Richard

coolstorybro

I won't reiterate what year1buick said but I agree 100%. I read the article, and those children are obese because they're eating too many calories. It's easy to overeat on carbs. They're also not eating any fruits or vegetables or any foods containing micronutrients and probably not taking a multivitamin or anything, but malnourished isn't about calories, it's about nutrients. Anyway, they're still eating more calories than they're using so they're fat. Taubes I disagree with 100% and there is a good deal of criticism about his narrow views out there (just Google “Gary Taubes criticism” and you’ll see what I mean). With his logic, I could eat 5 pounds of bacon fried in butter or any other non-carb meals of 5000-10000 calories a day and not gain weight. Trust me, I can easily eat 4000 kcal/day of low-carb foods. Where are those calories going? The first study he sites is likely the Minnesota Study, where war objectors were placed on approximately a 50% reduction from maintenance calories (which only put them around 1500 calories/day or thereabouts in the first place) and were held there for 6 straight months. Activity (walking) was enforced and most men reached the lower limits of body fat percentage by the end of it. Their maintenance calories changed, but the total reduction in daily energy expenditure only amounted to 40% (of which the majority of that was due to the weight loss). Weight and fat loss had basically stopped at the end of the study which makes sense; the original 50% deficit had been reduced to at most 10% due to the 40% reduction in metabolic rate. For what it's worth, when I'm REALLY cutting down to 10% body fat or less, I do two weeks at a time of about 1200 calories a day from almost ONLY protein (or a protein-sparing modified fast or PSMF). It's pretty torturous but it works. You experience a lot of the stuff Taubes mentions about like getting moody, loss of energy, hunger etc (although no suicidal tendencies haha) because you’re starving yourself (this is true any time you diet). But that level of ridiculousness is NOT necessary if you just want to be fit. You can reduce calories to something like 11-13 x lean body mass and get down to ~15% body fat comfortably and sanely. During maintenance I eat maybe 200g carbs per day with no ill effects. Right now I'm trying to put some mass on so on workout days I eat about 350-400g carbs. And at any given time I can be prone to eating a giant cookie, or massive dessert, or 30 pieces of sushi, or a cheeseburger with fries, or all of those in one sitting. I just don't do those things too often. You’re right though that going too low-fat is a bad idea, because fat does provide long-term satiety (and protein provides short-term satiety) and you’ll likely end up binging if you try to go low-fat for a prolonged period. I keep fat around 20-25% of my calories at all times, unless I’m doing a PSMF, which is a short-term thing only. In 2009 I ate whatever I wanted but limited calories to ~2000-2300 kcal/day and I got pretty lean but everyone kept telling me I was “too skinny”. Back then, I didn’t know anything about nutrition and I wasn’t eating anywhere close to enough protein. This past summer, I discovered Lyle McDonald’s stuff and was significantly lighter and leaner than in 2009 but I spared a lot of lean mass, so I looked a lot better. The point is, the weight comes off as long as calories are restricted. If you want mostly fat to come off, you need to watch your macros. I went in the opposite direction of you Bill, I tried low-carb with no calorie restriction but still tracked my calories for the hell of it. Last fall I had gotten too chubby and so I tried low-carbing it off. I was eating ~3000 kcal a day and lost maybe 5 pounds in water weight that quickly came back. When I combined low carb with calorie restriction (~2000 kcal/day) I started making real progress and went from maybe 18%bf to ~15%. Then I started reading Lyle’s stuff and attained a very good understanding of nutrition, did a modified version of his Ultimate Diet 2.0 to get down to maybe 12-13% body fat and then did a PSMF down to <10% this past summer. With my current understanding and some discipline, I am confident in my ability to manipulate my body mass as I choose. I’m still figuring out the lean mass gaining thing though (I’m actually trying to gain weight for the first time in my life), so we’ll see how that goes. But to most people reading this thread, you can get relatively fit with a simple calorie deficit either through diet or exercise (ideally a combination of both).

That's not possible. The situation you describe is a scientific miracle. Why did no fat people come out of concentration camps? How do people starve to death? You've solved world hunger if you can explain how someone can create mass out of nothing. Stuff like paleo and low-carb works because it subconsciously limits your calories. I've gotten a six pack eating sugary cereal within the limits of my macronutrient ratios. It's about how much you eat, not necessarily what. And I'm also about 35 pounds lighter than when I aged out. Bottom line, the diet to which you can adhere is the best one. As long as you're somehow in a caloric deficit, you'll lose weight.

