From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: RE: [BD] A list of questions about Tour 1
Date: Mon, 8 Jun 2009 23:08:47 +0100
Having organised a fair few large non ultimate events I thought I'd add my two
pence worth
My comments start on the micro scale and work up to macro (not ideal but as
people lose interest in my mail the correct people will be left standing for
the meat of it:-) )
Mirco..
There were a few things that have been covered in previous emails where the
location/facilities were lacking, but DON'T underestimate how hard an event
like this is to pull off, especially as a first time effort. So for the event,
I would like to thank the organisers.
Having said that, a couple of points for next time.
The water issue appeared to be worse the further from the tap that you played.
The food on site was pretty good, but who plans the catering and doesn't
include drinks in the package?
Midi..
Most of the issues appear to be more along the Bid description versus actual
facilities.
1 (deliberately first) Water is a post event issue at almost every tournament,
which would lead me to believe that it is being undersupplied by an order of
magnitude, or at least 2 containers per pitch so that one is always being
refilled whilst a full one sits at the pitches. Stipulate a larger requirement
in the bid recommendations.
2 Can we progress the standard size of Tour pitches to include an 11m gap
between sidelines on all pitches and then mark a parallel sideline 3m back so
that we have a spectator and kit area (5m wide) and still a 3m clearway for the
benefit of the game.
Macro..
The whole list of reasons that things appear to go wrong is because
people/teams/organisers/uku repeatedly say one thing and then change their
minds which leads to a cascade of events that leads to a crisis management
mentality.
>From my perspective the issue is the incongruity of the growth and active
>expansion of our fabulous sport and the way that "it" was done in the past
>when the sport was in its infancy.
The whole tour appears to be run on a wish and a promise (i'm not knocking the
massive work done by uku and TDs).
1 Timescales- -Bid dates/entries/schedule release-- as anything expands the
planning increases exponentially, so these date/ deadlines have to move forward
a huge amount. We should be looking at successful bids being awarded now for
the 2011 season, not discussing how to change the format for 2010. I appreciate
that this is not possible, but I would suggest the 2010 and 2011 bids run in
parallel and then the 2012 and 2013 bids are worked on the next year so that
this timescale is gained. Once bids are earlier the other deadlines should fall
into place.
2 British (and NI) Ultimate is now a large organisation and has to operate as
such.
We have to ask why are there so few bids?
Who would launch into a massive event in the knowledge that the the budget is
fixed and that the past performance shows that agro and bitching is the best
feed back that you will receive.
We need to operate the Tour events in an open market fashion.
(i) Get rid of the requirement to fix a team cost-- a good tournament costs
what it costs
(ii) stop whinging about TDs profits. If someone wants to put a bid in at
£1000 per team let them, there will soon be a queue who can undercut without
compromising quality
(iii) Apply substantial penalties when anyone doesn't fulfil their side of a
contract (TDs and Teams)
If a bid falls short of a stringent set of UKU requirements this should
trigger automatic heavy fines which can be fed back to the participating teams
(this should stop the "padding" of bids)
The perennial issue of teams dropping out at last minute also falls into
this category.
Tour entry should be finished a good few months before events, and I would
suggest that there is a fixed deposit paid to the uku to enter the tour in the
first place(totally separate to individual tour entry). If any team then pulls
out of an event this deposit it forfeit. If a team does pull out of a tour
event at short notice, don't change the schedule, just apply Bys. I.e. don't
fire fight, have a robust system that will severely penalise "contract
breakers". Don't try and repair a flawed system, the knock on effects are
usually disastrous.
It will be tough to do, not least for the UKU, but it appears to me that the
UKU are pulled in far too many directions. You cannot come close to keeping
everyone happy. But there is a time when it is far more important to focus on
the sport and the "big picture" rather than constraints that individual teams
or even players often exert unfairly on the uku.
Anyone still standing???
Sich
BAF
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