Page 73 - Issue 63_FINAL WEB normal_Neat

CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE EDITOR

Dear Editor
We have all seen the large number of younger vets riding time trials, who cannot see any benefit in
joining the VTTA and who are perplexed by the standards system in determining what appears to be a
random finishing order. Those of us who have been in the sport long enough know that it is based on
solid evidence of performance decline due to ageing - it's just that the results are not presented in the
most meaningful manner, so here is another way of resolving this issue.
Plusses achieved mean little outside the context of a particular event, so let's ditch them! Replace them
with an age/gender adjusted time, which would give a more easily understood result and a time with
relevance across all events and which could be compared easily with your mates and rivals. Under such
a new system the standards tables would get rewritten as 'age adjustments' and the random benchmark
times for 40 year olds disappear. These 'age adjustments' are the increase in standard time compared to
a 40 year old male bike rider (even for women and trikes).
The recent 25 mile championship traditional and new style result would look like this:
** These adjustments are the current age standard minus the 40 year old men's standard (1:06:00).

Traditional result calculation New result calculation
Actual 25M Adjusted
Rider Age Standard Plus
time adjustment** time
1M Tye 57 49:42 1:09:30 +19:48 03:30 46:12
2M Ainsworth 60 50:43 1:10:14 +19:31 04:14 46:29
3M Horsnell 89 1:13:02 1:31:55 +18:53 25:55 47:07
1W Carpenter 50 55:52 1:13:51 +17:59 07:51 48:01
2W Field 54 57:20 1:14:44 +17:24 08:44 48:36
3W Hutson-Lumb 54 59:46 01:14:44 +14:58 08:44 51:04
Tables would be produced in a new format to provide these adjustments.
This method will always give the same finishing order as the current system, but creates a more easily
understood result. We would all prefer to see a 'proper' time against our names than some random
'plus'. The maths involved is also a bit easier and nobody has the ignominy of a 'minus' result.
But what about the personal standards award system? In fact that becomes much simpler as we only
need to look for a year-on-year improvement in a season's best adjusted time at each distance.
........and the season long competitions? They also become simpler - take the best adjusted times in each
season (no need to worry about anyone with a mid-season birthday as that's already taken care of in
arriving at the adjusted time), calculate an average speed for each distance and then an average of these
averages (just like any normal BAR calculation). For the BAR competition there is no need to convert
a 12 hour performance to an equivalent 200 mile time - an adjusted 12 hour distance can be used for a
speed calculation.
In all these changes the same winners and finishing orders would exist, but we dispense with plusses
achieved and replace them with adjusted times, more relevant to today's levels of performance than
standards based on a 40 year old 'crack' rider of 1943. These adjusted times would gain the status of
personal bests for vets competition and may encourage more over 40s to join the VTTA.
Sincerely
Rudyard Ryder

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