dcpinsonn wrote:
No I get that I just got my lowest score rating of the year from Sunday & was definitely in better shape than early season races & definitely executed better but because the middle of the race did relatively well I somehow was worse compared to my early season races. My highest rating on the year comes from a Sprint I did on a horrible weather day a few weeks before my goal 70.3. I went in with no taper/with really high volume. I peaked for the 70.3 a few weeks later & crushed it (fast time, good weather day) but scored lower than the Sprint. Should I have peaked for the Sprint because I could have done even better and scored even higher than what I did? I was 1 point off of the elite standard at the Sprint but 4 off at the 70.3. I beat some pros at the 70.3 & know I would have been closer to them at the 70.3 than the Sprint if any had been in that race. I know I performed better at the 70.3 but I didn't perform better compared to the masses because the weather was decent. You get a higher score when others fall off versus when you have a good race. It's making me rethink what races should be important.
I do think it's kind of odd that you can't look at two 70.3's and know who had more fitness on the day. At 70.3 Maine, the top-39 AGers scored 100+. At Oregon, the top-23 scored 100+. Are you telling me nobody from Oregon 24-39 beats anybody from Maine if lined up on the same day? Obstri doesn't seem to think so. The way I'm understanding the rankings is that a 106 from Maine could be a 102 in Oregon. But then why not have a system where those numbers are the same because the athlete is getting the score based on one of them?
yeah, I think you are being unrealistic about the scoring system and how potentially accurate it can be.
Your score for the race is calculated roughly off of how all the other racers do. If you enter a race where 100% of the racers who count in the scoring system have an A++ day and crush their PRs, you'll score a lot lower than if you had entered a casual sprint race where a good number of the racers either not tapering since it's an A race for them, and also probably attracts a lot more casual racers who aren't die hard about the sport as would a world championship event.
In that regards, I do agree with you that you can outperform in races where you happen to manage the tough environmental factor better than everyone else. If you're used to training in summer AZ heat, you'll wilt a lot less in an egregiously hot race, and likely outperform. Simlarly, if you are used to training in rain and sketchy road surfaces you'll outperform in rainy messy races for your scoring.
I also don't get your conclusions re 70.3 Maine vs Oregon. There were more AGers 100+ in Maine but that doesn't mean nobody from oregon can beat the Maine people. It likely means that more historically very fast people (AG100ish) showed up to Maine vs Oregon, but doesn't mean that nobody from Oregon can beat them. I do think you can conclude from that though is that you'll have a slightly tougher time winning the AG or podium in Maine given the larger number of 100 scoring racers there.