The AO Championship Cttee. is interested in knowing what you thought of 1) the new schedule introduced this year for the Outdoor Junior-Senior Championships and 2) the schedule used in the past two years for the Outdoor BMY Championships. We also have a proposal regarding scheduling of throwing events at the Junior-Senior championships which should be of particular interest to throws coaches and officials. The Junior-Senior Schedule had the heats for the 100m, 200m, 400m, sprint hurdles on day 1 with the finals (and semi-finals in the case of the 100m) for these events on day 2. The only distance events held on day 2 were the 5000m walk and 800m, with the 1500m, steeplechases and 5000m events being held on day 1 in that order. The main objective was to create an exciting day 2 mostly with finals on the track. This schedule, however, precluded, or made difficult , certain doubles (200-400m; 400m-800m; SC-1500m-5000m; sprint hurdles-400m Hurdles). The Sprint Medley and 4x400m relays provided some runners who had not progressed to the finals an opportunity to run an event (or two) on the second day. The 4x100m was held on day 1.
For the Bantam-Midget and Youth Championships the competition (aside from the hammer throw) was started around noon time on day 1 and did not finish until around 8:00 pm. (The late finish was in due mostly to the very bad rainfall.) There was only a short break on the track in the late afternoon, which although not intended for that purpose, served as a short window to feed the track officials.
The advantage of starting later on the Saturday is that many clubs can save expenses by driving in that morning. The organizers can save by not having to book as many rooms for officials on the Friday night.
We can, however, revert to the more traditional day 1 schedule which has the meet starting at around 9 or 10:00 am in the morning, with a standard 45 minute lunch break and then finishing by around 6:00 pm. Since the longest event is 3000m the meet doesn’t have to go into the evening quite as much as it would for longer events.
Another issue that arose during the BMY’s was the large number of horizontal jumpers, which made it difficult to complete the events even with two pits running continuously (day 1). Should we have qualifying rounds on the Friday night for the long jump? (perhaps only for those who have not achieved a certain standard?) or should there be standards imposed for everyone entering the LJ events?
Throws official Jim Preece is proposing a new system (“Rolling Start”) for scheduling the throws events at the Junior-Senior Outdoor Championships. Please read his proposal at the link below and let us know what you think.
Please send your comments and especially your suggestions on the above-mentioned items for scheduling to Roman Olszewski at [email protected]. This items will be on the agenda for AO Technical Cttee. and Board meetings later this month and September.