Olympics

[The Steward]

What would a new-age SIMOlympics look like?

[Carole Hanson]

-Definitely need a song/art contest, or maybe both
-Handicapping (SIM or real life or maybe both, I don't mind)
-A cool idea but I don't know how feasible, The Steward creates the same mare for however many teams there are (so let's say 6 teams, The Steward will create a mare 6 times over and she will have the exact same abilities each time) and the teams work together to breed her for the best foal possible
-Elimination scavenger hunt maybe? So let's say there's 6 teams, place 5 horses into AJ that have a headshot of a horse with a medal on them. One team eliminated, then next round 4 horses, then next round 3 horses etc.
-Trivia contest of some sort? Maybe each team nominates one person to play a trivia contest about all things SIM, history, races, forum stuff, trainer stats etc.? Not sure how to make this super fair though

[The Steward]

Those are all fantastic ideas!

[Carole Hanson]

Just had an idea, the finals could be actual races with historical horses involved. So this is how it could work. 6 teams competed and after all the other contests, the standings are:

1. Team B=23 points
2. Team E=21 points
3. Team A=20 points
- Team C=20 points (for a tie like this, a tie breaker for placings in contest could be used, so if Team A had 20 points but had 3 2nds and no wins, but Team C had 1 win and 1 2nd, Team C wins the tie breaker)
5. Team E=17 points
6. Team D=16 points

There are 6 historical races, all dirt and turf divisions (sorry AW and mixers!), SIMsters would have voted on 6 horses to make it into the historical races (or we could do 12 horses and each team picks 2 horses per race?) from each division. Now, the teams get to choose a horse in each race based on their standings so far:

Team ranked 1: 3x first pick, 2x second pick, 1x third pick
Team ranked 2: 2x first pick, 1x second pick, 1x third pick
Team ranked 3: 1x first pick, 1x second pick, 1x third pick
Team ranked 4: 0x first pick, 1x second pick, 1x third pick
Team ranked 5: 0x first pick, 1x second pick, 1x third pick
Team ranked 6: 0x first pick, 0x second pick, 1x third pick

Picks 4, 5 and 6 in each round are drawn randomly, so team ranked 6 could potentially luck into getting 4th pick for the 5 races they don't have any preference. The races in which the teams get to utilise their pick order are also drawn randomly (so team ranked 1 could end up being able to pick first in TR, DS and DM based on luck of the draw).

Each race would have points of course and I think it would be pretty fair because we never know how these historical greats stack up against each other. Plus, it's a fun excuse to finally do those historical match ups.

[David Howard]

I imagined horses wearing skis and goggles hurtling down a very steep ski jumping hill. Furthest distance wins.

[Nena Olson]

I remember winning the Olympics once (or was it twice? I can't remember how I got Instrumental lol) fun times! Would be awesome if someday we could use our pensioned horses and retrain them to compete in eventing... SIM THoroughbred Makeover!

[Noel Collins]

Similar to the mare breeding but with identical ability racers. Team has to figure equip, surface, races. Open to enter any races and contest is for points earned racing. If it’s a mare pass it around team after for breeding? Go old school and make it an offspring of say two of the greats that would never have met up in the shed age wise. Or two real life greats that wouldn’t have been able to meet because of age. Like Zenyatta and Man o War

[Shannon Hunt]

Is there somewhere where a not-old person could catch up on what sim Olympics entail?

[Carole Hanson]

Hmm, I feel like if you searched the forum extensively with the keyword Olympics you would find the old threads about it, I believe we called it the "SIMlympics" but I may be wrong (so maybe that will yield some search results too?).

[Laura Ferguson]

Hmm, I feel like if you searched the forum extensively with the keyword Olympics you would find the old threads about it, I believe we called it the "SIMlympics" but I may be wrong (so maybe that will yield some search results too?).

I think there was actually a separate forum for the Olympics under the contest forum, long since gone. I can find where there was some discussion prior to the Olympics, and some aftermath, but not the contest itself, which apparently was nine or ten (!) real life years ago. Although I guess that makes sense, since I was on the team that won, and the prize was racing Sleep to Dream (age 28) and breeding/racing her first foal - Wearing the Roses.

There was a workout contest, a trivia contest, some sort of creative contest, a handicapping contest, and a few races where the entries were restricted to the olympic teams. I think that is all, but I may have forgotten something. Having a good team was key - some teams had members who signed up but then really didn't participate, and I think some other teams had trouble working together. I was lucky - our group was pretty awesome.