Re: RE: Endurance as a team sport

["Michael or Susie Jones" <mjones@springercoop.com>]

>Susie wrote:
>
>>There's a lot of strategy that goes into determining which riders should
>>compose a team.  Teddy's referred to "rabbits", who are not chosen as team
>>riders but whose job is to "lure" riders from other squads/teams into
going
>>faster than they should.
>

Scott replied:

>Interesting. But, if I knew that the rabbits were not part of a team and
>could not hurt
>my teams standing if they finished ahead of me why would I be lured into
>following? It would be a waste of my resources to compete with them.
>Only those riders who are part of another team are worth the effort.
>Individual riders
>are riding in a different race.
>


You're right.  Riding as a team requires a much different strategy than
riding "just for yourself."  What most USA riders seem to do (and I'm
referring to PAC rides as well as WEC rides) is try to "have their cake and
eat it too" - they'd like to get a team medal, but even the team members get
caught up in going for individual medals.  (And I'm not saying that a team
member shouldn't go for an individual medal, I'm just saying that perhaps he
shouldn't go for an individual medal at the expense of the team.)

Under the current FEI rules, it is up to each squad to determine whether
it's the individual or team medals that are the ultimate goal and plan their
ride accordingly.  Personally, I like the extra strategy that this lends to
International competition.  However, it appears to me that in most cases the
squad doesn't have a clear concept of their ultimate goal.

You mention that "teams are not part of Endurance Riding today".  This is
not completely true.  I've been to a number of rides where informal teams
compete for team awards.  I believe that PNER has a year-end team award (or
at least they used to).  You are right that we cannot "refine our team
strategy without practice."  However, I do not think that a group must
necessarily practice together to learn team strategy: the practice can be
done through participating in a number of different teams and learning how
the basics of team strategy work.


Susie Jones, AERC# 7997
Miami, NM