Race Rules - Youth & Masters age group discussion

[intraftfed]

A. Age group/s in Youth - options proposed are:

a) 16 - 19; 19 - 21
b) 16 - 19, 19 - 23
c) 16 - 19
e) 19 - 21
d) 16 - 21

Considerations are:

1. a), b) or c) are the long term aims as one age group 16 -21 is a mistake and 19 - 21 misses out the real youth. Physically a 16 year old boy/girl is very different to a 21 year old and so should not be competing against them.
2. 19 - 23 is maybe too similar to the adult teams and not really needing its own category
3. Are there enough countries that can put teams together in the age group 16 - 19? Holding a Youth WRC with less than 15 teams is hardly worth it. Maybe we should keep the age group as d) 16 - 21 until we have at least 15 teams in the age category of 16 - 19 that can attend a Youth WRC.

B. Number of teams per category.
It has been proposed by the Czechs to have 2 teams per category instead of 1 as it is now. They feel this will give more Youth teams the chance to race as there are very few races available for them at this stage in time. It also means a chance of more teams attending each YWRC.

C. Masters age categories.
The Czechs have also suggested having a 40+ Masters and a 50+ Masters age categories. There may be very few 50+ teams right now but it is quite easy to include this at an event and this is a category that will grow!

[intraftfed]

I have been running a survey amongst our members re Youth age categories so as to get more information about where our members are as far as youth development. I asked the question: "If the Youth WRC 2013 age category was 16yrs to 19 yrs, would your country be able to send a men's team?" The response was as follows:

Yes = 5 countries (Brasil, Czech, Indonesia, Russia, Venezuela)
Maybe = 6 (Albania, Bulgaria, Canada, GBR, Kazakhstan, Netherlands (GBR and Netherlands having sent teams before))
Probably not/ No = 24 (including the following countries who have sent youth teams before: Costa Rica, Germany, Italy, Japan, Turkey)
No answer yet = 15

A further survey of countries who have youth development has also brought up the following information:
- the following countries would like the age group to be 16 - 21: Indonesia, Italy (actually in their race rules like this), Japan, Netherlands, Serbia
- the following countries would like the age group to be 19 - 21: Turkey
- the following countries would like the age group to be 16 - 19: Czech, Mexico, Russia and Venezuela
and I'm still waiting for answers from the others like Brasil, GBR, Slovenia.

[intraftfed]

From Boris Purjakov via email

In the world there are currently few junior rafting teams. In order to more quickly develop our community, in the beginning there should be more flexibility for the younger categories that most of IRF members don't have, and those who have younger categories, they have it in small number. Our opinion is to foster the development of junior rafting by enabling the junior category runs from 16 to 21 years of age. Serbia is currnetly very active in the development of junior teams, for last two years with a lot of effort and commitment, we succeeded to hire coaches who volunteer for the preparation and training of these young people. For last two years we've got 14.000 $ of the sponsors, just for the junior teams. After several years of working with young teams, when we achive greater number in world, we can divide it in categories: cadets - age 16 to 18, and juniors - 19 to 21. I repeat: Our view is to foster the development of junior rafting is necessary to allow that for now the junior category runs from 16 to 21 years of age.

[Jean Claude Brasil]

I think that to be youth it has to be for younger people who can not run in adult category.
So my vote is for 16-19.

I also think that Master is a good bet for the future. But members in this category should not compete in adult then.

Cheers
JCR
Team Brazil

[Jakob Faerch]

Could it be an idea - on youth level - to introduce R4 with Coxman/guide. As you have in rowing.
Maybe only at (B-level and) C-level youth-events.
This could possible open up for a quicker way for IRF and national federations to develop new teams. The coxman/guide could be allowed of a greater age (adult) - this would be a great way of learning, consider safety for very young peole running hard rivers, etc.

Maybe this would mean that a lot more members would be able to send junior teams?
Of course there will still be normal (real) R4 and R6 youth competition, but there would also be a category for R4+1 Youth and maybe R6+1 Youth.

Future youth categories:
Junior (age 16-19) R4+1
Junior(age 16-19) R4
Junior (age 16-19) R6+1
Junior (age 16-19) R6
Youth (age 20-21) R4 / R6

Could you include this proposal in future survey to members Sue, and ask the question: Would you be able to send a Youth team to a B-level Event if there was a category for R4+1 (adult coxman/guide) or/and R6+1 ? It would be interesting to see if the positive answers are higher. It would still be possible to run normal R4 and R4+1 categories at same events.

Masters category is a must for IRF. The way to join an International Masters organsiation is much faster than the other established international organisations. We need to have a track record of masters events, so great that Czech Rep. have started this
All of us are getting older, master categori wiil soon have many potential competitors.

