AIDA Team World Championship 2012

[Erki]

What happened with Finnish men in DYN?

 

[spar8]

They did not dive.

 

[trux]

I do not know - the official results show some strange data - zero RPs, white cards, but high penalty eliminating the AP value entirely. I guess the organizer instead of using a standard and tested Excel sheet, used some shitty untested application, that is not able to handle the points and cards properly. It may mean DNS in fact.

 

[finflyer]

Second hand info: Both Mikkos protested against the judging decision that gave Mikko N. a red card in STA. The judge decided to play safety diver and grabbed Mikko's hand after a good SP when weak samba occurred, even the safety divers did not react. Finnish team filed a protest with no success, so they decided to retire from competition. I hope that Mikko P. will write here and give more details.

V

 

[dannybuoy]

A collection of pictures here:

AIDA team world championship, Nice - a set on Flickr

 

[Simos]

A collection of pictures here:

AIDA team world championship, Nice - a set on Flickr

Great photos, thanks Daan! Are those weights on Alexey's back? How are they attached?

 

[dannybuoy]

Great photos, thanks Daan! Are those weights on Alexey's back? How are they attached?

Good, huh? They have velcro glued to them.

 

[Kars]

I'm expecting a new suit end of October, that will have a more elegant implementation of carrying the dynamic weights on the back. I'm looking forward of liberating myself of the neck pressure...

Very nice photo's Daan, I love your light hearted beautiful impression of the event!

 

[chrismar]

Second hand info: Both Mikkos protested against the judging decision that gave Mikko N. a red card in STA. The judge decided to play safety diver and grabbed Mikko's hand after a good SP when weak samba occurred, even the safety divers did not react. Finnish team filed a protest with no success, so they decided to retire from competition. I hope that Mikko P. will write here and give more details.

V

Sounds very poorly handled by the judge and the jury, but that's only going on the information provided. I would have been pretty angry too, as the competitor is never supposed to be disadvantaged by organisational mistakes. Who was the judge? Was the DQ for the touch or for what caused the judge to touch him? The latter would be fine (assuming it was a valid reason), but the former would definitely be an incorrect decision.

 

[lojo]

From whatt I heard, the athlete was falling back when the jugde asked safety to hold him.

I am a bit surprised that sambas are accepted at all in competition. No matter how minor they are.

 

[finflyer]

From whatt I heard, the athlete was falling back when the jugde asked safety to hold him.

I am a bit surprised that sambas are accepted at all in competition. No matter how minor they are.

That is why I will not speculate any further, and would like to see a detailed first hand report, preferably a video. To accept any samba at all, is a rules question, not a judging question, so for this case it's irrelevant.

V

 

[watts]

Did Asso Aurore have weights on her head?

 

[finflyer]

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=4480210132888

Here is the video, so you can decide if red card was right under the present rules.

V

 

[MikkoP]

Second hand info: Both Mikkos protested against the judging decision that gave Mikko N. a red card in STA. The judge decided to play safety diver and grabbed Mikko's hand after a good SP when weak samba occurred, even the safety divers did not react. Finnish team filed a protest with no success, so they decided to retire from competition. I hope that Mikko P. will write here and give more details.

V

That's pretty much it. The judges told that Mikko Niemeläinen had post-blackout mechanical movements. To give a red card for PBMM there has to be at least two very clear and definite noddings of the head. "In the case of any doubt concerning the mentioned signs, the benefit of the doubt will be given to the athlete and his/her performance will be considered valid." In the video I can't see even one clear nodding. There is maybe one small dropping after the protocol, but you can see that the athlete is conscius all the time as he notices himself that he has a samba and takes a better grab from the edge of the pool. After that the judge decides to grab the athlete, who has no problem at all supporting himself.

The Finnish team filed a protest. The jury didn't change the color of the card, and when asked if they could show us the two clear noddings in the video, they refused to do so.

It was a tight dive, no question, but there was nothing that should disqualify the athlete. Samba is no reason for red card, and it was not a reason to give red card to all the other divers who had small or big sambas during these world championships. There were much worse sambas all around in every discipline and they were all given white cards. Also, the most basic rule of judging and safety diving is to not touch the athlete, unless he really needs help and can't keep his airways above water.

After this event Mikko N just couldn't find a reason or motivation to do his dynamic. I thought I would do a performance just for fun, but I felt already so tired and annoyed with the jury and the organisation that I decided to skip it and focused on couching the Finnish womens' team, who did a great job in their first team comp and ended up fourth, only six points from the bronze medal.

