I start with an initial plea for those who don't care about the subject to hit "delete" now.
There was discussion of how Figure Skating is scored in determining the winner. I can give a short explanation. Like cross country, the low score wins. There are 2 program, short and long. As someone mentioned earlier, it is ordinal scoring so placing in each program is all that matters...NOT how much you win by in each round. The short program is in multiples of .5 and the long is in multiples of 1.0. So, in the short program, the winner gets .5, second gets 1.0, third gets 1.5, forth gets 2.0 and so on. In the long program, the winner gets 1.0, second gets 2.0, third gets 3.0, forth gets 4.0 and so on. Add the points together to get your winner and ties are broken by the better placing in the long program. Therefore, if you are in the top 3 after the short program, you can still win it all by winning the long program as follows: 3rd in short = 1.5 points 1st in long = 1.0 points Total = 2.5 points Your best competitor can do no better than: 1st in short = .5 points 2nd in long = 2.5 points Total = 2.5 points You were better in the long so you win. Simple enough? Sorry to fill t-and-f time with this Winter Olympic tidbit. Bob Bettwy Director - Program Control Washington Group SRS Technologies [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> (703) 351-7266 FAX (703) 522-2891
