Olympic format improvement?

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 tehmarks 18 Aug 2021

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2021/aug/18/modern-pentathlon-horse-punch...

Is your money on Kate French after four years of intensive lead climbing, or Janja after four years of wielding an epee?

Removed User 18 Aug 2021
In reply to tehmarks:

Few things seem so utterly pointless than speed climbing, but modern pentathalon must be right up there.

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In reply to tehmarks:

If they want to keep to the narrative of the lone soldier escaping then I guess it would have to be auto-belays on a relatively easy route. So old school speed climbing where the route changed at every comp, routes were demonstrated, I guess a video demonstartion like in Lead World Cups for the qualification round. 'Classic' speed routes used to be about 7a/7a+

OP tehmarks 18 Aug 2021
In reply to Graeme Alderson:

> If they want to keep to the narrative of the lone soldier escaping then I guess it would have to be...

Speed soloing on a real crag. Now that would be worth watching. After all, it is only a real sport if it involves significant peril — at least according to Mr. Hemingway.

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OP tehmarks 18 Aug 2021
In reply to tehmarks:

Sorry, I correct myself. Speed soloing on a real crag while being shot at by the other competitors, which will form the shooting element of the competition. Seems like the most logical and homogenous format to me.

 Philip 18 Aug 2021
In reply to tehmarks:

Scrap the whole escaping soldier thing, and make it more of an adventure.

Open water swim, speed climb, canoe slalom, cross country run, and ???

Best I could come up with for 5th activity was coconut shy.

Edit: mountain biking.

Post edited at 12:52
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 Michael Hood 18 Aug 2021
In reply to tehmarks:

What they fail to mention is that the German lady, on finding she wasn't getting on with "her" horse, could have opted for one of the reserve horses - but she didn't.

Having said that, I believe she was in the second pool of riders, and that particular horse had already done something similar with its 1st pool rider (difficult to find confirmation of this since 1st rider wasn't in contention) and I've no idea if that information is passed on to the 2nd pool - unlikely.

When that occurs, shouldn't the officials withdraw that horse since it may just be having an "off" day rather than it being a test of horsemanship with an unfamiliar horse.

 RBonney 18 Aug 2021
In reply to Michael Hood:

This was mentioned by Claire Balding but she said that the reserve horse is a reserve for a reason and it's a big risk taking it. They don't know if it can do the jumps. I think in this case it would have been a gamble worth taking though, but it's easy for me to say. 

 Michael Gordon 18 Aug 2021
In reply to Michael Hood:

Pretty poor how she elected to carry on with a horse that was clearly unhappy, making it more and more stressed. You've only got to see a tiny bit of footage to see how much it's sweating. Considering the welfare of an animal is clearly not one of the tests of the 'modern' pentathlon.   

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In reply to tehmarks:

I kind of like the idea of the new Olympic sport of horse punching replacing dressage and being a two round contest.

Round one, a rich b*stard punches a horse, round 2 the horse kicks them in the head.

 hang_about 18 Aug 2021
In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

If they want to keep animals involved then 'swim + alligators' or 'swim + sharks' could work and be in line with the escaping ethos. 

 Michael Hood 18 Aug 2021
In reply to RBonney:

> This was mentioned by Claire Balding but she said that the reserve horse is a reserve for a reason and it's a big risk taking it. They don't know if it can do the jumps. I think in this case it would have been a gamble worth taking though, but it's easy for me to say. 

I'm surprised, I'd have thought:

  1. You have X contestants divided into 2 pools, so you get Y horses where Y = X/2 + reserves.
  2. You then randomly decide which horses are the reserves.
  3. You then randomly decide who gets which horse.

The implication of what CB said is that step 2 is replaced with "the worst horses are the reserves".

You could of course just randomly decide who gets which horse and the ones left out are the reserves, but it appears that's not the case since the reserves were IIRC the same for both pools. But even if you wanted to do that you could randomly allocate pool 1 to all horses, and then allocate pool 2 to just the non-reserve (already ridden *) horses.

