London 2012 prediction contest (and the winners are...)

[Geoff]

Jeremy we have 5 medals so far and not 4. Mo, Jess, Rutherford, CO and Grabarz.

There have been several disappointments and internal UKA targets missed but we should win at least one or two more medals and possibly just make it to 8. Tonight will determine whether the target will be reached with the women's 1500 and men's 4x400 plus an outside, outside chance in the pole vault. Hopefully, we will win at least one.

[boysen]

My guess is that the CVC medal list will total 8.....p[itched low becomes easier to obtain of course but if reached does that justify an extension of contract...even if it is refused. If monies from Govt for sport are reduced how should % reduction be calculated? Number of medals as a % of competitors?

[boysen]

Thought on Rudisha....he does not race he demonstrates.

[LopenUupunut]

Some controversy today. Since there hasn't been a medal ceremony yet and Heidler is currently considered 3rd, I'm counting her as the bronze medallist. If you had Zhang in the medals, too bad. iain is the only to get a perfect 6 points for this event!

Our cute little bunny-wabbit had Cakir and Bulut going 1-2 and is not only still in the lead but actually speeding up Right now I'm the only one foolhardy enough to follow its blazing pace... will I run out of steam?

LopenUupunut 143
GPC3 138
dvorakfan 137
nevetssllim 137
Geoff 135
iain 130
BernardII 128
Mr Halibut 128
jeremy1 128
jnathletics 127
gospel 126
Tracker 124
trickstat 123
greenie1982 121
Occasional Hope 119
kingmaker 110
shivfan 97

Template 144
AW Form Guide 139
T&FN Formchart 135

[jeremy1]

5 is correct and I miscounted.
Nowt tonight after two poor performances, one by Dob who cannot seem to wean herself off the Baddeley school of 1500 metre running;

Our relay guys are beyond dreadful and clearly nobody in our sprinting fraternity gives a damn.

[boysen]

If the buck stops somewhere the continued failure , at all levels seemingly, of 4x100 is it at the door/desk of the Officer Commanding? If so what should be the outcome?

[trickstat]

Thanks for all your efforts LopenUupunut. Strikes me as an unusually strong performance by the AW form guide this time. I usually find I do better than them and I suspect I'm not alone in that.

[wilmar]

DARN - totally missed this contest. Can I still be added with the same submission entered to the www.atletiektoto.nl contest (you can check there - obviously not changed because my silliness to doubt Bolt is exposed... .

