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i think the touch rule should remain this restrictive to avoid any kind of subjectivity
i totally agree with Marcello and other judges giving Goran the red card, even if he maybe knew from the beginning that a protest was 100% leading to a white card
some decisions must be taken away from external pressure (public, coach, the athlete himself) to guarantee fair judgement
chapeau Goran for your behavior after the dive :king
this is not what i meantIt doesn't make sense to me to protest against the rules, only against the application of the rules.
the protest analysis must be intended to be objective by definition or at least as much objective as a judging human being can be, or we don't need judges anymore :hmmBut if there is a subjective protest after the objective judging, the whole process is subjective by definition. So why not make it subjective in the first place and save everyone the drama?
this is something i can really sharewhy do the coach have to stay close or even in the water, with the athlete? Thats the biggest problem.
Since its a individual performance coach shouldn't be allowed to "interfere" with the performance, like in many many other sports?
while this i don'tAlso let the satey to touch. You have to trust you stafett or you have the wrong person at the job? Saftey first.
this is something i can really share
while this i don't
Thanks Jouskary for your nomination: i promise i'll make my best for aaaaall of you freediving people... and for peace in the world, too!!!
Kars, marketing is one of the things freediving need most to grow, at least in Italy
it's something i've been thinking of for a long time and still haven't found: let's open a topic about this!!
I was happy to see Goran's red card overturned, regardless of whether the safety's touch was technically in violation. Judges must have some ability to apply common sense in borderline cases, governed by the spirit of the rules. Written rules are designed to minimize ambiguity, but it is not possible to get this down to zero. (Did the athlete properly say "I'm OK" or was it a mumble? If goggles are moved upward 3cm to the eyebrows, do we consider that "removed" or not? If a coach in static is in the motion of tapping at the same instant the athlete decides to come up, and jumps back a split-second later, should this really result in a disqualification? If a CWT diver disconnects his lanyard on the ascent for safety reasons, how far away from the line can he surface before he is considered "out of the comp zone" and DQ'ed?) So there will always be unforeseen ambiguous circumstances requiring a human judgment call.
My preference would be to see the rules stated as simply as possible using common sense, to allow room for judges' interpretation in borderline cases. (E.g.: "If a safety diver, coach, or judge provides any physical assistance to an athlete before a card is given, the athlete is disqualified.") There is still a strong incentive on every side to keep things unambiguous, by not touching at all. If no touch occurs, there is no ambiguity. But in the case that the diver does inadvertently touch the judge's foot, or is congratulated by a careless safety, the judges should have the discretion to decide the outcome in the spirit of the rules. These decisions could theoretically be protested and appealed up to a "Supreme Court" of A-level judges, but the buck stops there. We are humans judging humans on a human endeavor, and perfection is not attainable. We shouldn't pretend that it is.
My own opinion on a case such as Goran's is that, since the interference was not his (or his team's) fault, he should AT LEAST have been allowed a re-swim; i.e. the entire dive should have been invalidated as if it never happened. Perhaps there should be an additional color card for this. (A clear card?) Outright "Disqualification" seems entirely inappropriate in such a case. What if the safety diver accidentally bumps into the diver 15 meters into his swim? What if the announcer messes up the countdown? Clear card, re-swim. But in the spirit of the rules, Goran's performance was obviously very solid, and in any case was technically completed (mask, signal, ok) before the interference occurred. So although there was admittedly some level of ambiguity introduced by the touch, it was not enough to disqualify the performance. As an AIDA judge myself, I would also have given a red card because of the technical ambiguity (or a "clear card" if such a thing existed), and changed it to white on review. Just my two cents.
Personally, I'd be very careful in making the rules more ambiguent, and giving judges too much freedom and more right to decide. Judges are subjective, and they do have liasons with freedivers, which makes them even more subjective. We do not want to be again in the situation like we were for example with samba in the days before the new SP, where at one judge your performance finished with a white card, despite a heavy LMC, while at another one you could not even smile or move a finger, without it being considered an uncontrolled movement, resulting in a red card.