FIR always strives for consistent tournament quality across all FIR Racketlon events. This serves not only to set expectations of what kind of matches players can expect when entering tournaments, but also that appropriate ranking points are awarded.
One important aspect is that an Elite class is filled primarily with Elite players and does not contain a large number of truly „B“ players e.g. as a result of the tournament’s location or timing. This can be achieved for singles events by selecting a draw-size which results in a draw „cut-off“ having a relatively consistent World Ranking. For Mens A event, the cutoff World Ranking in the range 60-80, for Womens A events, generally with far fewer entries, a cutoff of around 20-25 is typical, as shown by the the cut-off graphs for all 2017 FIR tournaments.
Although the uppermost goal is to achieve the best possible player experience for all tournaments, this is often not possible without concessions or compromise, resulting in some players being disadvantaged. Sometimes the rules cannot easily be applied to exception cases and a subjective judgement call is necessary.
Our goal is nevertheless that the tournament draw process follows a rule-based, objective system as far as is possible. The main driving force is to set deadlines to ensure that the tournament draws and schedules can be made on time and in accordance with the rules. Especially with the new rule introduced in 2017 that Elite draws should be broadcast live, this demands a more rigid timeline with some advance planning, so that players are able to know when to tune in to Facebook. When the rules are not easy to apply, we strive for clarity on how to deal with it.
An equally important aspect is to ensure that decisions are taken on a neutral, unbiased basis, and consistently across all tournaments. This must be accompanied by the need for fairness towards the players, to avoid e.g. that some players are consistently forced into classes they are unhappy with, or that late entries are allowed by some tournaments but rejected by others.
Making a tournament draw can often be a very challenging process. In an attempt to facilitate it, the FIR Council has discussed and approved a Tournament Draw Process, which is now available on https://www.racketlon.net/content/tournament-support.
Your feedback is welcome – we will be happy to improve it further, where this is possible.