Here's the video. Surfacing happens around 2 mins.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=4480210132888

 

[Kars]

From the video I feel that the judge made an unfortunate misjudgement.
Even more disappointing is that they did not point out the specific flawed movement, skipping the response-ability test. Judgement is very difficult, and I think Judges should have the skill and ego to admit their mistakes. Doing that will they would be a great example for (freediving)society. I think freedivers are in their right to demand this.
If the judge fails, the judging team should correct it, with the athletes interest as the hi-est.

I'm in favour of allowing the athlete to dip his airways.
If there is a water level edge, there should be a mat on it, so a falling head would not loose teeth

But in all seriousness I think it's clear that Mikko was very responsive all the time.

The only thing is that with the high-tall edge, the head sticks up high and angle upward making bloodflow to the brain difficult.
Am I right thinking that BO's at CWT are more taxiing for the body then a BO at static? Do Static BO's have shorter recovery times?

 

[cebaztian]

That's pretty much it. The judges told that Mikko Niemeläinen had post-blackout mechanical movements. To give a red card for PBMM there has to be at least two very clear and definite noddings of the head. "In the case of any doubt concerning the mentioned signs, the benefit of the doubt will be given to the athlete and his/her performance will be considered valid." In the video I can't see even one clear nodding. There is maybe one small dropping after the protocol, but you can see that the athlete is conscius all the time as he notices himself that he has a samba and takes a better grab from the edge of the pool. After that the judge decides to grab the athlete, who has no problem at all supporting himself.

The Finnish team filed a protest. The jury didn't change the color of the card, and when asked if they could show us the two clear noddings in the video, they refused to do so.

It was a tight dive, no question, but there was nothing that should disqualify the athlete. Samba is no reason for red card, and it was not a reason to give red card to all the other divers who had small or big sambas during these world championships. There were much worse sambas all around in every discipline and they were all given white cards. Also, the most basic rule of judging and safety diving is to not touch the athlete, unless he really needs help and can't keep his airways above water.

After this event Mikko N just couldn't find a reason or motivation to do his dynamic. I thought I would do a performance just for fun, but I felt already so tired and annoyed with the jury and the organisation that I decided to skip it and focused on couching the Finnish womens' team, who did a great job in their first team comp and ended up fourth, only six points from the bronze medal.

Here's the video. Surfacing happens around 2 mins.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=4480210132888

Mikko. Why do you think the judges in the jury ruled like they did? I guess it was 5 judges voting. What do you think happen? What is wrong with the system? How can it be fixed?

Sebastian

 

[spar8]

My opinnion. Rules should not include anything unclear, and should be same for everyone.
Another example from same competition: Some diver (I'm not saying was it men or women, because it's irrelevant, their judgement was right) in dynamic made bigger samba than Mikko N did, but still got white card. So, if the rule would be same for them, one of the medalists country would be different.
The voting is totally wrong, there should be clear text "In unclear cases, the case should close by for athlete benefit". If I'm not wrong, there even is some text which mean't same than this?

Very excited to see next year world championships. There is lot more samba cases than in team competitions, and I think lot of touch cases in static.

 

[Simos]

Mikko. Why do you think the judges in the jury ruled like they did? I guess it was 5 judges voting. What do you think happen? What is wrong with the system? How can it be fixed?

Sebastian

Without going into changes of the specifics of rules (e.g. PBMM etc) Sebastian, the one thing I think is a real shame is the fact that neither Mikko N or Mikko P got to do their DYN following this whole thing. Just the fact that Mikko P was tired because of the appeal process is wrong in my opinion - I wasn't there but I can imagine it was a pretty stressful situation (and perhaps a bit heated?).

Is there a reason that the appeal and decision has to be done in 'real-time' there at the event, while the competition is still taking place?

Why don't all the competitors finish all the disciplines, launch the appeals if they have some as soon as they get their card but not get a response there and then and then after everything is done and dusted (i.e. all disciplines) all the appeals can be reviewed in calmness and with more time and less pressure and decisions taken. I am sure judges would prefer that too as they won't be on the firing line right away with little time to review and make a decision..

If I remember correctly this was an issue before - I think it might have been Goran's World Record? (slightly different but again judges were under a lot of pressure, then the appeal was rejected and then the athletes had to protest etc etc)

I guess other competitors won't know exactly what the standings are while the competition is happening but then again they will know that an appeal is outstanding, so there is a chance for the decision to be over-ruled.

Just an idea....

 

[finflyer]

Mikko. Why do you think the judges in the jury ruled like they did? I guess it was 5 judges voting. What do you think happen?

I do not feel that those questions can or should be answered by anyone but the persons that made the decisions and voting. All else is speculation leading to nowhere good. If the judges were not willing to point the clear reasons from the video, there's not much to debate of.

V

 

[trux]

Why don't you ask directly your landsman, the president of AIDA, Kimmo Lahtinen? He should know, and I would be surprised if he did not share the information with you.