HANDICAPS Shooting, like all other sports, is blessed with participants of varying skills so that over an extended series of meets, the same teams and individuals continually win. To equalize the distribution of awards and maintain a high degree of interest, various corrective systems have been developed. One of these is the NRA Classification System, wherein competitors of near equal ability are grouped and compete for a class prize. Classification lends itself best to single competitions or to leagues of individuals. True handicap systems work best when the league winner is selected on the basis of the number of matches won and not an aggregate score. Handicapping systems tend to reward improvement rather than overall consistent high performance of balanced teams. Some leagues meet the problem by balancing team membership so that raw scores fired by teams will be within a few points of each other. Team Balancing: Teams may be equalized by first listing participants in order of average and selecting the teams shown in the following sample. Team rosters for a single club’s 4-team league: Shooter 1 Shooter 2 Shooter 3 Shooter 4 Shooter 5 Shooter 6 Shooter 7 Shooter 8 Shooter 9 Shooter 10 Shooter 11 Shooter 12 Shooter 13 Shooter 14 Shooter 15 Shooter 16
TEAM A
TEAM B
TEAM C
TEAM D
1 8 9 16
2 7 10 15
3 6 11 14
4 5 12 13
17