Am I now "that" parent?

[Reservoir13]

Last weekend my 11 daughter participated in a gymnastics competition. In her age group, there is only one other -12 year team mate competing. The rest of the girls came from different clubs. This was the fourth competition this year, at the 3 previous meetings she obtained 3 stars (ie. the highest level in this type of competition, with 1 being the lowest).
She was so happy to be there and she had a great day. All her exercises went well and I was convinced that she would have a 3 star result again. Her team mate did not have a good day: she fell off the bars and the 3x off high beam. Normally they are quite closely matched, and sometimes I can see the other girl is better, but today (i know I'm not objective but i am trying) it was the other way around.
You can see where this is going: my girl received a 2 star result and the other girl the 3 stars. I could see my daughter trying to keep her smile up but in the car on the way home she cried her eyes out. We talked to the trainer afterwards, who was also non-plussed and vaguely promised to check the score card.
At home, for two days, my girl was upset. I can see 3 possibilities: Either her execution of the exercises was so bad that regardless of the fact that she did all required exercises her score came low. Or the jury was asleep, or her coach held up the wrong number while she was doing her exercise (namely that of her team mate). The last option is not entirely remote as my daughter caught her holding up the wrong sign at the last exercise.
So, here is where I may be unreasonable: This morning, I couldn't stop myself and have emailed the organisation to ask whether perhaps a mistake was made.
I fear that if it is a case of mistaken identity due to the fact that the coach held up the wrong number, it may be that the coach will not admit to it. I'm not sure the organisation will reply as it was a general info email. Was I terribly unreasonable? Is this just something you have to accept in a jury-sport?

Life isn’t fair, and things don’t always go your way. This should be a good lesson for your daughter to learn.

This is not a "life isn't fair" scenario given the other girl made several major mistakes and the coach did make a mistake too the numbers.

Does it matter? is this competition a qualifying competition for something else? Does the 2 stars instead of 3 mean she is missing out on something?

If you have spoken to the coach and she would look into it then gone straight yo the organisers that probably won't go down well with the coach.

It's worth checking and asking for clarity, I wouldn't expect too much through as they'd have to concede that they did something g wrong, but worth an ask.

I think you have to accept the result. What would happen if it was changed? Someone else's daughter would now be upset - and maybe her parents would then complain ... the coaches, judges etc who give up their time for these types of events have it hard enough; they really can't win. I'd encourage your daughter to be pleased with what she has achieved, both now and in the past, and to look forward to what future events hold. Compared to the trials and tribulations of school performances, tests, exams, applying for places at Uni etc, this is a small thing to get upset about and perhaps a good opportunity to help her come to terms with not always winning. By emailing for a different ruling, you've perhaps taken the wrong step and encouraged her to think that complaining is a winning solution when you don't get your own way.

I think your DD would be best having times like this so it can teach her how to accept them. Thinking that they just win everything is setting her up for heartache.

Isn't learning resilience like this the point of competitive sport?

And if you don't like the subjective nature of scoring, it's the wrong sport. It's only going to get more annoying as they get bigger.

I think I would have been less focused on finding out the truth and supporting my daughter. Sorry that seems harsh but I think as a parent your role isn't to find justice on her behalf here but support her to do that if she wants to find a reason or just be there to help her cope with difficult feelings.

Whether the score is right or not I'd be asking your daughter why she was upset and helping her resolve it. She may be upset at the perceived unfairness in which case if she wants to raise it herself I would support her to do it. If she feels she was crap because of her skills I'd ask what she wants to do to improve (extra classes).

I think it's possible a mistake was made bitin think it's more about helping her resolve it xx

I agree with you. How do we teach children that training and giving their best will be rewarded, when it isn't. The scoring isn't subjective. MNers wouldn't put up with it if it was academic.

I don't know anything about gymnastics but thought that in most sports you don't argue with the ref, judge's decision is final.

And if you must, you do it through the coach.

I feel sorry for anyone volunteering in youth sport at the moment. My brother coaches football and is swamped with emails questioning every little decision. Kids can't cope with disappointment. Parents can't cope with seeing their kids disappointed. Bad lessons, bad sportsmanship all round.

Thanks for your honest views. Just to make clear, that towards my daughter I did try to follow the right instructions: telling her it was ok to be upset, but that she has to try to accept it. That it is a jury sport and that next time maybe it is the other way around.
For me personally however, I do find it hard to accept as this wasn't a situation where it was close or it could have gone either way. If they'd both received 2 stars she would have been sad but it would have been much easier to accept. I don't think there is something I can tell her otherwise: she already trains 4x a week and is constantly repeating her exercises at home.

As for the difficulty in being a youth sports volunteer: yes, I can see that it is challenging. In another sport of one of my kids (soccer) I also notice however that there are situations where the coach always selects the son of close friends for the core team and other kids are left as replacement (regardless of competence). I'm not complaining about this exactly for that reason (it is a volunteer job and if I think I could do better, I should do it myself). This time around i do feel that there was an objective mistake. But I take your points and will try to keep my hands from the keyboard next time!

Oh it absolutely is. The result is unfair. This will teach her resilience.

I've tried recalling my email. We'll await whether the coach gets back on this.

And for the record: the other girl was apologetic. She immediately admitted afterwards that she didn't have a good day and she felt bad for my daughter. I don't blame her for anything of course.