100m BOLT, Usain BLAKE, Yohan GAY, Tyson 7
200m BLAKE, Yohan BOLT, Usain MARTINA, Churandy 2 6 0
400m MERRITT, Lashawn JAMES, Kirani BORLEE, Jonathan 1
800m RUDISHA, David Lekuta AMAN, Mohammed KAKI, Abubaker 4 16 16
1500m KIPLAGAT, Silas KIPROP, Asbel WILLIS, Nicholas 0
5000m GEBREMESKEL, Dejen FARAH, Mohamed LAGAT, Bernard
10000m KIPROP, Wilson FARAH, Mohamed BEKELE, Tariku 3
110m Hurdles MERRITT, Aries LIU, Xiang RICHARDSON, Jason 5 5 5
400m Hurdles CULSON, Javier GREENE, David TAYLOR, Angelo 1
3000m Steeplechase KEMBOI, Ezekiel KIPRUTO, Brimin Kiprop MUTAI, Abel 6
High Jump UKHOV, Ivan SILNOV, Andrey GRABARZ, Robert 6 8 8
Pole Vault LAVILLENIE, Renaud OTTO, Bjorn WALKER, Brad 9
Long Jump WATT, Mitchell MORGUNOV, Sergey SALADINO, Irving 1
Triple Jump TAYLOR, Christian ADAMS, Lyukman DONATO, Fabrizio 6
Shot Put HOFFA, Reese MAJEWSKI, Tomasz STORL, David 4
Discus HARTING, Robert KANTER, Gerd SMITH, Rutger 5
Hammer PARS, Krisztian IKONNIKOV, Kirill KRYVITSKI, Pavel 4 4 4
Javelin VESELY, Vitezslav THORKILDSEN, Andreas VASILEVSKIS, Vadims
Decathlon EATON, Ashton HARDEE, Trey SINTNICOLAAS, Eelco 7 20 20
4x100m Relay JAMAICA UNITED STATES TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO
4x400m Relay UNITED STATES BAHAMAS BELGIUM 17
20km Race Walking BORCHIN, Valeriy KANAYKIN, Vladimir WANG, Zhen 2 7 0
50km Race Walking KIRDYAPKIN, Sergey SCHWAZER, Alex BAKULIN, Sergey
Marathon KIRUI, Abel KIPROTICH, Wilson Kipsang ABSHERO, Ayele
Women
100m FRASER-PRYCE, Shelly-Ann JETER, Carmelita BAPTISTE, Kelly-Ann 7 15 15
200m FELIX, Allyson CAMPBELL-BROWN, Veronica JETER, Carmelita 6 14 14
400m MONTSHO, Amantle RICHARDS-ROSS, Sanya OHURUOGU, Christine 2
800m JELIMO, Pamela SAVINOVA, Mariya SEMENYA, Caster 13
1500m CAKIR ALPTEKIN, Asli DIBABA, Genzebe KOSTETSKAYA, Ekaterina
5000m CHERUIYOT, Vivian Jepkemoi DEFAR, Meseret KIBIWOT, Viola Jelagat 2
10000m DIBABA, Tirunesh CHERUIYOT, Vivian Jepkemoi KIPYEGO, Sally Jepkosgei 7 3 3
100m Hurdles PEARSON, Sally HARPER, Dawn FOSTER-HYLTON, Brigitte 7 18 18
400m Hurdles ANTYUKH, Natalya WALKER, Melaine SHAKES-DRAYTON, Perri 4
3000m Steeplechase ZARIPOVA, Yuliya CHEYWA, Milcah Chemos ASSEFA, Sofia 6
High Jump CHICHEROVA, Anna LOWE, Chaunte SHKOLINA, Svetlana 2
Pole Vault SUHR, Jennifer ISINBAEVA, Elena MURER, Fabiana 5
Long Jump REESE, Brittney MIRONCHYK - IVANOVA, Nastassia SOKOLOVA, Elena 5 11 11
Triple Jump SALADUHA, Olha IBARGUEN, Caterine LEBEDEVA, Tatyana 4
Shot Put OSTAPCHUK, Nadzeya ADAMS, Valerie KOLODKO, Evgeniia 10 10 10
Discus MULLER, Nadine PERKOVIC, Sandra LI, Yanfeng 3
Hammer HEIDLER, Betty LYSENKO, Tatyana MIANKOVA, Aksana
Javelin VILJOEN, Sunette SPOTAKOVA, Barbora ABAKUMOVA, Maria 1
Heptathlon ENNIS, Jessica CHERNOVA, Tatyana DOBRYNSKA, Natallia 5 19 19
4x100m Relay JAMAICA UNITED STATES GERMANY 1
4x400m Relay UNITED STATES RUSSIA JAMAICA 12
20km Race Walking LIU, Hong KANISKINA, Olga KIRDYAPKINA, Anisya
Marathon KIPLAGAT, Edna Ngeringwony SHOBUKHOVA, Liliya KEITANY, Mary Jepkosgei 0

[LopenUupunut]

wilmar, you are very badly late, but luckily for you I've won this contest with 1 event to go so I'm in just the right mood to be lenient

[jnathletics]

Thanks LopenUupunut for the contest. always great fun.

But jeremyLast whats with the goof on my name? or you trying to make fun of the yank? In that case you can when britain earns half the T&F medals the USA earns.

[dvorakfan]

Some of the girls obviously don't like me (Kaniskina, Lowe, Jelimo)
At least the relays were good for me yesterday

Thank you very much for organizing the contest. It's great fun every year, only missed TFN this year.

[jeremy1]

JNathletics... dont be so ridiculouly sensitive. No goof?? intended and you dont need to remind me of your medals in athletics, thanks. You are American... mmmm. no surprise with that post!

[LopenUupunut]

The last event is over, and it's time for the official final standings!

