What do you think about the quality of competition judges and referees?

[Goldenfist]

I started martial arts competitions about 2 years and all I can say is that I am very disappointed. I happen to like martial arts and thought competiting was something that should follow after so much practice but I find that there's a different standard by every group confusing! Other than 1 or 2 people, most of the people, are not trained or qualified to judge. Some tournaments after the money is collected, the wait begins, they are almost always short of help period. Was it always like this? Can anyone direct me to a well organized competition anywhere in the U.S.? I'll even drive to Canada.

[GLW]

Don't even get me started on this topic....

[Ai Lek Ou Seun]

For the most part....tournaments suck!:p :rolleyes: :D :cool:

[Goldenfist]

They can't be all bad or are they?

[Ma_Xu_Zha]

some years i dont go to events and sometime i do compete.

it would be nice to be judged by people who know what they are looking at. i dont like being a yang taiji guy being judged by people who dont know yang taiji but took a course in being a judge when in fact they themselves should compete and build a reputation than go from student to judge when their own taiji sucks.

in koushu this year i did cheng man ching form because i know all the judges were qualified cheng man ching people who i know were all very good...but most events have shady judges.

[bamboo_ leaf]

(started martial arts competitions about 2 years and all I can say is that I am very disappointed.)

If you want to compete, get into MMA do what you want to do and win. There will be no question as what is what. You may be still disappointed only in a differnt way :cool:

You sound confused as to what MA is all about. I have been to a couple of tournaments in my time, but I never went with the thought of competing I went to demo my work, not to win or lose.

Tournaments are good for meeting people showing what you can do and watching others, nothing more then that. If your taining is about that I would say it’s a little misguided. But if that’s the game then understand what the game is and use it, don’t complain until you can change it.

[Goldenfist]

Is true that why complain unless I can do something about it. But every journey must start somewhere and always with the first step is what I'm saying. Competitors should be able to expect some standards, judges should not judge if they have not trained or competed. We are charged for their services and we should be judged by competent people. That's the only way to preserve our art, maintaining standards is what I'm saying. I appreciate your feedback.

[GLW]

Having actually WORKED for a number of years on this topic, I can tell you that the basic problems are lack of care and lack of training.

Typically, you have a person that has achieved some level of skill in their art. They then assume, along with a number of others, that this skill magically translates into being able to judge the skill of others FAIRLY.

What you get: Many of them only know their method of doing things. So, to take Taijiquan for example, they look at someone doing a Yang style form. Their training is say, from Guan Ping method, and they view a person doing Yang Chengfu's set and then Chen Man Ching's set, and then a Guan Ping set...and guess what, they say that the first two are bad and the Guan Ping guy is right...regardless of what anyone did.

Or, you get a judge that is either too hard or too easy on their students and friend's students...instead of being FAIR.

What is missing is a method for judging, guidelines, and a framework for comparing one person to another.

You also have the politics of inviting someone to judge because they are well known, bring students to compete, or are friends of someone... and you get bad judging.

I have pointed out in NUMEROUS planning meetings that people remember THREE things about a competition:

(1) Did the event run somewhat on time
(2) Did the event appear to be somewhat organized
(3) Was the judging perceived as basically fair and accurate.


AND...people ignore 1 and 2 if # 3 is good....

Some of the BEST judges I have seen are the least known. Similarly, some of the worst are the ones that are very famous. (and no, I won't name names....)

A person does NOT have to have been a top level competitor or even a top level master to be a good judge. They DO have to have knowldege of the principles and methods of the area they are judging...and MOST of all, they have to have a desire to be fiar, accurate, and to improve on their judging skill at each event.

I have seen people that were national champions a previous year...with several years experience in competing...sit down to judge and simply follow the judge they know best in scoring....making them basically worthless.

I have also seen very well known teachers act as judges in such a way that they conspired with other judges to promote one person over another... (even to the point of two Chinese judges speaking about it in Chinese in the bathroom between events...and the promoter did NOT remove said judges from their position....

