: which is why almost without exception they recommend their Division 2 paddlers to take Judges’ runs at Division 1 (and Premier) races! And it is a nonsense to suggest that doing a Div 1 course as a Judge is somehow ‘easier’: like when you have sat on the bank at Tully for 3 hours freezing you wotsits off, and then have ten minutes to make the start?
c) A paddler is ready to paddle a Div 1 course when he/she is ready to benefit from doing so: and that is a call which a Coach makes on an individual paddler: a ranking system cannot decide it.
‘the promotion system strips the lower divisions of ability’
a) That comment could only be true if we assumed a static model - that paddlers do not improve during an eight-month season. But in many cases that eight-month season is a third or a quarter of the whole slalom career to date of a paddler who advances from Div 4 to Div 1 in two seasons or not much more: if paddlers were not improving radically, what is all that coaching and practice for?
b) Examination of results would suggest the opposite: that paddlers who are promoted to Div 1 or Div 2 in September/October are better in September/October than paddlers promoted in March were in March i.e. by comparing their results against the paddlers who are static - who have been in the bottom half of Division 1 or Division 2 for a year or two.
c) Therefore I would argue that if we had a system like the French one whereby all results are compared to ‘M.Base’ it would tell us that the overall standard of each Division is actually as high, if not higher at the end of the season than at the beginning of the season.
‘to give developing paddlers a slightly longer apprenticeship’
a) Which Coaches feel that their paddlers need even longer racing on flat or easy water before they get onto Division 1 courses? Has anybody asked them? Clearly not those Coaches who send their paddlers to Division 1 or Prem races while they are still in Division 2.
b) That would indicate that Coaches on the contrary think that the present apprenticeship is too long: there is plenty of research out there to indicate that too much lower-level practice can be counter-productive (French Rugby coaches never train young players at half-speed, for instance, as English Rugby coaches always used to do).
c) Paddling and racing on rough water depends on the development of kinaesthetic sport-specific motor-skills; the principles of Long-Term Athlete Development say that the window of opportunity for this development closes with the onset of the growth spurt. On that basis our paddlers are already being delayed too long - or would be if they abided by the restrictions imposed by the ranking system even at present.
d) Only a paddler’s Coach (or an adult and experienced paddler in situations where there is no coach) is in a position to decide how long a developing paddler’s apprenticeship should be, and what form it should take.
e) No major Slalom nation restricts paddlers in this way - not even France, which is more restrictive than most.
My suggestion is, therefore, that we should reject this package - or rather, send it back to the Competitions Review Committee with the suggestions that:
(i) No proposals should be brought forward until there is a clear consensus as to what our Divisional system is for (on the basis of our masthead ‘Putting Paddlers First’).
ii) That consensus should also be clear on the distinction between what a Ranking System can (and therefore should be allowed to) decide about an individuals programme, and what decisions should be made by paddlers and their Club coaches - and in the case of Juniors, their families.
iii) That consensus should also deal openly with questions involving potential conflicts of interest between paddlers and organisers, so that it could never be said that the sport is slowing down promotions in order to guarantee more numbers and therefore financial viability at lower division events, and a supply of judges at higher division events ...