(*) - I was going to say "already used" rather than "already ridden", but that would be less technically correct although maybe more appropriate.

 magma 18 Aug 2021
In reply to tehmarks:

yeah, big issues with horses and olympics, but bigger issues with athletes and their mates flying around the world qualifying/training etc

 Ian W 18 Aug 2021
In reply to Removed User:

> Few things seem so utterly pointless than speed climbing, but modern pentathalon must be right up there.


I think modern pentathlon was originally meant to be a competition of posh manly pursuits, seems to have morphed into an audition for the next Milk Tray Man*......

*..or woman.

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 magma 18 Aug 2021
In reply to Ian W: these guys with guns?

youtube.com/watch?v=zGxSM5y7Pfs&

 Robert Durran 18 Aug 2021
In reply to Removed User:

> Few things seem so utterly pointless than speed climbing, but modern pentathalon must be right up there.

I would have thought bouldering and lead climbing would come close. I thought the whole point of modern pentathlon was that it was meant to be useful (for a cavalry officer at the time it was invented).

 Michael Gordon 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Robert Durran:

If they're trying to mimic a lone soldier, surely an assault course event would be more suitable? You could incorporate shooting into that. Or just join the armed forces and see what they're really made of...

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 Offwidth 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Robert Durran:

The old french cavalry test,  three bottle of champagne, three horses, three willing partners etc, might have been an interesting alternative choice? In the end most well known sports are just games with rules that developed and became popular. Modern pentathlon is a bit unusual as it was invented for the Olympics. A sport in the Olympics will always have some keen competition. On the other issue of opinions of what is pointless, as the old saying goes opinions are like arseh*les, everyone has one.

 Howard J 19 Aug 2021
In reply to tehmarks:

All sports are pointless and artificial, not excluding climbing, and I am cautious about criticising an activity I don't participate in and have little knowledge of.  Modern Pentathletes are well aware that they will be riding an unfamiliar horse.  The point is to test different skills of horsemanship, not simply showjumping (the jumps are considerably lower than in the specialist events). The randomness introduces an element of unpredictability and perhaps unfairness, but that is what the competitors sign up to.  It is hard to tell whether Annika Schleu's experience was down to the horse or her own failure to get control of it, but the latter is what the event aims to test.  It is perhaps the hardest of the MP disciplines to master, simply because it involves another sentient being.

There are questions about animal welfare, and there have been criticisms of it from "pure" equestrians, but similar concerns could be raised about all equestrian sports (and are).  Is it cruel to the horses?  I simply don't know enough to form a view. I have done enough riding to know that you can't force a horse to do something it doesn't want to do - as Schleu discovered.  It does seem to be cruel to the competitors, but that is sport for you (as the weird scoring system for the climbing also demonstrated).

Animal welfare aside, it seems to me that any reforms are for Modern Pentathletes themselves to decide, not Guardian journalists or climbers.

In reply to Removed User:

> Few things seem so utterly pointless than speed climbing, but modern pentathalon must be right up there.

Most of the swimming styles other than freestyle?

 Sean Kelly 19 Aug 2021
In reply to tehmarks:

One thing possibly that we could take from the Olympics is the losing finalists in the FA Cup, Euros & World Cup(football), would be awarded  Silver Medal, not the dreaded 'loser's medal. Also the corresponding the semi-finalists would get a Bronze medal. It would remove most of the negatives of not actually winning. Compensation so to speak.

Post edited at 13:17
OP tehmarks 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Sean Kelly:

They might not act so ungraciously as one of our Olympic boxers did in declining his silver (sorry mate, you got the medal your performance deserved, stop being a child), but in a knockout-format team tournament, let's be honest, no team is likely to go home thinking 'excellent, we got silver!'. Losing is losing regardless of the award you do come away with.

Obviously I don't play sports at a high level, but even recreationally and even when you've already outperformed realistic expectations, it's a bit gutting to go out of any tournament.

 Ramblin dave 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Robert Durran:

> I would have thought bouldering and lead climbing would come close. I thought the whole point of modern pentathlon was that it was meant to be useful (for a cavalry officer at the time it was invented).

To be honest, I'd have said that climbing fits the basic model of sensible Olympic sports fairly well. You take a skill that has some fairly obvious practical applications throughout a lot of human history - the ability to get up cliffs, over fortifications, onto vantage points etc - and then compete at a stylized version of it.

