Can someone tell us why Akela Jones was allowed to do HJ on day 2 after abandoning the pentathlon 800 on day 1?

You place in the 10k, you place in the PENTATHLON. If y'all think falling in the hurdles, jumping 6'6 and 22 ft is not an honest effort for the pentathlon, idk what is. Maybe I'm crazy, I just don't know why ppl are trying to break up each individual event like the entire thing isn't what matters. Clearly she tried her ass off to get back in it

You'll have to show me where "honest effort" exists in the NCAA rule book. My understanding is that clause was removed a couple of years ago. Too much of a judgement call. Now it is simply "failure to participate". Meaning starting any event meets the standard. The combined event (pent/hept/dec) is a single event made up of multiple events. Starting the first event meets the standard for participation.

Maybe it for reasons that she was competing in the open HJ the following day. Yes, she was expected to win the Pent and the HJ was secondary. But, with the hurdle fall, the open HJ became the point producing focus. Either way, she had the ability to pick up 10pts in either event, and that she did.

Skee wrote:

You place in the 10k, you place in the PENTATHLON. If y'all think falling in the hurdles, jumping 6'6 and 22 ft is not an honest effort for the pentathlon, idk what is. Maybe I'm crazy, I just don't know why ppl are trying to break up each individual event like the entire thing isn't what matters. Clearly she tried her ass off to get back in it

That's because they're distance people who can only think about miles, intervals and Galen Rupp. They have absolutely no idea about the other events and try to extrapolate everything from their precious distance events.

Star wrote:

Seems like she produced a result in the pentathlon - placed 14th after getting 0 points in the 800.

If you don't line up in a race or if you drop out, you don't get credited with a result. You get DNS or DNF

The pentathlon result was not a DNF. It was 14th place.

Do you want her to be DQed?

I think overall it was a pretty honest effort to do well in the pentathlon.

If someone enters the 800 and the mile and just doesn't show up for the mile, they shouldn't be allowed to run the 800. That's not an honest effort and it takes a spot from someone who would have run.

I know people like hard set rules but I think it should be subjective an err on the side of the letting the athlete compete.

I heartily agree! To make an analogy, what if she took three high jumps, but each time couldn't get it together to plant and ran through the pit. Would LR's position stay the same...that she should be pulled from the meet.

Hard to understand LRs logic on this one, and if you want to cling to the "honest effort" position, completing 6 of the 7 events and then having what sounds like a psychological problem in the 7th is still an "honest effort" to me.

Sorry, meant to say completed four of five events.

.............................. wrote:

You'll have to show me where "honest effort" exists in the NCAA rule book. My understanding is that clause was removed a couple of years ago. Too much of a judgement call. Now it is simply "failure to participate". Meaning starting any event meets the standard. The combined event (pent/hept/dec) is a single event made up of multiple events. Starting the first event meets the standard for participation.

It is my recollection that there was a rulebook cycle where the specific term disappeared, but the term honest effort is in the 11-12, 13-14 & 15-16 rulebooks. In the 11-12 rulebook the verbiage is highlighted meaning that it was either changed or added so it is possible that the 09-10 rulebook is the cycle where it was not included.

In the current 15-16 rulebook it is in Rule 4 Sec 1 Art 1.

"Competitors who conduct themselves in an unsporting manner, who are

offensive by action or language, or who are found to be in violation of honesteffort, shall be warned or disqualified by the referee from the event and from the remainder of the meet (Rule 3-4.2d)."

Additionally, the rule committee published this supplemental document in June 2013 to better express the nuances of scratches, medical scratches, did not start, failure to participate& honest effort situations.

This document does not address every possible scenario including the one being discussed here, but does provide more guidance than was previously available in print.

Addressing the specific situation with the information we have (which may or may not be all of the information taken into consideration by the referees), it appears the athlete in question gave an honest effort in her combined event. She fully participated in 4 of the 5 components of the event and started the 5th.

This is pretty simple.

Look at the final results of the Hep. She received a score and a place and therefore did not fail to complete that event. (You are inserting your own definition of "completion" of the heptathlon and ignoring the official one.)

Having completed the heptathlon according to the standards of the event and receiving a place and score, there was no reason for her to be disqualified from the meet.

Check the Scoreboard wrote:

Look at the final results of the Hep. She received a score and a place and therefore did not fail to complete that event. (You are inserting your own definition of "completion" of the heptathlon and ignoring the official one.)