I tried to maintain suspense by not posting an update yesterday but failed epically. I WIN FINLAND'S ONLY GOLD AT THIS OLYMPICS! With just the right combination of insane obsession and dumb luck, I caught that silly rabbit in the final 600 to claim the top spot. Special thanks to Mervyn Luckwell for not winning the javelin

Athletics Weekly, nevetssllim and GPC3 round out the overall top 5 and can also pat themselves on the back. Athletics Weekly can be extra-happy as they beat Track & Field News by a whopping 8 points

The following people will receive a special prize (minor bragging rights) for winning one of the five categories:

The universe's foremost expert on jumps is GPC3, who scored 32 points in this category! Curiously, he was followed home by a whole heap of "extra contestants", with T&FN Formchart sole second at 31 and AW Form Guide, the template and late entry wilmar in shared 3rd with 30 points. (Mr Halibut also scored 30.) GPC3 got a perfect 6 points for men's TJ and was one of just two to have Jenn Suhr winning the pole vault.

The glorious winners of the "Other" category (road events and multis) are Mr Halibut and iain with 22 points each! The walks seem to have made the key difference here as iain had Kirdyapkin and Tallent going 1-2 and Mr Halibut was the only to have Chen Ding winning the m20K.

The official virtual Wooden Spoon is awarded to shivfan. He certainly has the potential to do better as he finished in the middle of the pack last year and was =4th this year in men's track, but he seems to have been injured in the run-up to the Games as he limped home well behind the main pack.

Congratulations to all winners, and thank you very much everybody for taking part! I hope you enjoyed this contest as much as I did

Final standings:

LopenUupunut 179
nevetssllim 172
GPC3 168
dvorakfan 167
wilmar 164
BernardII 162
Mr Halibut 161
Geoff 160
jnathletics 160
iain 157
Tracker 157
jeremy1 156
trickstat 154
gospel 153
Occasional Hope 142
greenie1982 141
kingmaker 132
shivfan 115

Template 177
AW Form Guide 173
T&FN Formchart 165

[dvorakfan]

@Lopen: did you join the atletiektoto contest? Where did you finish?

[LopenUupunut]

@Lopen: did you join the atletiektoto contest? Where did you finish?

I did join it, quite possibly for the last time. I had my second-worst placing ever (out of 6 attempts) in the top 3 ranking... for the record, f/f's atletiektoto predictions would have scored 175 here.

In another contest with the same scoring system as atletiektoto my entry scored something like 232. (Official final standings haven't been published yet, but it ought to be 232.) I got an extra 2 points in women's marathon in that contest thanks to a feature letting me pick "anybody else", but even with those 2 points removed it would still be 230. If it was the same guy doing the predictions (presumably only with tiny changes), the same basic scoring system was used and my points were calculated right in both cases, where did those extra 30 points come from? You get one guess...

Rant over

[dvorakfan]

@Lopen: did you join the atletiektoto contest? Where did you finish?

I did join it, quite possibly for the last time. I had my second-worst placing ever (out of 6 attempts) in the top 3 ranking... for the record, f/f's atletiektoto predictions would have scored 175 here.

In another contest with the same scoring system as atletiektoto my entry scored something like 232. (Official final standings haven't been published yet, but it ought to be 232.) I got an extra 2 points in women's marathon in that contest thanks to a feature letting me pick "anybody else", but even with those 2 points removed it would still be 230. If it was the same guy doing the predictions (presumably only with tiny changes), the same basic scoring system was used and my points were calculated right in both cases, where did those extra 30 points come from? You get one guess...

Rant over

I think I didn't get you

But if you had your 2nd worst placing this year (200 points? I got 201...), you are one of the most consistent ones.
My worst is 178., my 2nd worst 49.

It' interesting who different scoring system cause different results.
A couple of years ago there was a constest on a board (which doesn't exist anymore) were you had to pick the medalists and got points if they finished in the top-8 (I think 10 points if your winner-pick won, 7 points if he finished 2nd, ... 1 point if 8th - or something like that). Also completely different from yours...
Or T&FN, where only medals count...

I always try to enter every contest I can find for major championships, regardless of which scoring system - and then look how my placings/results differ.