[paz]

From A GB perspective the youth category would need to go up to 21. The organisation in Britain is mainly run by current competing senior members. There is not a lot of sponsorship or coaching supporting outside of the senior teams. This makes it very hard for us to involve juniors as young as 16 at present. Health and safety becomes an issue as well as finding responsible adults to travel, train and race with the teams if they are this young. The 19-21 category allows us to help the youth teams but not have to take responsibility for them so we are much more able to bring teams along to compete in this age range. To conclude we would be happy with 16-21 or 18-21 or 19-21. I think a masters category is a really good idea but I think one age group would be enough 40+. Although as long as all teams were competing in the same competition you could split the results in the overall classifications into 40+ and 50+.

[Joe Willie Jones]

Hi All,

I am only going to comment on the youth age limits in this post....
My firm belief is that the IRF youth category should be kept at 16-19.

It is true that there are very few 16-19 year old youth teams that currently exist. It is also absolutely true that many countries will not be able send teams to a YWRC – at least until they develop such teams. But again – we knew this already – and this is WHY the IRF formed the youth category in the first place - to promote and encourage the development of our sport among YOUTH !

If we vote to raise the age limit to 21 (or even 23 as suggested by some), then we are getting totally away from this concept. 20 and 21 year old young adults are ALREADY competing in the adult class. We do not need to also add this age group to the youth category - these young adults do not need this kind of special help.

If we keep the 16 -19 age group format, national federations will need to develop a REAL youth league and put energy into coaching and developing infrastructure specifically designed to help, encourage and excite our YOUTH to become involved in the sport of rafting. This is what we want to happen.

The average 16-17 year old competitor cannot equally compete with the average 20 -21 year old. Size, strength and experience NATURALLY put them into different categories. There is no doubt in my mind that if we raise the limits up to 21, then the focus of the youth league will swing towards developing teams of 20 and 21 old young ADULTS - not YOUTH as was intended. Coaching and infrastructure emphasis will be centered on this older group (because they will much more likely be the ages of the competitors on winning teams) and the emphasis on developing young competitors will be lessened or neglected entirely.

The idea is well-intentioned, but poorly conceived - and it could prove to be counterproductive to our stated goal. I vote NO on messing around with the current youth category age structure.

[Denilson]

my vote is for 16-19 male and female.

Deni Brasil Team

[paz]

I agree with Willie's comments that the younger age group is the best way at really attracting young people into the sport, but only if countries are able to enter teams. The problem is that the Costa Rica event was boarder line with the number of teams entered and if the age group had stopped at 19 it probably would not have gone ahead at all. If it is a choice between increasing the age group in the short term to try and keep the momentum and then reduce it when it is a stronger event then I think this is preferable to holding an event that very few teams enter and subsequently struggles.

Sometimes you have to step more slowly towards the desired end result, but like i say if there are enough counties who could provide teams in the younger class then push on. Those questioned that could do this seemed to be low and as I say from a GB point of view I think we would struggle.

[Buzzo]

Hi
We are agree with Wilie´s coments.

[intraftfed]

I think Paz has hit the nail on the head as to exactly what the problem is at the moment - if we make the age group 16 - 19 will we have enough teams to actually bother having a World Champs? Its hugely costly to run a WRC and if there are only 10 teams is it worth it for the organisers? This is a crux question.

A suggestion from the Czechs has been to allow 2 teams per category from each country - maybe this would ensure enough teams?

Cheers
Sue

[Joe Willie Jones]

Hi All,

Sue and Paz are right on that score... I agree that it will be tough to justify a YWRC if only a handful of teams are competing. Keep in mind though that every team sport in existence began with a small core group of enthusiasts until it grew in popularity and recognition. This is the job that we all face in the IRF - we voted to form a youth league, and now it is up to us - each federation and each team and each team member - to go out make it happen. If the idea of a youth league is to grow to fruition, each of us has to do our part to encourage and support the kids who want to participate, and put the hours and effort into making it happen.

I personally have dedicated many months of my time working with and coaching kids when I would rather be paddling myself or spending time with my family. But at the end of the day, there are very few things in life that are more satisfying than working with a talented and enthusiastic kid and helping him or her to become a better paddler - being there at that magic moment when it 'clicks' and a particular technique or movement falls into place for them and they 'get it'. Granted, I am getting old and feeling a need to 'pay ahead' for all that this sport has given me through the years, but this is why I am in the IRF and spending so much of my free time on the computer voicing opinions and slogging through documents in the first place.

So what is the solution in the short term? I could get totally behind the Czech idea of boosting event numbers by allowing two teams from each nation in each category, except for the fact that to allow this, we would need to make a significant change in the rules. The YWRC is a Class A event, and Class A rules allow only one team per nation in each category. Rules are the 'Constant' that we all need so that we have a common point of reference to build our sport around. Continually rewriting rules or making regular exceptions gets to be rather silly and tedious at a certain point. It takes a lot of time to argue though and validate the reasons for a change and finally come to agreement. I am not too keen on the concept of making 'temporary' rule changes anyway - it kind of negates the reason that we have 'rules' in the first place.