This is a solid litmus test - if an athlete ends up in the posted official results with a score/place and the protest period has ended you should be able to safely assume the referee made the determination that there was no violation to the honest effort rule. Otherwise the results would be held while the referee is sorting through everything and then either posted with a score or posted with a DQ.

Just to be clear however - there is no such thing as a "fail to complete the event" rule. It is possible for an athlete to start an event, NOT complete it and still not violate the honest effort rule.

>Q: How is this legal by the rules?

>A1: DON'T ATTACK HER!

>A2: Assume the referee knows the answer

Both of these are pretty stupid failures to address the question.

Wonders never cease to the immaturity of the brothers Johnson to attack some poor girl who struggled at the national meet. Don't you have something else to sensationalize . Get a life you fat has beens.

Here is the rule, in black and white with no room for misenterpretation. Pay special attention to the "note"

Failure to Participate

ARTICLE 2� a� Competitors or relay teams must participate in the trials and/ or finals of all events in which they are declared� Declaration procedures and deadlines for individual and relay team members, excluding alternates, must be published� Such participation is also required in subsequent rounds as a result of qualifying, or when participation is a criterion for entry in a subsequent meet�

b� Participation is the expectation that a competitor start the athletic challenge requirements of the event, according to the rules of the event� Qualification to the next round of an event is, in itself, satisfaction of participation within the qualifying round�

Note: A Combined Event, such as the Decathlon, is one event. Failure to participate, affecting other events in the meet, occurs only if the competitor fails to start the first event within a combined-event competition.

You've quoted the Failure to Participate rule - not the honest effort rule. The original question that started this post was about whether or not she violated the honest effort rule - there wasn't ever a question as to whether or not she started the Pentathlon which is what your rule and the additional note address.

Jonathan Gault wrote:

Failure to Participate is different from Honest Effort. I think Honest Effort is the one she would have to be more worried about.

The failure to participate rule is what applies here. "affecting other events in the meet" is defined and should be applied to this particular situation. "Honest effort" is not even specifically defined in the rulebook and defers to the participation rule.

As a former decathlete I can tell you that the reason the rule exists is because it is possible to foul out of long jump or PV or HJ eliminating your ability to score. The athletes would have to continue to participate for no reason if this rule didn't exist.

Who cares what the rules are at the WC? Different governing bodies.

This has been the rule for at least the last 25 years and probably longer.

This has nothing to do with honest effort. At all.

Typical LRC.

since honest effort was removed and re-inserted in rule book, and now there is a participation clause that says, merely starting an event allows you to continue on in the meet, how could honest effort ever be called? Give me an example.

Someone in the 1500 need only line up, jog 50 meters, not interfere with any other athletes and step off the track. If he shows up 2 hours later and smokes an 800, was he in violation of honest effort, or did he meet the burden of the failure to participate clause?

I am truly interested, and this is why honest effort was removed in the first place. Please help educate me so I can be an informed coach.

.............................. wrote:

since honest effort was removed and re-inserted in rule book, and now there is a participation clause that says, merely starting an event allows you to continue on in the meet, how could honest effort ever be called? Give me an example.

Someone in the 1500 need only line up, jog 50 meters, not interfere with any other athletes and step off the track. If he shows up 2 hours later and smokes an 800, was he in violation of honest effort, or did he meet the burden of the failure to participate clause?

I am truly interested, and this is why honest effort was removed in the first place. Please help educate me so I can be an informed coach.

I think you're scenario of jogging off after 50meters would be subject to review as follows:

"ARTICLE 2

If a competitor is to be withdrawn from an event, or abandons an

event, then an evaluation shall occur either prior to the start of the withdrawn event or immediately after the abandoned event

ARTICLE 3

Should the decision be made to withdraw from or abandon an

event, the competitor shall be scratched from any subsequent event(s) in the meet

However, a subsequent examination and resulting recommendation by

the appointed/approved medical doctor/certified trainer of the competition

shall be considered by the referee to determine if continued participation is

allowable"

USATF will bend the rules and overlook things if they like the athlete and especially if the athlete is sponsored by Nike.

This has nothing to do with USATF... this was at the NCAA championships. Why is this thread still going? This is not hard to figure out, and has been correctly defined several times already.