Someone should propose this as a solution to save drum corps.

Absolutely, but when you're in the 20%+ bodyfat range (for males) like many drum corps alums macros don't really matter nearly as much as just creating a caloric deficit. Once you get below 15% then you should probably start hitting the weights and focusing on your macros, not that the weights wouldn't be beneficial at higher BF percentages. And in many ways nutrition is probably at least as complicated as rocket science, if not more so…

Phantom 2010. I fell asleep.

Like any internet discussion about dieting (or anything for that matter), there's a lot of misinformation here. The simplest advice is probably best. Calories in < calories out = weight loss. At the same time it needs to be something to which you can adhere. If you really want to learn something about nutrition, read up on guys like Lyle McDonald and Alan Aragon. They present opinions backed by specific medical studies and debunk a lot of the silliness out there like caloric deficits don't result in weight loss or eating a million meals a day or eating "clean" or paleo or whatever. A lot of that stuff definitely works for some people, but there are easier and more enjoyable ways to do it too.

I appreciate what you’re trying to do here, but I question the feasibility of many of these ideas. They already shortened the show length requirement to something like 9 or 9:30. If corps still insist on putting on 11 minute productions with 35 members…well that’s probably not very intelligent design from a competitive or entertainment standpoint. This I don’t understand. Why confine the designers? If they can effectively cover the field, and many of them can, why stop them? There was very good field coverage from most Open Class finalists this year. This I really don’t understand. You think that by limiting BDB, OC, Spartans, Revo etc. to 60 members that more people will want to start drum corps? Because that’s the only way that this actually increases participation instead of decreasing it. If OC groups can effectively recruit more than 60 kids, then they should be able to provide those kids with the experience of marching. The regional touring model is a nice concept, but it’s not really possible without more corps. Obviously there’s a good concentration of corps in California so I could see a regional circuit working there. And I guess you could do an east coast circuit with everyone from Platinum up to Les Stentors and maybe encompass 7 or 8 corps over 900 miles, if you even consider that regional. But where do the northwest corps compete? Or the corps from Texas? What if a corps starts up in Florida? Except many schools here in the Northeast don’t get out until mid-to-late June so you’re getting squeezed on the other end. In my opinion, the best way to increase Open Class participation and sustainability is for more intelligent people to start new drum corps. Getting this to happen is something else entirely. Handicapping the stronger groups isn’t much of an impetus to start a new corps I don’t think. Are there prospective corps directors out there saying “well I would start a corps, but I don’t want to compete with SCVC so forget it”. Are those types of people really the ones you want starting corps anyway? Music City and Legends are two of the newer corps that have been steadily rising through the ranks of the class. They’re showing that you can start and build a competitive group with the current model if you’re intelligent about it. But too many groups expect to beat BDB and SCVC in their first year, or even in their 5th year, and they’re setting themselves up for failure by doing that. Set reasonable goals. Recruit hard. Be conservative with your expenses. Run it like a business. Sounds easy, right?