I'd rather teach my daughter not to roll over and be meekly accepting of injustice.

I agree with that as well SoupDragon. And I will urge her to ask with her coach again at training tonight. But if it was due to a mistake of the coach, I don't think she will easily admit to it or whether she can even find this out.

Agree @SoupDragon Some life lessons genuinely teach resilience. If a mistake has been made, as it sounds like here, then why not rectify it? I can’t see how the other girl can have got a better score if she fell off her apparatus! It’s odd that so many people are trying to justify this, and defend the indefensible, rather than applying critical thinking skills.

No , go ahead and query it , my child was mixed up with a lesser performing child in something much more important than gymnastics, luckily mistake was realised and correct marks awarded

My dc do a different sport where the results are sometimes determined by the referee. After 15 years between them of competition, we've learnt that sometimes there appears to be no reason to how the day ends up. You can have a good day and lose, you can have a bad day and win. Rather than thinking its a loss, a bad result often yields more learning opportunities which means next time they are better prepared. An easy win teaches them nothing.

I don't think you are in the wrong for questioning it, could they recheck the scores from the running order? My daughter does gymnastics and it's a lot of training, I would hate for this to happen. Totally accept that you are only a poor landing from disaster but this sounds like something may have gone awry with the marking.

The OP has legitimate reason to believe a mistake may have been made so she owes it to her daughter to politely challenge the decision. At this level I’d challenge once, giving all the reasons why I am confused about the result and then accept whatever final decision is made. At this point, if the result still doesn’t make sense I would go down the ‘Life doesn’t always seem fair, channel your frustration into improving’ route.

I don’t know anything about junior gymnastics but it seems very odd that a person can fall off two apparatus and still get the highest possible score. There is some subjectivity in gymnastics scoring but I am pretty sure there are rules that ensure it is more objective than subjective. But maybe things are different at lower levels.

I’ve got to say that some of you have a poor attitude which I hope you aren’t passing on to any children. I was taught that anything worth doing is worth doing well. OP’s daughter is clearly striving for excellence, and that should be encouraged. It is an attitude that will serve her well in life and may well transfer across to other areas of her life. Budding Olympians don’t have that, ‘It’s no big deal’ attitude. I’m not suggesting that OP’s daughter is aiming for the Olympics but without that early passion I’m not sure how many gymnasts would succeed at the higher levels.

You shouldn’t have emailed, you should have tried to pursue it through the coach. If the coach was not able to give a reasonable explanation, then maybe you could have asked the coach to contact the organisation running the competition on your daughters behalf. gymnastics has a lot of hierarchy and it won’t be appreciated that you’ve got above the coaches head. I wouldn’t be surprised if it impacted on your daughters coaching too, as I can be a lot of favouritism.

Yes, you are that parent - I think you need to have a good think about why you are supporting your DD to compete. Do you or she do it for the external affirmation? That way, disappointment and resentment lie.

And remember, in a lifetime, this is one competition. It's what you sign up for by competing, and whether it was fair or not, your DD is learning a lot. Including that "Comparison is the thief of joy."

Instead, think about: Did you DD learn anything? Did she do a good job in her own /her coach's terms? Did she do her best? These are the things to think about: in the end, she should be competing against herself - to improve so that "yesterday's challenge is today's arm up" and all that sort of inspirational guff - these are clichés, but they also contain a lot of everyday wisdom.

I don't think you can comment on the judges' decisions unless you are an expert - and even if you were, you weren't there in the judging panel. You don't know what went on, or how decisions were made.

I hope your DD learns gymnastics and competes for the challenge for herself, and the joy & achievement of learning something difficult, for herself. These things will give her lifelong confidence & skill. Not the stars.

While I would have understood/accepted your message if they'd both came in with 2 stars, I find it hard this time around. As to 'did my daughter learn anything...confidence': It is clear that she feels it is very unfair and actually brought down her confidence. In her mind she did everything right, she trained hard for her exercises and she improved, and the results were below a team mate that did not show improvement (that day, for sure the team mate would have been equal at other occasions).
Exactly for the fact that I'm not an expert I would love for someone who is to have another look at her scorecard. If the coach comes back and confirms that it was indeed her execution, then it is a good learning moment for my daughter. But on the face of it, that would not be the case as the other girl on 2 apparatus did objectively worse.
I think I will go in after tonight's training to see what the trainer says - I have both girls on video doing their exercises so perhaps the trainer that wasn't coaching her that day can give some insights. Or perhaps I am then that parent again 🙄.

When my DD was at a gymnastics competition a winner was read out

Everyone turned around to stare at each other and then someone shouted out

'He's not here today'

You are not wrong to be upset as it would seem that no matter how hard these DC try there are always favourites

Especially in fact when it comes to casting the same bloody DC for the main part school plays

@Reservoir13 Unless you are a trained gymnastics judge YABU.

You will undermine your DD’s confidence at competitions if you allow her to think the judges get it wrong. (Of course they can - it’s just not helpful for gymnasts to have this in their heads IYSWIM). Also, undermining her coach will not help your DD - she needs to trust her/him.

Have you seen her score sheet? Where did your DD lose out - execution or difficulty?

Just concentrate on encouraging your DD to focus on improving her skills, especially in execution - this is often where young gymnasts lose marks. Let her focus on enjoying her sport and being the best she can be.