GBR Cadet and Junior Calendar and Policies Consultation – Response Summary

Following the recent consultation on GBR Cadet and Junior Calendar and Polices, BF received 15 responses to the consultation: 12 parents, one ranking coordinator and 2 coaches.

Some of the feedback received was not relevant to the subject of the consultation and some of the feedback was based on incorrect interpretation of the documents. Feedback on other subjects has been noted to be picked up at an appropriate time. With regards to incorrect interpretation the responses were considered in terms of ensuring that that documents are as clear as we can make them.

We would like to extend our thanks to those people who took a great deal of time and effort to review the documents in detail and provide comprehensive feedback and suggestions. There were a couple of inconsistencies and errors spotted and we have hopefully rectified those.

The post-consultation documents have been published here.

Due to lack or resources we are not able to respond individually to each consultation response. Instead we have provided a summary of the most frequently asked questions and comments that we received:

Is the ADP participation compulsory?

No, ADP camps are not compulsory. The camps are there to add further competitive training scenarios, sparring and team match training, and to complement the athletes season performance/development plan.

The goal for each weapon team of the ADP staff is to prepare the best squad of fencers for the Euro and World Championships at Cadet, Junior and U23 level.  Attendance at camps is one of a number of factors in discretionary selections and will only be used in individual Euro and World Selection if there are insufficient fencers that have met the qualification standards. We would therefore strongly recommend attendance.

There are too many events, there are too few events, they are too close together, they are too spread out.

As a general principle we have tried to avoid 3 competitive weekends in a row for competition.  However we cannot avoid the challenges that the EFC/FIE calendar creates which inevitably causes congestion and lack of available weekends. We have tried to create calendars where there is some flexibility for athletes to make choices rather than attending every single competition (including missing ones during exams if that isn’t something you wish to do).

We would encourage coaches and parents to use their athlete profiles to plan their athlete’s competitive schedule. It is NOT developmentally appropriate for every athlete to attend every event.

BF will continue to work to lengthen the season and therefore provide a spread of competitions so that athletes can create appropriate individualised developmental plans that is right for their development.

You should not run events during exams

BF is not going to stop running events just because of exams.

However, we recognise that the chase for ranking points creates stress and to encourage sensible decision making around that we will consider the proposal that events clashing with May GCSEs will be worth 50% of the ranking points.

Why are you running repecharge at BRCs?

To give athletes more DE experience and reduce the variability of results. The Championship experience which replicates the Junior World Cup format (no repecharge) will still be delivered by the British Championships.

Why are the BRCs all in London?

We have a commercial arrangement with Leon Paul which requires us to run a set number of events in the Leon Paul centre in return for kit hire for the BF championships.

For Cadets – other than the Cadet & U23 National Championships, there are 22 ranking competitions across 6 weapons. 12 are run by Leon Paul in London with the remaining 10 intended to be outside of London.

For Juniors – other than the Junior & U23 National Championships, there are 24 ranking events of which 16 are run at or by Leon Paul.

The National Championships were held in Nottingham last year.

One of the reason for shifting to London was feedback from the community that they would like to have competition before the C&J Nationals, this meant running the Nationals on 21/22th September and Nottingham was unavailable.

In an effort to continue to keep prices low in the face of falling public funding, SportsDock was the most suitable and financially viable option. The biggest expense continues to be the transport of volunteers and with such a huge number of volunteers required for the major events, it is financially more prudent to hold competitions closer to where the majority of volunteers are travelling from.  BF will continue to investigate the viability of other venues and locations for our major events.

We will be consulting with the athletes and coaches with regards to holding as many of the ADP camps as possible outside of London.

I disagree with the competition selection

Every year a lot of time is spent reviewing the EFC and FIE competitions based on the previous year. Convenient travel for one family does not necessarily mean that it is easy for all and there are a number of factors taken into account when selecting the competitions. Athletes can still choose to go to gain experience at non nominated events and participate in other team events.

We would encourage fencers to look at international domestic competition to gain more experience of international fencing. More info can be found on the websites of the relevant national federations eg France, Germany, Hungary.

Athletes that pull out of the Cadet Team Events should be de-selected 

The selection rules already state that athletes that decline selection for Cadet Team events may be required to forfeit their individual selection. BF will consider whether we should take additional action if athletes pull out of teams having previously accepted selection. Athletes should not be put under pressure from coaches or parents to withdraw from team events in pursuit of individual results, equally the welfare of an athlete may necessitate withdrawals due to illness and injury.

I disagree with the multipliers (EFC Cadet)

We have looked at the arguments presented and as a result added a 2x multipliers as an option and adjusted the descriptions accordingly.

I disagree with using discretionary selection/you should disband selection committees.

There is sufficient opportunity for direct qualification/selection of a suitable standard with clear criteria. Discretion is useful to take into account factors that are not solely measurable by individual performance. For example injury and contribution to team.

Selection committees are also responsible for double checking that the rankings are correct and the selection rules correctly applied to qualified athletes.

A parent should be on the selection committee

We will be publishing more information about selection committees on the BF website but it would not be appropriate for a parent to be on the selection committee and there are no plans to put this in place.

We should allow more fencers to go to EFCs

The results do not demonstrate that selecting athletes further down the rankings would provide a positive development opportunity. It is not appropriate to send young athletes to nominated international competitions where they have not even developed the resilience, technical and tactical abilities to perform sufficiently at domestic level.

We would encourage fencers to look at international domestic competition to gain more experience of international fencing. More info can be found on the websites of the relevant national federations eg France, Germany, Hungary.

More competitions should count for international rankings to avoid distortion due to ‘lucky’ results.

The calendar does not allow for this.

If you responded to the consultation and believe that your comments (in relation to the documents that we put out for consultation) have not been sufficiently addressed through the new draft documents or the responses above please email us at [email protected].