I think that it would be a far easier and more reasonable solution if we instead chose to run world youth competitions in the immediate future as a ‘Youth World Cup’ rather than a YWRC. World Cup rules are much more flexible and accommodating – they are designed specifically to do this kind of thing. With a 'World Cup', a host can invite as many local youth teams or teams from each nation as they want - this should solve any problem of low attendance. To me this seems to be a better solution to any low attendance problems as opposed to another rewriting of the rules. In the meantime, we grow the youth league until a proper YWRC is justified at some future date.

[DonPedro]

Hi all,

first of all I would like to have the definition of Youth and Junior racing set in the rules.
Youth up to 18 is there, but the Junior class 21 and under is not officially implemented.
Having done this, we always can allow one or the other class, depending on the difficulty of the river, to be included in future WRC's, not bending the rules.
One day we will have both classes.

In reality this means for us an age group 21 and under will have team members from 16-21 possible.
I can't imagine that we are aiming having all team members 21 years of age for a particular WRC, then next year they are all out and in the seniors.
It always has to be a good mix, so some continuity is in each nations development in the Junior class.
As for Germany, we can't get enough under 18 yrs. interested in raft racing. They rather race kayak and canoe.
It may be different in other IRF nations, but the last two WRC's showed us clearly that there is not enough right now.
It may develop in the future.

[Deb Cook]

Hi

I agree with the idea that we need consistent rules so that the IRF is regarded as a respectable organisation, but this is an area for development. I think it is too early to define youth as just 16-19, as there are not enough nations ready to send teams.

I would vote to keep it at 16-21 for the next while, and also like the idea that events for now could be World Cup, rather than World Champs - meaning that 2 teams per nation could be sent. I think we have to listen to our members and react to what they are telling us. Of course the ideal is for us all to be out there developing the youth, recruiting more people and spending our time helping build the future. But not every nation has the resources to do that and we need to be realistic about what we can achieve.

What I would like to see is Youth events happening in the run up to major senior events. That way they can benefit from having their senior teams there and train with them for the event, and also enjoy the atmosphere and camaraderie of the overall event, ensuring that they want to continue in the sport.

Cheers
Deb

[Staring]

I'm wondering, has anyone tried asking the athlete's themselves?

[Oleg Grigoriev]

Hi All,
Sorry to join you that late.
In my opinion we should set up age groups keeping in mind not the present situation(few nations develop youth sport and can nominate youth teams to the Worlds ) but looking to perspective of successive development and continuity of rafting as sport. So I would suggest finding appropriate solution for the next and subsequent YMWRCs. I hope that within next few years our members will be able to adjust their training programs, National selections etc. to the requirements set up by IRF.

First of all we should not be afraid of possible low attendance of Y&M teams to A-level event as this is the problem of growth. Gradually, we will come to desired attendance though it will objectively (in youth category) be twice lower than at WRC (as only high motivated IRF members will develop youth sport). The “desired” attendance to YMWRC can be discussed later.

Secondly, we have to keep in view that correct age groups division in both youth and masters’ category is based on physical abilities of the athletes.
Specifying division right, we will avoid possibility of improper shaping of a National youth team by a coach or team manager.
For example, making age group too wide (16-21) we open door to a coach/manager to form a team with the ages closer to upper margin of 21 years old and his hands a National YMWRC team will primarily consist of 19-21 years old athletes. So, we unintentionally encourage the process of washing down athletes of younger ages, who in most cases are not able to compete on equal terms with senior sportsmen.
Is it what we were aiming at? In this case proclamation of developing Youth sport by IRF is becoming a profanation. We simply are duplicating WRC, which, as we know, is organizational headache to IRF and additional financial burden to a nation hosting A-level event.

Other factors that can also be counted while determining age groups:
A. Accepted International practice. In paddle sports: 4-5 age groups (Youth&Masters’ categories)
B. Youth sport has different organizational, financial structure and training practices.
Say, Russian rafting federation is dealing with Youth sport clubs, financed by Ministry of Secondary Education and are supported by other youth organizations and parents. Clubs are developing sport activity among ages up to 18 years old, so the programs are adjusted with view to the respective age.
Universities are a separate thing. They only finance students’ teams (age group 19-21/23).
This strict division plus separate reporting to respective agencies is an obstacle to form a mixed team of ages 16-21 in Russia.
Besides, RRF as member of Russian Sport Committee in organizing event should follow its Ages division of 14-16, 16-18(rafting age groups accepted in Russia). That is why competitions in Russia are performed in junior age groups. Ages above 19 years old participate in regular events.
I think that this is more or less universal practice accepted in other countries.

