Cheater at AGA 2011 competition spotted
AGA International Aquascaping Contest 2011 result was anouced last week and my tank "Lost" happen to be in 2nd place in 120-200L. However to my surprise the 1st place goes to IAPLC 2011 rank #14. It is a great scape, no doubth about it but according to the tank size written on the IAPLC booklet, it is 120x55x50cm tank which is 300L or 87.177 US gallons. How could the tank of that size competing in 120-200L category? I checked the AGA entry details and it was written 100x45x40cm which is 180L or 47.551 US gallons. Someone was obviously cheating. He reduce the tank size so that he can compete on smaller category (maybe he want to be in different category as Cliff Hui) or to have better depth. Imagine 300L tank submited as 180L, reported almost half.
The holy-grail of aquascaping is to make small tank look big. What the easy way to do that? Declare big tank as small tank. Imagine what would hapeen if I declare my 90x45x45cm tank as 30x15x15cm tank? Every one will amaze ont he depth that I create on that tiny little tank.
I have reported this issue to AGA but they dont seem to be eager to disqualify it.
IAPLC rank #14 entry: 
AGA 2011 entry:
I think that the organizers of the competition just do not want that it would become known around the world. Such mistake to very affect to reputation of the competition. Thanks for post.
ReplyDeleteI will share this news with my friends
Can't really blame the organizer, imagine there are 1000++ IAPLC participant, who have the time to screen it. However, I do wish the organizer gave a strong penalty, unless the participant can prove that the tank size is real and not just word of mouth. For example, the organizer can easily asked him to take a raw photo of his tank with measuring tape attached.
ReplyDeleteOtherwise more people will do the same thing.