I quite agree with these two points. I started flying sportsman in '98 and about a year later I won a contest in a field of five decent pilots and decided to self promote myself. I proceeded to struggle in intermediate, but I was not bothered by it. It challenged me and I got better, then I got worse as my flying time started to taper off and I dropped out in '03.

Last month I flew my first contest in seven years and debated stepping back down to sportsman. I contacted the CD and was informed that he had no problem with it. After talking to people at the local club I determined that intermediate would have a decent turn out, so decided to practice the intermediate routine. There were five pilots in intermediate, and I finished fifth. Still, I was satisfied. I had a normalized score of about 3500, did not finish on the bottom in every round, and the guy who won came from a higher class in IMAC. Not bad for only twenty practice flights with my pattern plane. There was only one contestant show up in sportsman, and they were a DNF. I would much rather finish fifth of five than first of one. First out of five is my goal, and now I finish my practice flights with one advance maneuver (that slow roll is a but kicker now that I have been practicing it with out a "cheater low rate") .

Sure, some may sandbag it, but most probably do not. I like to challenge myself. Sure, I like to win, but I don't cry if I don't. If it comes to some forced system, I would not have a problem if it were consistent.