This implies that Open Class corps have a limited number of spots and are close to or at that limit. Outside of BDB, did any OC finalist field more than 100 members? Spots are not the issue here. World Class: 2000 - 19 Corps 2001 - 18 (Tarheel Sun folded) 2002 - 19 (Cascades move up) 2003 - 23 (PC, Cap Reg, Mandarins, Magic move up) 2004 - 24 (Esperanza moves up) 2005 - 24 2006 - 23 (Kiwanis/Troopers out, Blue Stars in) 2007 - 22 (Cap Reg, Magic, Esperanza out, Academy in, Troopers return) 2008 - 20 (Southwind, Cascades out) 2009 - 22 (Surf in, Cascades return) 2010 - 23 (Teal Sound in) The numbers only paint part of the picture. Without looking at decisions made by each corps and what ultimately led to their current status, you can't draw any kind of accurate conclusion. A while back I started digging into what happened with all the OC corps since 2000 to now. By my rough count, there were 46 OC groups in 2000. There are probably somewhere around 20 more that started and failed within the decade as well. Anywhere, here's the list of corps that competed in DCI shows in 2000. I'm not even sure these are all OC groups (or D2/3 back then). I started researching them but only got so far. Allegiance Elite - Merged with Edmonton Strutters in 2004 to become Fusion. All-age as of 2009 Americanos - Lot's of discussion on here about this corps management, and if the desire even exists to run a corps. Indefinitely folded drum corps - only indoor percussion and winterguard. Bandettes - Blue Devils B - Active Blue Stars - World Class Capital Regiment - World Class in 2003, Inactive in 2008, Open Class in 2009, Inactive in 2010. Many questions surround their 990s, operating expenses, and leadership/board structure. Capital Sound - Cincinnati Glory - Merged with Marion Cadets in 2001 Colt Cadets - Active Decorah Kilties - Delta Brigade - Dutch Boy - Inactive as of 2010 East Coast Jazz - Folded after 2006 finals when buses were impounded in Madison and equipment was sold to cover costs to get home. I've heard first-hand accounts of poor record keeping and members marching multiple years for free. Edmonton Strutters - Merged with Allegiance Elite in 2004 to become Fusion. Parade corps (focused on younger musicians) with DCI aspirations according to web site. Also maintain Movado winter guard. Emerald Knights - Esperanza - Moved up in 2004, folded after 2006 season General Butler Vagabonds - Wiki - Before the 2001 season, the 1990s version of the Vagabonds abruptly collapsed due to internal conflict. HYPE - ??? Impulse - Active Jersey Surf - World Class Joliet Kingsmen - Kips Bay Crusaders - Knight Storm - Decided to dissolve in May 2001 citing recruiting difficulties (http://www.scorpsboard.com/news/2001_news/knight_storm5_14_01.html) Lake Erie Regiment - Legend of Texas - Wiki - 2 years active, "substantially longer tour" in 2000, "unable to financially field a corps" in 2001 Les Sénateurs - Merged with Les Sentinelles to form Quebec Alliance in 2002. "Recruiting challenges" led to demise in 2004." Contributing to such recruiting challenges was the quickly shrinking division III drum corps season. Once all remaining regional drum corps circuits had been taken over by DCI, Eastern division III corps could no longer take part in the quick DCE or DCI Atlantic Division tour that had been held in early July for most of the 1990s. All that division III units could aspire to was a short season lasting less than three weeks, with limited competitive appearances on weekdays in cities that happened to be on the road to the DCI Championships location. This had limited appeal for many potential members." (http://www.drumcorpsworld.com/articles.cfm?ID=697) Les Sentinelles - Merged with Les Senateurs to form Quebec Alliance in 2002. "Recruiting challenges" led to demise in 2004." Contributing to such recruiting challenges was the quickly shrinking division III drum corps season. Once all remaining regional drum corps circuits had been taken over by DCI, Eastern division III corps could no longer take part in the quick DCE or DCI Atlantic Division tour that had been held in early July for most of the 1990s. All that division III units could aspire to was a short season lasting less than three weeks, with limited competitive appearances on weekdays in cities that happened to be on the road to the DCI Championships location. This had limited appeal for many potential members." (http://www.drumcorpsworld.com/articles.cfm?ID=697) Les Stentors - Active Mandarins - World Class Mélomanes - Folded after 2000 - ???(http://www.drumcorpsworld.com/articles.cfm?ID=693) Memorial Lancers - ??? Oregon Crusaders - Active Pacific Crest - World Class Patriots - Folded after 2003 - I've heard first hand accounts of members being paid to march Phoenix - Brick, NJ - ???? Racine Scouts - Active Raiders - Active Scenic City - ??? Seattle Cascades - World Class Spartans - Active Spectrum - Tampa Bay Thunder - Merged with Kiwanis Kavaliers in 2002 Teal Sound - World Class Vanguard Cadets - Active West Coast Sound - ??? Yamato - Just from what I was able to dig up, it's hard to say that Open Class is a less sustainable model than World Class. My conclusion is that the groups that were in D1 in 2000 were MOSTLY financially stable and the groups that were in D2/3 were MOSTLY financially unstable. Now I would guess that groups in both classes are mostly financially stable. So while the total number has declined, the percentage of stable groups has significantly increased. An economic downturn was all it took to separate many of those that had a sound business plan from those that were running an organization by the seat of their pants. To Tom's point though, many of the groups that folded out of World Class started as Open Class units. I would guess that in some of these situations, moving to World Class made these groups LESS financially stable.

Uh, then how did they get the picture up on the jumbotron?

