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Evaluating relative performances in disabled sports competitions

Percy, David F. ; Warner, D. Bruce

In: IMA Journal of Management Mathematics, 2008, vol. 20, no. 2, p. 185-199

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    Titre
    • Evaluating relative performances in disabled sports competitions
    Auteur
    • Percy, David F.. Centre for Operational Research and Applied Statistics, Salford Business School, University of Salford, Greater Manchester M5 4WT, UK
    • Warner, D. Bruce. Centre for Operational Research and Applied Statistics, Salford Business School, University of Salford, Greater Manchester M5 4WT, UK
    Type de document
    • Postprint
    Langue
    • Anglais
    Publié dans
    • IMA Journal of Management Mathematics, 2008, vol. 20, no. 2, p. 185-199. Oxford University Press
    Autre version électronique
    Identifiant OAI-PMH
    • oai:doc.rero.ch:301132
    Summary
    Handicapping systems play important roles in many sports. This paper focuses on disabled sports competitions, which primarily aim to encourage participation. Nevertheless, prizes are awarded for relative performances and should be allocated fairly. We review handicapping procedures specifically for disabled Alpine skiing and identify imperfections with this system, particularly how historical and new results are combined to determine scaling factors. Significant problems also arise due to different class sizes and variations in courses and conditions. We investigate the difficulties in establishing a suitable handicapping system and propose modifications to the existing procedures that improve their fairness. We develop simple mathematical models and statistical analyses that might be suitable, based on results data relating to several years of competition, and we evaluate the performance of our proposed method in comparison with that of the existing approach