Switch lines (Closed for comments)
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Started
In the rulebook it’s written that a course should not favor left or right handed riders. I totally agree with this but I also think that there would not be a problem if there is one line that favors a left handed rider as long there is another line that favors a right handed rider. I think this would be expert lines.
Today almost all lines are straight, and I think it would be cool to have more lines that changes directions and that will probably favor left or right handed riders.
What’s your thoughts on this topic?
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I don't see how that would help make the sport bigger. If the lines favor a rider that jumps to the left in finals, then it would be ridiculous and totally unfair to riders jumping to the right?
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Well Erik is specifically saying that the lines could favour left or right but only if there are an even number of left and right lines.
The main issue I see with it is
1) the logistics of ensuring you have an equal number of left vs right lines. Lines are often built by multiple people who dont necessarily communicate repeatedly through the build so the chances of ensuring equal left vs right is quite low. I can see too many left or rights being made but not having enough time to rectify it and then they end up being used.
2) the problem of making sure that the left and right lines are equal in difficulty. You may have two expert lines one which is a very hard expert line and one which is a very easy expert line. If the very hard one happens to be built for left hand jumps and the very easy line is built for right hand jumpers then you may find that no one is able to complete the hard one (even left hand jumpers) but the right hand jumpers get a benefit in the easy one by the fact that it is natural for them.
Crude example: If a line is made for left hand jumpers and has a static hop up 13 pallets then no riders will complete it. If a line is made for right hand jumpers and the static hop is only 7 pallets you may have right hand jumpers able to complete it but left hand jumpers fail because of the right hand jumping aspect.
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Steven you are right, of course I see a lot of problem coming with this. It has to be fair. The switch lines usually looks pretty much the same in all competitions, I think there are some potential in these kind of lines. A “normal” line could include both left and right jumps, but its still hard to make it fair.
I saw some bike trials competitions and there was both left and right jumps in the same course. Of course Bike and Uni trials are different.
I mainly posted this to see whats your thoughts are on switch lines
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I also think that it could be the source of a whole lot of problems, Steven got the point. It also matters if the hop that favours left or right handed riders is at the beginning / middle / ending part of the line and so on: take off area, landing area, length, height etc. - all in all, it would be nearly impossible to make it fair unless you make the same exact jump mirrored. For instance, if the left hand jump is at the beginning of a line (before other harder parts) then right handed riders can try it a couple times without wasting a lot of time and energy on the other hard parts on the line. Then if on the other line the right handed jump is the final jump, then left handed riders have to go through the whole line every time to try it. And this is just one thing.
What I would suggest instead of this (and what we did a few times already) is to build lines mirrored, where riders have to choose if they go on the left or right path (exactly the same lines just mirrored), but both options include left and right side jumps, so riders are forced to do both.
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Mirrored lines is a clever suggestion for this problem Mark