As far as I know, finals is the second Saturday in August every year, 2010 being no different. It just so happened that this year it is the on the latest possible date using that methodology.

All of Open Class: 1 Blue Devils B......86.000....July 17 2 Vanguard Cadets....84.400....July 16 3 Spartans...........78.300....July 18 4 Gold...............77.800....July 17 5 7th Regiment.......77.000....July 18 6 Impulse............76.400....July 17 7 Revolution.........76.150....July 20 8 Oregon Crusaders...75.600....July 11 9 Spokane Thunder....74.000....July 17 10 Legends............73.200....July 21 11 Genesis............71.100....July 20 12 Music City.........70.550....July 21 13 Colt Cadets........69.950....July 19 14 Forte..............67.750....July 22 15 Raiders............66.700....July 06 16 Velvet Knights.....66.500....July 17 17 Racine Scouts......66.200....July 18 18 Les Stentors.......66.150....July 18 19 City Sound.........62.400....July 17 20 Platinum...........60.850....July 18 21 Blue Devils C......56.800....July 16 22 Spirit of Newark...53.800....July 17 23 Blue Saints........51.850....July 18 24 Stragnas...........???? Corps going to Indy: 1 Blue Devils B......86.000....July 17 2 Spartans...........78.300....July 18 3 7th Regiment.......77.000....July 18 4 Revolution.........76.150....July 20 5 Oregon Crusaders...75.600....July 11 6 Legends............73.200....July 21 7 Genesis............71.100....July 20 8 Music City.........70.550....July 21 9 Colt Cadets........69.950....July 19 10 Forte..............67.750....July 22 11 Raiders............66.700....July 06 12 Velvet Knights.....66.500....July 17 13 Racine Scouts......66.200....July 18 14 Les Stentors.......66.150....July 18 15 Platinum...........60.850....July 18 16 Spirit of Newark...53.800....July 17 17 Blue Saints........51.850....July 18 18 Stragnas...........???? Raiders haven't played in a while. OC's also been quiet for over a week. Warrenton tomorrow will be interesting to see how 7th, Legends and Raiders shake out. Keep in mind BDB's score is on a 5 judge panel. I think OC's is as well. Raiders' likely is too.

My understanding is that OC show revenue is put into a pool that is divided up at the end of each year. I thought that they elected to do it that way instead being paid on a per-show basis for some reason that I don't remember. Is that inaccurate?

There's more to drum corps than just playing shows. The kids in Open Class know this more than anyone. Trust me. If that were the case, then I would estimate that there would be no new corps ever. You have to start somewhere even if you don't have great equipment and a top-dollar staff yet. I'd imagine it's hard to fundraise the money for all you've mentioned without actually having anything to show for it until you've covered all those expenses. How many sponsors would give money to someone selling the line "well we need $800,000 in the bank before you'll actually see anything as a result of your donation. Hopefully that will be within the next 10 years. Thanks for your trust and support." As made clear by my overt sarcasm, I don't think what you've outlined is realistic. I would be curious to hear from the directors of the new/returning corps for this year to see how many of them had all that you mention in place prior to November 2009.

I think you're being a little harsh. On the west coast, there are a good amount of shows. Tonight in Freemont it is basically an OC show. Same with Dublin tomorrow. And Paramount on the 17th. Then most corps are getting ready to head to the midwest to start the OC shows that lead up to finals week. Revolution is playing 17 shows this season including prelims. How does that suck for them? They went out west to play some OC shows and will play more as they tour towards Michigan City. For those groups that aren't willing or able or choose not to tour all summer, who are they supposed to compete against? There are only so many OC corps spread throughout the country. If you can think of a way to get them to play more shows together while keeping travel costs down, well I'd love to hear it.

Troopers' new uniforms are like the new coke: they'll be around forever.

less talk, more pics

U Well they're acting in the interest of their organization, as the leader of any organization should. My beef is with their ethics in their approach, where they're proposing the advancement their organizations at the expense of others. I don't take exception with the motive, just the method.

For my money, the reason is simply that they feel the G7 proposal its what's best for their organizations, instead of what's best for all of DCI.

bawker, props for not only a well thought-out post, but also for making it very readable from a formatting perspective. Truly a lost art on many message boards.

