BROE has come a long way especially with its “BROE2” revamp, but people still struggle to set up adaptive events on it. The primary cause of the problem is that the adaptive and para classifications can be very restrictive. You might want to set up a relatively ‘open’ event including a range of adaptive/para classifications, but it is not easy to do so. You either brute force enter every single permutation and then consolidate the entries into sensible race line-ups when you are making the draw. Or you create an open event without any restrictions on who enters, but then do the check and filter process again at the draw making stage.
Probably the most experienced Entries Secretary in UK for setting up adaptive events in BROE is Marlow RC’s Helen Thompson and she provided the latest updated advice:
- Having done this a few times now and giving it more thought again following this year’s MTR, I’ve come to the conclusion that the most efficient way of collecting entries on BROE2 – for competitions where the race programme is created in the way that you do it – is just to set up two “bucket” events.
- Op 1x – relabeled ADA 1x – Used to capture all 1x entries, regardless of whether junior, senior, open or women.
- Op 2x – relabeled ADA 2x – Used to capture all 2x entries, regardless of whether junior, senior, open, women, mixed, supported.
- ·nce entries are closed and the race programme has been put together, then individual events can be created in BROE2, relabelled appropriately (eg Sup Mx Ada 2x), and entries moved across. I think that’s the simplest way.
Note that BROE assigns Crew Name from Stroke, so it’s helpful to enter the adaptive rower in the supported 2x in seat #2.
Jeff Elms from British Rowing offers clarification as well:
- There is no specific event within the rules of racing for a combined adaptive / non adaptive crew but the rules of racing do allow for a competition to offer such an event via the use of local event rules and this can be supported via BROE although obviously BROE will not police the local rules and this will be left to the competition organisers. The two available ways to do this are to offer an “open” event and add local rules to restrict the entry criteria. E.g. open 2x where the competition defines and polices the parameters around one being adaptive and the other not. In this case both crew members would need to hold racing licenses. The other option is very similar but in this case the event is set up as a primary event. This means that the membership type required would not be “race” but “row” – or coach etc. It would also mean that no ranking points would be allocated. So basically the choice of which route to take is yours. You can obviously use the override to rename the event appropriately. As the number of entries are unlikely to be high the points issue is unlikely to be a significant consideration so the main thing to consider is will the non-adaptive rowers be actively racing in which case it needs to be open and they would need a racing membership or are they more assisting (eg. steering) in which case it might be more appropriate to set up as a primary event as this would mean someone with a row rather than race membership, like a coach could be the second person.
One final issue that comes up which is a matter of the Rules of Racing, is that BROE does not allow J14s and under to row in the same crew as an adult. This rule is regularly ignored especially in “Family Double” events but especially in the Support Adaptive events as well. I understand that British Rowing plans to make a request to the rule committee to amend this rule, but in the interim Andrew Brit has identified an effective workaround in BROE.
- “Pass the BR numbers of the rowers involved to the Entry Admin for the event. They can then place the rowers in the crews and tell BROE to ignore the validation failure.”