So another thing that is needed is an ENFORCED code of ethics.

[bamboo_ leaf]

(Competitors should be able to expect some standards, judges should not judge if they have not trained or competed. We are charged for their services and we should be judged by competent people. That's the only way to preserve our art, maintaining standards is what I'm saying. I appreciate your feedback.)

there are no standards, (depends on level and experince) having judged some myself I know this (some are a little better then others), I think your expecting to much from something that is basically a promotion hosted by either a teacher or school. Go there have some fun, meet some people and enjoy. Your money is going to help pay the costs of the event.

In the forms division, it’s a demo, a performance, dosnt mean anything. It’s an indication of some skill but not the skill its self. The sport fighting events are more honest, they tell more about the skill of what’s being used then watching some one do an exercises.

If you feel that you must compete to preserve your art then these would be the events to compete in.

I often find it a little ironic that people complain about compulsory forms and such. This was / is the PRC attempt to eliminate many of the things being discussed here.

Standards in form, event, judging. When I was in Tianjin I watched a taiji event. It was well orginezed, well judged, everyone seemed to know what they where there for.

The AAU used to have some good events I don’t know if they still run them. Many yrs back it was run by Mr. P. Star. I thought it was well run, a good experience.

[GLW]

Mr. Star basically took the hard work and ideas that the people that created the USCMAC did and then spawned a lot of animosity and controversy for 3 or 4 years.

The USAWKF was on the road to creating something that might have worked...and then politics reared its head again...and back to square one.

The USWU was working on this stuff...judges training, certification, etc.... but they are too small and limited in what they are doing so their impact is only felt at their once a year event or at the Berkely event.

The model used WAS based upon the standards that the PRC created with the IWuF...but modified enough to work with Classicla styles.

The problem now is NOT that there are not methods and standards...that work has been done.

The problem is that there is not a method to get people trained to use them.

In this, the Sanshou community is light years ahead. They had it easier because in their rings, it is pretty obvious who wins most of the time.

[Brad]

I honestly don't understand how any kind of fair judging standards can be created for classical style forms. Trying to find a judging standard for 100+ different styles that a majoirity of people agree with, for arts that weren't designed for competition in the first place, seems like an impossible task to me. I think some official judges training would be nice though. Even if I didn't entirely agree with someones judging standards(forms competition is allways going to be very subjective), at least I'd know what I'm getting myself into, plus it gives a way to see more easilly which idiots are blatantly cheating so that people can tell who to avoid. No matter how unimportant an event is, it still takes a lot of the fun out of it when you know some famous "master" is a cheater.

[bamboo_ leaf]

(The problem is that there is not a method to get people trained to use them.)

Interesting read about Mr. Star. It was 93 when I last saw him and his event.

Things are still evolving, recently BT and Mosahan members of this forum put on an event where people demoed their style before engaging in some type of sparing. they where graded on the usage of the style as apposed to just winning. In the main forum some people are complaining about the same practice. Wanting just to sparr with out doing any type of forms.

I think it’s a good move in the right direction and brings the practice of performance and usage more in line with the intent of the art. Many clubs and org. have their own events and avoid all the problems stated.

People complain about not seeing gung fu work or it not looking like one would think. i.e with no flavor of the style, I think this is one way to preserve and change the objective of winning to one of really demoning skills in which one is training.

[SPJ]

In the 21 century;

San Da is the fighting sports of KF. There are rules and regular China, US, world tournaments.

Wu shu is a gym/routine competition again with rules and regular tournaments.

If you are interesting in being competitive, persue Wushu or San Da for regular rules in the states or Canada.

Best of luck.

:)

[GLW]

“I honestly don't understand how any kind of fair judging standards can be created for classical style forms. Trying to find a judging standard for 100+ different styles that a majoirity of people agree with, for arts that weren't designed for competition in the first place, seems like an impossible task to me. “

That is EXACTLY the argument that those that have maintained the status quo have used to AVOID doing the work.