In principle I support Pieter Bekker’s proposal(mentioned in his correspondance) to make norm of IRF Rules the following age divisions: 16-18, 19 -40, 40+. That is very logical concept.
Let me remember that in earlier versions of IRF Rules, the starting age of the athletes to the A-level events was 18 years old. At WRC-2005 age limit was lowered to 16. That means our members have a will and reserve of forming teams with younger ages. It makes sense to return to the previous version of the Rules with regard to this aspect. Doing this we will synthesize additional motive to develop youth sport on national level.
In Masters’ division I can support Czech approach, which has a big experience in the sport of veterans:

My proposal for A-level international events in Youth&Masters' category:
1. 16-19 ( Better 16-18, but National selections may be limited to the age of 18. Since they are done in advance, some of the athletes may turn 19 by the time of YMWRC.
2. 19-21/23 (that group could be introduced to IRF events viewing our Olympic ambitions and meeting the interest of our members who are developing students’ sport).
We should not also forget about International project - World Students’ Games, that can become one of the main IRF targets in future.

3. 40+
4. 50+
There is one more positive aspect of setting up 4(in total) age groups in Youth and Masters’ categories. We can increase attendance of A-level events in future, as 4 National teams can participate here .

Oleg

[intraftfed]

Much of what you say makes sense Oleg. However, there is one point I'm not so sure on

we should not be afraid of possible low attendance of Y&M teams to A-level event

Low attendance affects bids - no one wants to bid for an event that may have less than 10 teams attending. And even on the occasions that it is at a similar time and location to the WRC it still has huge costs to run it. And at times the WRC will be on Class 4/5 rivers with no Class 3 options near by so it will have to be a completely separate event.

To boost this there are various options:
1. Make it a rule that, until the YWRC has enough teams, the Masters WRC must be held at the same time as the Youth.
2. Allow nations to send two teams in each category (2 mens , 2 womens) until there are a decent enough number of teams

Cheers
Sue

[Oleg Grigoriev]

Sue,
We previously have decided to combine for the time being Youth and Masters' events with regular WRC. It could be held prior or after the main event. Y&M can be incorporated in regular event as well, so the attendance of the main event will not suffer. There are some other solutions to this, so that is not the subject of present discussion. I would only attract everybody's attention to the problem of accurate specification of age groups and not more.
Oleg

[intraftfed]

Hi Oleg

At the moment this issue affects my vote strongly. I would not vote for 16 - 19 unless there were definite steps being taken to ensure there are enough teams that will attend the YWRC. There is no rule saying the Masters WRC must be held with the YWRC.

So to me these decisions are dependent on each other at this early stage of development.

Sue

[Oleg Grigoriev]

and again Hi!
Why we consider Youth&Masters' sport in the term of A-level event only?
There are World Cup(series), open B-level events as well.
We can also increase attendance of youth A-level event allowing two teams per group(m/w) and for both class of boats(R6/R4). So we have a huge resourse of attendance even for A-level events.
The problem is how to make these events interesting for a possible bidder, but that is a separate issue.

[intraftfed]

Agreed, I just wanted to ensure that if we do choose the 16 - 19 age group that we then immediately look into how to ensure enough teams will attend to make it worthwhile for organisers to run a WRC.

[intraftfed]

In reply to Starling - we're assuming that each federation is working closely with its athletes and so their answers are based on that as well.

[intraftfed]

The summary so far from the discussions and the survey is that the following countries would like the age group to be:

a) 16 - 21: Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Serbia, Britain, USA (7)
b) 19 - 21: Turkey (1)
c) 16 - 19: Czech, Mexico, Russia, Brasil, Chile, Canada, Venezuela (7)

As you can see its no easy decision one way or the other.

Is there another option? What about two categories as Oleg has suggested before: 16 - 21 and 16 - 19? This would allow each country to send teams in the category that suits them and the countries with more youth teams could then send two teams. Is this realistic?

[DonPedro]

Hi all, as I already proposed Youth (16-18) and Juniors (19-21) should be official race classes within the IRF. The organizing committee in conjunction S&C. com. then can choose what is the best for the venue and championship.

[intraftfed]

Hi Peter - would we need to choose? Could we not have 16 - 19 AND 19 - 21 at one event? This would increase number of teams that could attend an event which would be good.

Some people have said that 19 - 21 is not really "youth" and that many of the adult/open teams are in that age range anyway - what are your thoughts on these comments?

[Oleg Grigoriev]

The questions for final vote should be:
1. 16-19 and 19-21
or
2. 16-21

1.The reasons for subdivision of Youth sport into two separate groups 16-19, 19-21were formulated on the Forum by Joe, the groups were named by Peter. This division is normal practice of all developed sports.
2. Age group 16-21 is a compromise of today and a deadlock for the future for the reason also expressed on the Forum

So we should choose among two(not three) options.