Collapsing of Classes

With a view to fairness and competitiveness, where possible Singles League Racing try to avoid running classes with just 1 or 2 racers in them, and to that end any classes that had less than 3 racers in either vet or open at the start of the season get collapsed. This means that the vets and opens are combined into a single class, which we call simply the 'Men' or 'Women' category (i.e. 'M' where otherwise there would be 'VM' and 'OM', or 'W' where otherwise there would be 'VW' and 'OW').

Hence in some classes, racers who registered as a vet are finding themselves running in the same class as racers who registered for the open class. If this has happened to you it means that your class has been collapsed. Here's how this works for vets:

1. If a racer who signed up as a vet is in a collapsed class, they will be shown as in the combined class in the start list, results, etc., along with any open racers in the class.
2. If such a vet racer bumps out of the collapsed class they will go into the vet class above (unless it too has been collapsed).
3. If a vet racer currently in a non-collapsed class bumps up into a collapsed class, they will go into the combined class.
4. Vet men and open men can be collapsed to form a combined men class, and vet women and open women can be collapsed to form a combined women class. Men and women classes cannot be collapsed together.

For example, if the S8 men classes have been collapsed, then the S8 vet men and S8 open men would be running together in the S8M class. Should an S9VM or S9OM racer bump up, they too would go into the S8M class. Should a vet in that class bump up they would go into the S7VM class.

Note that this is fixed at the start of the season and there will be no further collapsing or un-collapsing of classes later in the season.

Note too that our classes are based on handicaps, and so the vets in a given class race at about the same level as open racers in the same class. Hence, the often heard "its not fair that I have to race against these young hotshots" is totally wrong since the "old guy" is in the class because he is racing at the same level as those "young hotshots" and is competitive with them!