Interesting thread. All I ever say to the judges (when I'm done flying) is: "Thank You." All I ever do with my income tax refund check is cash it. I'm not dishonest by any means. In fact, some people say I'm too honest. Don't worry, if you're really an honest, church going person, you know there is someone keeping score at a higher level. I've actually watched guys do the 2 half-rolls in 402 wrong (i.e both the same direction). Some of these guys were competing against me, and I flew the maneuver correctly. I watched the judges (after the landing) trying to figure out if the guy flew them right (talking, moving their hands, etc.) NOBODY said anything. Not the pilot who screwed up. Not even me. Chances are pretty good if you screwed up like that, you did other things wrong too. I think I actually won that round after the dust settled. The weirdest thing about our judging process is that even though it has all of these potential flaws and weaknesses - doesn't it always seem like the guy (or gal) who flew the best, wins? At least most of the time I find that to be true. Just my opinion.
I DO think we should put a little more emphasis on judging technique. We spend a lot of time talking about airplane setup and trimming, flying technique, etc. What it really comes down to is how do the judges see the fruit of all this labor. If you practice snaps until you can do them in your sleep, and then get zeroed by a judge who doesn't recognize a real snap - who's fault is it? If we worked as hard on judging as we do on flying, you wouldn't need to announce a "0" to the judges. Let's fix the problem instead of putting a band aid on it.
Hope I don't get hate mail - but those are my thoughts on the subject. Flame suit on...

John Pavlick
NSRCA 3815