Date: September 20 2007

From: CIAM Subcommittee F2, F2B Work Group Coordinator

To: F2B Flyers, worldwide

F2B K Factors Status Report

On August 28 2007, the F2 Subcommittee has submitted, to the FAI Bureau in Lausanne/Switzerland, a formal proposal suggesting the implementation of a 2 years minimum trial period during which the current k factors for F2B shall be set to one (1). To be set in force by January 2009, the proposal will be incorporated into the Agenda of the upcoming CIAM Plenary Meeting from March 28/29 2008. Until then, the members of the F2 Subcommittee will decide whether to support or withdraw the proposal or whether to submit the issue for a vote at the CIAM Plenary Meeting.

At this point in time, the F2B Work Group invites the c/l stunt community to contribute to the opinion forming process of the F2 Subcommittee members. On Sept. 11, a related forum was established on the Internet:

http://www.rcmodely.sk/Controlline/index.php

Here is a recapitulation of the reasons for the establishing of the proposed trial:

• As defined by the 2007 rule, the complexity of manoeuvres is expressed by the number of manoeuvre elements to be judged separately (see current Rule and Judges Guide).

• More manoeuvre elements means more possible errors, leading to lower marks for complicated manoeuvres. As shown in the graph below, the application of k factors on top of this leads to a distortion of results by overcompensation:.

• The now available marks bandwidth, expanded from 1 - 20 to 1 - 100 in 2006, grants judges sufficient range to qualify all levels of competitors performing all manoeuvres and their elements.

• In an event where all competitors are obliged to fly the same manoeuvres in the same sequence and in all rounds, there is no need to assign different complexity weighting to each manoeuvre.

While of a number of simulations performed on major contest data from the last two years has not led to clear evidence “pro” or “con” and because the opinions within the F2B community are ambiguous, a worldwide trial (in front of judges being aware that their marks will not be modified by k factors) of sufficient duration seems to be appropriate.

The forum mentioned above is open to anyone. Please feel invited to register and express your points and reasons whether to support or not the planned 2-year trial without k factors. Should you prefer to address yourself to the F2 Subcommittee member representing your nation within CIAM, please do not hesitate to do so. In order to make your point known to the entire F2 Subcommittee, I would like to suggest that you write to this e-mail address: ciam-f2@fai.org

By approximately November 15 2007, a voting tool related to the k factor issue will be made available on the same platform. This voting serves the purpose of supporting the opinion forming process within the F2 Subcommittee and of the CIAM Delegates of those nations not being represented with the F2 Subcommittee.

The list of those receiving this report is incomplete. Please kindly forward, distribute and discuss the information within your F2B community and encourage the expression of opinions found. Thank you for contributing; your effort for the common cause is very much appreciated.

Peter Germann, F2B Work Group Coordinator