Taikai question

[JByrd]

I'd appreciate ideas from those of you who have experience drawing competition brackets. Once you have the rank frequency distribution of the registrants, do you adjust the division boundaries to equalize the division sizes? Or do you draw the division boundaries at traditional places (unranked, 6-1 kyu, 1-3 dan, etc.) and tolerate very large, and very small, divisions? I hope I'm making sense here... Of course I'd be grateful if you could take the time to explain the rationale behind your preference. Thanks!

[Neil Gendzwill]

What's a "traditional" boundary? Split the rank divisions however you like. I notice at Steveston these days they have a division just for sandan, probably for the very reasons you state.

[JByrd]

What's a "traditional" boundary? Split the rank divisions however you like. I notice at Steveston these days they have a division just for sandan, probably for the very reasons you state.

I guess the only downside of being very free with the division boundaries is to risk a wide disparity of skill within a division. But I suppose that's not too big a deal. Thanks for the input.

[Neil Gendzwill]

I guess the only downside of being very free with the division boundaries is to risk a wide disparity of skill within a division. But I suppose that's not too big a deal. Thanks for the input.I guess you just have to determine if you can live with that. I know when we run our little club tournament, if I ask whether we want to run separate divisions or lump everyone in, the lower ranked people usually would rather compete with the higher ones than have a teeny division just to themselves.

One other possibility is to divide by age rather than rank.

[tango]

I agree with Neil's point about dividing by age as a[nother] possibility...

[Neil Gendzwill]

If you don't mind explaining in more detail, what is the mix of contestants you're trying to juggle?

[ender84567]

Depends on gross size, here the smaller tournament (mwkf championship) is usually divided mudan, shodan/nidan, sandan and up. Larger (detroit with 200+ attendees) they divide Mudan, shodan/nidan, sandan, yondan and up. in both cases youth (under 16) is a separate division and is not usually divided by rank, just as youth, they occasionally divide this into senior youth and junior youth depending on the distribution.

[JByrd]

If you don't mind explaining in more detail, what is the mix of contestants you're trying to juggle?

I don't have a population yet. Our club taikai is usually in early June. I'm just thinking about how things went last time, and considering the possibility of doing things a little differently this year.