Ok, so with all the bs I read everyday I believe its time to have us who are working judges and competitors (within reason) at events around the country put a base set of "XDL" rules and how to interpret them. Why? Because it sounds like we all have a different idea of how to run things, how to look at thing, and while I agree at times, I think often the views expressed by others have not gone through a long insomniacs night overview I gave them.

First off, XSBA, now XDL rules are a 4 principal rule set.

Difficulty
Execution
Variation
Overall

If we're to break down individual freestyle in this manner it's important to consider all aspects in all areas where a competitor is judged.

That said:

Difficulty: Most important is to have a judge that knows through personal experience what is hard. So and injured pro rider or paying someone capable of competing is key.

Difficulty should be based on the 4 principals. Using the competing riders to set the bar. Why use the talent pool rather than a national standard? Well when you're stuck with 20 points broken by 4 and the best person there can do a seat stander in your amateur comp it makes no sense for him to score a 1 for difficulty in the wheelie aspect.

Now when you crack your 20 points into the 4 principals but you have one person that excels greatly in one or most principals they should be allowed a maximum of 2 addition points for their unique skill. So if your field is a bunch of kids doing off peg rev limiter coasters and all the traditional circle combos and you have one guy go out and tuck in and out of HC in a circle he could receive 7 points for the wheelie category. This principal applies to all the other categories as well. Park a 280 endo on a wall, damn right 7 points, backflip to skitch, burnout on the limiter in a drift dragging your hand, you all get the point.

Execution: This judge should know the sport so they can see when someone misses what they're doing even if they transition quickly into the next trick.

This is a simple thing to judge if you work backwards. We have current judges that start at 0 and try to make a score from what they see. I personally think we should all start with 20. When tricks are poorly done a point should be reduced, considering we're all shooting for about 20 tricks in variation this is a 1 for 1 idea. Everyone should attempt 20 tricks, everyone should have points stay or drop in their attempt of said tricks.

Variation: This judge should be able to count and know what a trick is.

Its easy, even G can do it, haha.

Overall: This judge is the most important with 40 points. This should be a non bias judge, just because they like one trick more, think this is harder, that is better, its is all irrelevant to the overall performance.

The category should be based not on the four principals but on the entertainment factor, fluid nature, appearance, and the innovation displayed in the run. The visual impact the run has is just as important as the tricks done in the run. This idea directly affects crowd participation. Just because a rider did a bar trick and people yelled that is not crowd participation, interacting with them would be.

Crashing: It's -3 points, it should not take away from any other principal. It's not execution because the trick was never completed, its not difficulty under the same idea, and they don't gain a point in variation either. So a crash is essentially -4 points and lost time, considering the top places are within 5 points it is a big deal. An exception could be made for the overall category if they crash and it affects their performance. We can all play off a crash, if you make a big deal about it well then, thats another story.

All that **** out there, I would like to hear from only the people who are doing this or in a position where they may be doing so soon. Not that I don't respect everyone and how they look at it but to make things better perhaps keeping this for competitors and judges is best at this time.

 

I read it twice! Good post Nick!

 

+ 1000

Booking my trip to watch XDL

 

wow , nicely put and could be the smartest thing i have ever read on stuntlife < no bullshit ) Lets see what everyone else says ........... killin it nick

 

Great post nick *tearing*

 

its all the same **** with stuntin it's 10% skill ........90% personality & caricature
i know its upsetting its not what u know its who u know

 

Well thought out and conveyed Nick ... Great post.

 

Dude is smarter than we thought.... may be the Jesus hair.

 

From a judges point of view, that would be a great idea. But...

It is still a freestyle sport. I don't think you must tell the participants what to do. Sure, a few guide-lines are necessary. But you don't want to make too much rules.

Compare it to figure-skating. I think it was a freestyle sport 100 years ago. But now, all the tricks are well defined with an exact point-system. Result: everyone is doing the exact same thing. You don't want to happen that to streetbike freestyle. Do you?

just my

 

1-Dedicate more points twords things that are measurable and arent arguable... longest, fastest, slowest, farthest, most, ect...
2-Base less overall points on an opinionated score; ie. individual run.

Somthing like an 80/20 split I think.

 

Well, I can only assume you've not seen or been to a US contest. Saying you have to do 20 variations, 5 of each... well, I just don't see how anyone would do the same run. Thats why I was saying we should keep this post for people in know the know, so it dosent get off topic with questions like this. Not that I don't think your input matters.

