3D.6 Ungeared Awards
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3D.6 Ungeared Awards
At Unicon, if there are five or more geared male riders in an Unlimited event, the fastest three ungeared male riders will be awarded with an ungeared title for that event. Similarly, if there are five or more geared female riders in an Unlimited event at Unicon, the fastest three ungeared female riders will be awarded with an ungeared title for that event. This is only for the overall classi cation, not for Age Groups. Other events can choose to award the fastest three, one, or none of the ungeared riders as they wish.
The subject has been discussed in another discussion, but I think we should talk about it in a specific discussion.
I don't think this rule is a good one:
- It's in 3D section (organizer section), not known to most competitors
- The attribution of these rewards is not linked to the number of ungeared competitor, whereas it is a reward for ungeared competitors, this attribution is linked to the number of geared competitors.
- The fact that many competitors aren't aware of this rule, and those who are, can't know in advance if there are going to be rewards, means that this ranking is neglected by competitors (which is a problem for an “expert” ranking).
- This classification often rewards ungeared 36“ competitors, whereas standard 29” competitors are sometimes faster.
- At UNICON, locals are more represented in the 36“ ungeared than those who come from far away, because a 36” wheel doesn't fit in standard luggage.
That said, I can understand why these awards were introduced in an event like the 10km, since there is no 29” category in the 10km. And yet there are plenty of ungeared competitors with a wheel bigger than a 24”.
But on a marathon, a climbing road race or a criterium, I don't think it's a good thing. I won this classification at UNICON20 for the climbing road race and at UNICON21 for the criterium. It's nice to be on the podium, but these medals don't mean much to me.
I'd prefer this rule to be removed, or leave the organizers free to reward whoever they like... If the majority think that it should be kept, then at the very least, the conditions of attribution should be reviewed.
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I would immediately agree to remove this rule - organizers are free to make additional awards anyway, and in my experience in Germany, organizers have taken this freedom if they feel it is useful and beneficial to their competition to make additional awards.
But as I have already written elsewhere, in my opinion the rule implicitly leads to another standard category alongside the 29er class. And especially if riders in the 29er class are actually better than those in the unlimited ungeard, I don't think that makes any sense at all.
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I was against this rule when it was voted in favor in the preceeding committee, and I am still against.
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This might be a bigger change, but I feel that the "unlimited" class, as far as awards and recognition, can be an "open" class, that includes ALL riders by default (geared, ungeared, standard).
Ungeared can be subcategory/special categories, just like standard class. For riders who choose to be in that category for specific reasons (Some reasons can be wanting to specialize in spinning, cost of purchasing/maintaining/transporting larger/geared unicycles)
I think the organizers should then be the ones to decide if a special class is needed or not, depending on the participants and the course.
- Normal flat 10k/marathon? Yes, of course have a standard class.
- Many competitors have ungeared 36"/29" because geared hubs are too expensive and uncommon, and those riders would be strong enough to push a geared hub faster? Organizers can choose to have an ungeared class in this case. (how waves and heats might change could be another topic)
- Unicon 20 mountain climbing road race, where basically everyone is on a 29" or smaller, and no good strong reasons to choose 29"+ or geared vs a standard 29"? No ungeared class. No standard class.
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I think we need to differentiate between official unicycle classes, which riders can rely on, as they design their eqippment and train for them, and awards, which organizers can make relatively freely, as they suit their competition best.
As I said, I am not a fan of having too many official classes, as this makes the individual classes in a small sport like ours even smaller. However, I would still give the organizers the freedom to have additional awards within an official class if it is deemed appropriate - but I would not prescribe special awards in the rulebook.
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As I've already said, I think this rule is wrong.
If we simply abolish it today without making any other adjustments, that won't be a problem, with the exception of the 10km. For me, this discussion is closely linked to that of the 29” category in the 10km.
In road races, wheel size and hub use have a direct impact on speed and therefore on performance. In other disciplines, equipment doesn't have as much impact on performance. Mixing 26“ and 29” wheels with G36“ wheels shocks me, especially as the standard 29” size is an existing category with a high density of competitors. I'd even go so far as to say that 29" is a wheel size/category that's more suited to road unicycling than the 24” category.
As far as categories and their number are concerned, if we compare ourselves to ocean racing, we don't have that many categories...
I can't vote to abolish these ungeared awards if there's nothing else to compensate for the 10km.
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As I said, I am not a fan of having too many official classes, as this makes the individual classes in a small sport like ours even smaller. However, I would still give the organizers the freedom to have additional awards within an official class if it is deemed appropriate - but I would not prescribe special awards in the rulebook.
I think the ungeared unlimited class has been superseded by the 29" standard class, but there are a lot of riders who turn up to Unicon with ungeared 36" as their main distance unicycle. It was meant to give us a distinction between the two main technological differences within unlimited. We need opinions from people who race this.
While I'm also not in favour of having too many classes, if we leave it to the discretion of organisers then it will be seen as an inferior category (even though many already see it that way because of the way it's tacked on to the unlimited class).
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> If we simply abolish it today without making any other adjustments, that won't be a problem, with the exception of the 10km. For me, this discussion is closely linked to that of the 29” category in the 10km.
I don't see any connection here. One time it's about an official wheel class and the other time about an award that any organizer could carry out even without the corresponding rule in the rulebook.
> I'd even go so far as to say that 29" is a wheel size/category that's more suited to road unicycling than the 24” category.
Then the consequence should be that the 24 class is abolished as an official wheel class, but not that there is a rule for ungeard awards.