Gael Force North Results Fiasco

Zerostandards

Looks like Gael Force Events seriously mucked up the results in Gael Force North. They had to close down the mountain (shoulder to summit) due to a change in weather conditions on the day, wise move I hear you say. Wise if you have planned how to deal with the fall out.

The problem is that they called some people back to the shoulder, turned others around and told them that their summit was now the shoulder and that this development would have no impact on their status in the race.

Turns out when the final listings were published they removed those competitors that were not allowed carry on to the summit from the final lists and "creatively" created a new event called full - Shoulder Errigal Event to categorise these finishers.

I know none of the competitors wanted to gain an unfair advantage over there fellow entrants but lets be honest if you are not placed in the first 10 it is academic where you finish in the placing's but the least you expect is to be listed among the finishers in the event you participated in.

Incidentally, a quick scan of the results in the full event shows that there are still at least 4 people in there that have no shoulder to summit time, one guy has no shoulder or summit time, just two Errigal foot times 15mins apart.

If you are going to change the rules and results retrospectively GF please be consistent.

Seems to me that it was a lazy way for GF to solve a problem that they should have had the foresight to plan for in anticipation.

The people who are affected were probably first timers and this sort of treatment will do nothing to entice them back to another event.

Get the finger out GF and establish a set of rules. You put a lot of effort into telling us all beforehand what we could be disqualified for , littering, littering oh and did I mention littering.

Its all a bit amateurish GaelForce

Kaskade

A similar thing happened in Connemara adventure challenge (also ran by Gael Force)

The kayak was cancelled with weather, We ran down to the Kayak transition, to be sent back and told our transition was the bike, By the time we got back up they had properly closed the kayak session so others didn't have that 2/3k run

They sent an email asking people to explain what happened to them, Then creatively 'adjusted' anyone who didn't kayak's time by adding in an extra 12 minutes I think. There was no mention of this mikey mouse time change in the results.

The marshals were completely clueless as to what was going on or where we should transition. Its a little unfair having clueless unpaid marshalls in a 'profit making' event

Zerostandards

I think you hit the nail on the head Kascade, "clueless, unpaid marshals" Gaelforce don't care what the outcome or results of the event are like, their job is done once they get enough people to enter the event, take their money and make a profit.

You cannot run an event like this without legislating for all eventualities before hand, the cut off for the Mountain in Donegal was 1500hrs I think and that was the only target for people in terms of cut off, to be turned around half way up the mountain and then for your name not to appear on the final results sheet is appalling.

They should as a minimum refund those people.

sconhome

Out of curiousity, is there prize allocations for these events or are they 'rewarding' in the completion of the event?

Zerostandards

Both actually, I believe there is a prize giving ceremony, rightly so! Of course there is personal satisfaction and fulfilment in completing the event you entered, assuming of course your name appears on the result sheet of the event you entered! Not the made up problem solving result list.