 

But thats not how the working XDL rules work, why change whats not broken. Endo comps are the only thing we should put a number on, unless its like the starboys event where there are many interesting comps for the fun of it. But the life of sport is and will be freestyle, and individual runs and freestyle are just that.

 

wow who picked this guy to be a judge...

im glad the groundwork is laid... you guys can modify whatever you like.. but.. I am a very very good debater and I can assure you that I have thought about this waaaay more than anyone

and you guys have to keep it simple where everyone understands it and everyone is agreeable with it

the less work and explaining I have to do.. the better

the current system works well with capable judges

 

While I'm not a judge for stunt comps, never have been and probably will never be, I think I can share a little with you since I have skateboarded for 10 years and have competed and judged during that time. Since I believe a skateboard run mirrors a stuntbike run, I will do my best to help. While you can have the best, most well thought out system for judging, it doesn't really matter. It all comes down to the judges. The judges are human and humans are biased in nature, so that will always be a problem. I think DSOG put a good view on having complicated judging procedures, cause while the run will be going on you will be focusing too much on the scoring and will miss the run, whether you score during or after the run. I do not, however, think your judging guidlines are too complicated. I think for the most part what you have said will work out ok. I do want to make sure I understand your scoring method though; are you saying 20 pts will be broken over the 4 pricipals leaving 5 pts per principal with a possibility of two extra points per prinicipal resulting in a total of 28 pts max? If thats correct you are limiting your judging in each area to increments of 20% by which I mean in "difficulty" you could only recieve a 0%, 20%, 40%, 60%, 80%, or 100%. I think judging in 10% increments would be better, but I may have your scoring completely fucked up. Your idea on execution is perfect and I whole heartedly agree, this guy put up his stuntwars run and seemed to be baffled why he didn't place higher, so I watched it. After seeing his run, I thought he did a good job over all with an ok variety, but what stuck out was that he repeatedly put his foot down and actually steped off the bike once. Execution to me is what differentiates a winner from a loser. Now another question I have is about your crowd entertaining factor, this has always made me dislike competitions. You at one point skateboarded, I think, so I'll use that. You are at a comp you just pulled off a sick technical run, you switch 360 flipped the pyramid, fakie heel flip switch nose grind 180 outted a down ledge, executed some solid slides and grinds, pumped and floated some tranny and tranny hips, and finished up with a picture perfect kick flip backside noseblunt side nollie 180 flip out. You are ****** hyped, get a good score, and wait for the rest of the competitors to take their runs. You are feelin good cause everyone is doin just ok runs. Then some guy has a mediocre run, but for his last trick front boards the biggest god damn rail in the park, and everyone goes ballistic. He ends up winning because of that one trick. Now did he win because he is better than you? Had a better "overall" run than you? Maybe his style is better than yours? No. He won off of hype. Is the crowd gonna go wild off a Ralph Louie circle jump to 50/50 mid circle? I doubt it. But are they gonna scream for a 120 mph power wheelie or rollin burnout? You know they are .

So I guess what I'm saying is no matter what you say or do, judging will suck, people will bitch about it, and everyone will tell you there is a better way to do it. If you feel this will work better than what you have done in the past, go for that **** and just fine tune as you go Nick.

My long ***, incohernt, raving, squid-loving, .

 

not arguing that or anything at all, just throwing an idea out there :YEAH

 

DLish is that a no-handed circle wheelie in a garage?

 

a one trick wonder would never win in a properly judged comp..

20 points difficulty
20 points execution
20 points variation (max 5 per discipline, wheelies, stoppies, burnouts, acros)
- on variation you do not have to do 5 of each if you dont want.. you will simply lose a few points.. it punishes riders who are not well rounded
40 points for overall... which includes fluidity of the run, how well the rider linked the tricks together, how well the rider played the crowd and judges and rider and bike appearance
-yeah I said appearance.. if you and your bike look like ****, why should you be out there competing in front of thousands of fans... do you consider yourself pro? then act like one

and yes I do believe there will always be problems with judged events.. the task is to keep them to a minimum and address them properly as they come along.. adjustments are made

I believe this years XDL judging staff has done great and that they were the right people for the job. we did make an adjustment or two after each event.. but in the end we have kept it nice and simple

in addition the XDL top 10 finalists in vegas will be video taped for review in case a grievance is filed

 

Have Some Comps Outside Of The Hotspots.

 

good post. if things ran that way i would have a bit more confidence in joining the competition. i havent rode in a while now but i still have some difficulty i can pull off clean, somewhere in that bag

 

I'm grabbing the air duct CLICK
back to the thread at hand.