PaceSetter Book

Sustained Activities 7

7.4 Handicapping

The purpose of a handicap event is to give all the competitors an even chance of winning whatever their ability. In a perfect handicap race all the runners would reach the finishing line at the same time. However, in practice it is seldom the case, although we do get close finishes. WEB COPY ©EVEQUE There are basically two methods of handicapping athletes for track and cross-country races: a) Handicapping by staggering the distances from which a competitor starts. b) Handicapping by staggering the time at which the competitor starts. Method (a) is normally applied to sprint handicaps and middle distance races up to 1000 metres while method (b) is simpler and more practical for distances from 1200 metres upwards on the track and it is also used for road and cross-country. 7.4.1 Handicapping by Distance The IFTA 800 metres handicapping tables can be seen in section 7.4.2 and are provided as a guide to assist coaches to establish a handicap programme. They give the recommended starting position measuring forward from the scratch line and fixed according to the ability of the runner. The tables provide for young athletes in a range of ability bands. The recommended staggers have been adjusted into simple steps of 10 metres apart from in level 4, which would only apply to young athletes capable of very high performances. Using this method it must be realised that the stagger from the scratch line should be related to the pace of the athlete to whom the handicap is being applied. For example, consider the level 2 handicap for a young athlete capable of running 800 metres in 2 minutes 40 seconds. This runner would move at a pace of 5 metres per second and as he or she would take 16 seconds longer to cover the distance than a 2 minutes 24 seconds scratch runner the starting position is set forward from the scratch line by 80 metres (16 seconds x 5 metres per second). This criteria have been used to create the scales for levels 1, 2 and 3 and the "in-between" staggers have been evened out for simplification. However, as can be seen for level 4 a stricter criterion has been applied. WEB COPY ©EVEQUE

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