 Edshakey 19 Aug 2021
In reply to tehmarks:

Wouldn't describe it as ungracious - I thought he conducted himself well in the interview, he was clearly devastated not to win and he showed a very determined attitude. Why should he be happy with silver when he genuinely thought he had a shot at winning gold? He also never said he should have won, I don't think he would deny that he got the medal he deserved, the other fighter was better on the day and that's what wins it.

I would say he was just expressing the feeling of "a bit gutting to go out of any tournament", given they interviewed him almost immediately after it all happened - he was still sweating!

 Michael Gordon 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Edshakey:

Yes, he said that looking back years in the future he may celebrate it as a silver medal, whereas in that painful moment it felt like more a failure to win gold. 

 Michael Hood 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Michael Gordon:

That silver being a failure to get gold will feel much worse for all the events where you're in the gold medal bout.

It won't feel that way so much in things like athletics and swimming where you come second out of 8 in the final.

In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:

The Geordies have been doing it for years youtube.com/watch?v=ApbRL9-slqI&

 Michael Gordon 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Michael Hood:

I'm obviously not speaking from experience, but think it may have more to do with how tantalisingly close the gold medal may have been. Laura Muir for example was never expected to win gold and the goal really was a medal position, so silver was a fantastic result. I can't remember the names unfortunately but another one of our boxers was totally stoked after winning silver in a fight against a long standing world champ (Cuban?).  

 Pedro50 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Michael Gordon:

Ditto Keely Hodgkinson in the 800 metres.

 Sean Kelly 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Pedro50:

> Ditto Keely Hodgkinson in the 800 metres.

She has had a phenomenal year, so this was the icing on the cake for her. To almost come from nowhere and achieve a silver medal was stunning. A silver medal is an achievement and not a 'loser's medal' in the accepted sense. I was aware of her before the games and made a special effort to watch her race live, and wasn't disappointed. I love to witness new talent coming through, and hopefully fulfil their potential.

 deepsoup 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Edshakey:

> Wouldn't describe it as ungracious - I thought he conducted himself well in the interview

He did conduct himself well in the interview.  But there's no getting away from the fact that he seemed ungracious in the ring and on the podium.  He's said since that he regrets that, which is fair enough really.  You're absolutely right that you can't blame him for being overcome by his disappointment in the moment.

It probably looked worse than it was because of the contrast to Pat McCormack's conduct the previous night when he was similarly disappointed but was quick to congratulate Iglesias, pay his respects to Iglesias's corner team and thank the referee.  Showed extraordinary strength of character I thought.

Post edited at 21:34
OP tehmarks 19 Aug 2021
In reply to Edshakey:

> Wouldn't describe it as ungracious - I thought he conducted himself well in the interview, he was clearly devastated not to win and he showed a very determined attitude. Why should he be happy with silver when he genuinely thought he had a shot at winning gold? 

Because not accepting your silver medal, publicly at the medal ceremony, because you didn't win gold is not really right, is it? His performance got him silver — devastated or not, declining to wear the medal that you actually did win is not very sporting.

I have no respect for people who can't lose graciously. He was bettered and thus didn't deserve gold — it is that simple.

 Edshakey 19 Aug 2021
In reply to deepsoup:

I hadn't seen his response since, I agree that's quite fair enough. Hopefully he'll be able to channel this into his drive for the future, I'm sure he's even more determined to get the gold next time

 Edshakey 19 Aug 2021
In reply to tehmarks:

I see where you're coming from, and agree to an extent. I think my idea of someone losing ungraciously would be saying how they should have won, disputing the result, blaming others, etc etc. He obviously did none of this, but not wearing the medal was probably a bit far. Almost every other Olympian can do it, so he probably should have managed it.

 Michael Gordon 20 Aug 2021
In reply to Edshakey:

> He obviously did none of this, but not wearing the medal was probably a bit far. Almost every other Olympian can do it, so he probably should have managed it.

Shouldn't be an issue in the next Olympics with pandemics hopefully over and done with. Bowing to receive a medal seems much better somehow than putting it on yourself.


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