Firstly, I've had quite a few messages from people saying they agree with some or all of my points. It seems that scheduling and water are the two main issues, although those who lost players to injury were particularly angry about the quality of the pitches. I personally only played on pitches 1, 2, 3 and 8 so maybe I never got as far as the hidden metal plates I've heard about...
I think the issue is mostly over-reach; the UKU Tour attempts to do the job of a league, only better. Except of course it has huge constraints on time. And everyone needs a definite finishing position. The result is unwieldy events consisting of far too many teams (67 at Tour 1), which then means you need a venue that can hold however many pitches (plus spares, since pitches are frequently lost last minute), and adequate other facilities. Since these venues are few and far between, the result is what we have now. And then the format and schedule have to fit these parameters of course. All of the problems could be solved with smaller events, and planning further ahead; if we really do need a 60+ team tournament then, like Sich says, let's have it in the diary for two years from now (which is great because my biggest gripe is when dates get changed...) Let's get TDs making bigger profits to run better events. Lewis said: > A first event at a new site is never going to be easy. Agreed. Why not host your own small scale tournament there first then, rather than attempting a massive event? I have never bid for a Tour because I feel I lack the experience to run one well. So I co-hosted a small tournament in February as a way of gaining some experience; things didn't go perfectly but I never expected them to. To aim to run a 67 team UKU sanctioned event at a new venue is extremely risky. Prospective TDs should just go ahead and run a tournament; the bulk of the work is in the planning of the first event, and you might struggle to break even for all that effort. The rewards will come later when everything is running smoothly - and I think its this fact that puts people off running huge events. But running a 16 team event really isn't going to kill anyone. I think people expect a higher standard for UKU events than they do for non-UKU events (I certainly do), so why not try your own first? > As far as money goes...if TD's are making a bucket load of profit would we > not have loads of bids? Not everyone is inclined to run one. I think you need a lot of experience. I think that those people who have run them in the past continue to put on events because they have put in the groundwork and that is the bulk of the work. You also need dedicated staff; not easy for someone who wants to play as well (its the main reason I've not really got involved that much as a TD personally). I could have run an event of the quality we had this weekend, but I wouldn't want to bid for an event that I didn't think I could run properly. Like any job, TDs must be responsible for providing what they say they are going to; the UKU must enforce this. Maybe to run a UKU event we should expect to pay more like Luke suggests (I personally think this is a must) and we should also aim to hold smaller tournaments like Pedro says. Realistically, the situation has arisen due to problems that the UKU have created themselves; trying to have some many teams at one venue is the cause of most of the problems. It leads to trouble with seedings, scheduling, formats, etc etc. I agree Felix and co do a great job with the mess they are presented with, but I just think it could all be avoided. > I think the best thing the UKU could do is make britdisc an announcement > group only (or even scrap it altogether) ... Yes, definitely repress people's ability to make complaints publicly. Why not start your own facist ultimate regime Lewis? :-p In all seriousness, what percentage of tournaments attract complaints on BD? I think it is fairly low; most tournaments aren't perfect but they are good enough. I don't think any one of the problems this weekend was bad enough to warrant my complaints list, but the combination of them is. And the number of emails I've been sent personally as well as those sent on this list shows that I'm not alone in having these thoughts. At least with a public forum you know that your issues are not swept under the carpet, and that if others feel the same you can find out about it. I think the paucity of bids is because people don't think they can deliver what is essentially a big ask, yet people like Thac and co run great events in Cardiff, Wigsy runs Mansfield events well every year, etc, with very few complaints. So it is possible. > Another idea is each team could (spirit) score the tournament by have different areas to score on and feed them back to the UKU and TD's Good idea. The UKU could actually charge TDs a fee to run their sanctioned events (the benefit being that they can charge more for entry and will get guaranteed attendance), then the money can be refunded depending on the quality of the event. That means TDs will have a cash incentive to run good events, not to mention the fact that they are more likely to win bids in the future if they have delivered in the past. In my personal opinion, I would like to see smaller tournaments run at a higher quality, with better facilities, that cost more money to run and therefore attract a higher fee per event. I, along with the vast majority of players, invest a lot of time and money in training for and playing ultimate. When the cost of attending a tournament is about £50-70 per event per player (when you take into account travel, food, entry fees, accommodation, kit, UKU subs etc over the season), I'd rather pay an extra £10 per event and know that I'm going to have somewhere to shelter, and decent pitches to play on, and a sensible tournament format, all of which are going to lessen the chance of me being injured. Besides, teams these days are usually 15+ strong, so its not even going to cost that much per head. In summary: - fewer teams - better facilities - better quality pitches - TDs should make more profit as a result I refer you to this email sent by Si Hill (our UKU Administrator) some six years ago. I feel its still relevant. Brummie > From: [email protected] > To: [email protected] > Subject: [BD] Did you know...? > Date: Tue, 27 May 2003 21:27:49 +0100 > > Some thoughts about organising Tour tourneys (arising from the field-marking > fiasco). > > One of the original aims of the tour was to get us into a position where > these tournaments were run to minimum standards. In practice this doesn't > work because there is no sanction that can be imposed if something goes > wrong. Indeed - even though I was pretty fed up with the situation on > Saturday (and Sunday) - I still feel that in all probability Bisto stepped > up to organise something when we had few (or maybe none?) other options... > And then he didn't make any money because he was giving away the profits... > So how can I really complain? > > So it leads me to conclude (actually I concluded this years ago) so it just > leads me to repeat... > > I want tournament organisers (and/or their teams) to make money out of > running tournaments - I mean profit of at least £2000 - maybe more. From > some conversations I had over the weekend with experienced TDs I know this > is possible. > > It occurs to me that maybe people don't realise there is a reasonable amount > of money to be made. In particular, there MUST be some extremely able, > skint, student types out there who could > a) run a tournament like this standing on their head > b) really do with the extra beer money. > Seriously - if you ran 3 tourneys (1 tour, 1 mixed, Nationals) - which would > reduce your overheads, and the effort you had to put in each time, you could > make 5k - probably more. Go on - think about it. > > Please. > > Si > __________________________________________________ BritDisc mailing list [email protected] http://www.fysh.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/britdisc Staying informed - http://www.ukultimate.com/staying-informed