You're presuming the cause to be what you want it to be. An equally probable explanation involves the G7 making a power play on the leadership of DCI, but you don't want to believe that despite the evidence that points to it. The cause could very well be that Hopkins convinced the G7 that his vision for the future was a better one than DCI's. Is it? I guess we won't know for 5/10/20 years. Although if he had successfully made his supercorps division in 1997, do you think we would be better or worse off as an activity right now? Answer me this: what evidence points to this NOT being a money/power grab by the G7, beyond the belief that these are good guys who would never do such a thing to further their own causes, organizations and agendas? Side note: I just want to clarify that I don't believe they were being evil for the sake of being evil, or even being evil at all for that matter. I think that the G7 truly believes that the future of drum corps is in another direction than the one being promoted by DCI. Philosophical differences, as explained by Dan Acheson. A position of experience. And I don't think Hopkins is a bad guy or even necessarily bad for drum corps, but I don't support his vision for the future. But I do think he'd stab someone in the back to climb on top of them. It happens all the time in the business world and it's just a means of achieving success - it's certainly worked for him to this point (or to a few weeks ago). Sometimes being cutthroat can lead to great success, other times it can create you a lot of enemies. I apologize as my intent was not to condescend; I realize I tend to use powerful language or intentionally set a tone with many of my discussions here (a skill I have honed here on DCP for sure). It's frustrating though to be in a discussion when one side is speaking from 100% speculation and multiple members of the opposite side of the discussion speak from a position of some to moderate insight. I've given examples of when BOBSMYTH and audiodb among others have demonstrated beforehand knowledge of this situation. The people closest to this all lean the same direction, which is why I have such a hard time understanding your insistence that "something unknown" happened and that the G7 have been noble in their pursuits.

This insinuates they know something that the non-G7 corps don't know as well, else they would be on board with the plan, or at least pushing back on DCI's current business plan, correct? I find that very VERY hard to believe.

But Valenzuela, Fiedler and whoever the 4th G7 board member was (Glasgow?) all voted FOR the business plan in September. Do you really think some mystery occurence changed DCI so dramatically that those three suddenly reversed their view of the business plan? And Hopkins had an eerily similar proposition in 1997 to "save DCI". I think DCI has done alright since then...yet you believe that his 2010 redux was done because DCI needs saving yet again? Matt, do me a favor. Get to know some of the people involved in the activity heavily, like people who attend meetings in Indianapolis, and see what they think of George Hopkins. I'd bet they all respect him for his qualities mentioned by others (being a fabulous "idea guy", what he's done with YEA and The Cadets, etc.), but I bet they'll all say he's a snake if you get them to talk candidly enough. He's looking out for #1, which I have no problem with, just don't do it at the expense of DCI.

I haven't broken down a P&L since Accounting classes in college, but I'll try to shed some light. It's pretty straightforward. Show revenue is up. So is merchandise revenue. They actually made something off investments (in 2009? How the hell?), which accounts for $250K of the discrepancy between years. Expenses: more was paid out to corps (although the number of WC units increased I think?), but costs of facilities went up. They spent considerably more on advertising, which I think most would agree is a good use of their funds (and apparently it worked based on the show revenue numbers). They even trimmed personnel expenses (does this include judges?). Overall, money invested in shows is up (presumably a good thing) while administrative costs are down. That sounds good to me. You add the relocation expense to the investment loss and there's the bulk of the discrepancy between the years. "Is the money they were able to allocate back to the corps sufficient to cover their expenses?" To answer your question, I'd say "Yes" for world class groups because none of them have folded. But you have to understand that the revenue corps receive from DCI is only part of the puzzle to their operations. Any corps relying on DCI revenue to cover the majority of their costs is doing it wrong. They have to run their own businesses intelligently as well, and they should have a good idea of what they'll be getting from DCI and build their budget around that. So if a corps decides to buy a new truck, a new set of horns, new electronics and wireless mics, then the answer to your question would be "no", but in that situation is it DCI's responsibility to cover all of those expenses for that corps? Absolutely not. I don't mean this as a slight, but what has DCI done to make you so critical of their operations? Did you believe they were inadequately compensating corps prior to the G7 incident? And again, what level of detail would be sufficient for you to have trust in their leadership? So because not enough was being done to make this the "year of the fan", the G7 came to the realization that DCI cannot support the current number of drum corps and that number must be reduced? I'm not following your logic. Excellent point.

It's standard audit jargon. A public firm will conduct a review of the financial statements and then provide their professional opinion to the client.