It is not impossible if you approach it methodically. Chinese Martial Arts can be broken down into a number of different classifications. There are the obvious - Internal / External.

There are also the Northern and Southern. Within those groups, you can have things like Northern Long fist (Islamic Origin), Northern (Shaolin Origin – there ARE some variations from the Shaolin to the Islamic), Other Northern, etc… Southern Short range, Southern long range, Southern Combined…and you can go from there.

Now, within those subgroups, you have a large amount of commonality in basics, methods, focus, etc…

That approach can take care of about 90% of the issues. It DOES break down when you get to very advanced people. But, the reality in the US that I have seen in numerous competitions since 1986 (CMA only events) has been that very few competitors in the US can get a score into the low 9’s. I have NEVER seen a competitor that was above a 9.5 in the US (Compared to an international standard like what you would see in Taiwan, China, etc…).

Where I am going with this is that although it is NOT perfect, the level of competitor in the US would have to improve in a significant way before it would matter in a way that would be a deciding factor.

While there will ALWAYS be a subjective aspect to ANY artistic endeavor, it can be minimized. After all, form competition is NOT fighting. In Sanda, Sanshou, Tuishou, Chisao, Shuai Jiao, etc… There ARE rules, but there is almost always an easily determined winner and loser. Form…can be subjective.

But, if it were NOT possible to make a judgement, then no one would ever be able to say one person was better than another and have any agreement. In actuality, there is usually much more agreement than disagreement. Also, in many of the instances where I have seen the most disagreement, it was due to either the observers NOT knowing the rules or the UNTRAINED judges NOT following the rules.

Gymnastics, Ice Skating, etc… have the same subjective aspect. Barring ethics problems (event fixing and such), their system does work to an extent.

I refuse to believe that those folks are really that much smarter that they can do something that the entire CMA community can’t do.

[Ray Pina]

I started in Karate tournaments when I was 5 years old in 1979. Nothing has changes. They are long, drawn out days with judges that range from fair to quite biased backing their school or associated style.

Just last month I got disqualified from an "expert full contact fight" for illegal face contact after recieving one warning. The firt time, I did hit the guy. I didn't the second time. A line judge saw it and against his will the head judge had to boot me and disqualify me (still waiting for the footage).

I wasn't bummed though. I went to have fun and test some stuff out and I got some good feedback. It will be my last tournament like that. I am now focused on winning some San Da events. And eventually entering MMA.

Go to see other styles, meet people and have fun. But be prepared for a long day and a lot of BS .... bring aspirin.

[GLW]

Full contact with no face contact...what is that about?

I HAVE seen something like that...In 1995, the World Games were held in Baltimore. They had the IWuF Sansho competitions...and TECHNICALLY they were not supposed to allow a number of things like head contact.... but it was done anyway.

The ONLY reason that was written that way was NOT insurance...but because Maryland had a VERY strong Boxing Commission. They were NOT licensed as Boxers...so had they listed it as completely full contact, they would have been in violation of the law...and their Boxing Commission, although they could care less about people getting hurt, REALLY protect their monopoly on any type of fighting sport that would lead to gate fees and purses....

[Ray Pina]

You could hit the side of the head but not the face .... kind of rediculous. Also rediculous is that they matched me with a guy who weaighed in at 245 and I weighed in at 195.

Those rules would make me have to hook him to the side of the head, allowing him to get inside and just run me over. Or, I could've punched his chest, which we all know is a huge deterent:rolleyes:

Yea, I'll never enter one of these TMA events again. It really brought home what a sad state of affairs things have gotten to in TMA. At the same time, I've grown. So now I'll focus on figthing San Da for a year or two.

[Goldenfist]

So what bother going?

[TonyM.]

I think the old teaching adage applies to most referees as well.