I think Dr. X meant put up a "pole" not a poll.

As in go out in your back yard and put up a pole.

Then hang your bibs from it, and chant to the results gods while poring watered down Hammergel over your head.

Works every time! Maybe a Feng Shui thing or something. Saw it on Oprah.

-R

R4L writes funny stuff.

I could tell you how to beat me in the 200, but my ego couldn't handle the shame. But don't worry, even if you're only 23rd fastest you can complain that the officials should have used electronic timing just in case you were actually the 21st fastest.

RacerX wrote:
Dan if the question remains, try a poll.

Great idea. I put up a poll.

WarrenG wrote:I was thinking the same thing. It's like deja vu all over again.

It's mostly the newbies who have an expectation that Snelling will have results scoring like there is at most criteriums, but it doesn't, and it probably never will.

New game for the forum: Road race results beyatchin bingo 2008. Pick your 16 favorite keywords and phrases from the list, put them in a 4x4 grid in some random order, and start thread-watching! When you have "bingo" post that in your reply.

Prize: appropriately...same prize as for 26th at Snelling (or 14th, or 77th, or DNS).

finishlynx
timing chips
bay to breakers
customer service
USCF rulebook
pin your number
expectation
drove for X hours
trained for X hours
rode for X hours
waited for X hours
upgrade
volunteers
sea otter
who cares
night of the race
X months later
X weeks later
when I did triathlon
at races back in the 90's we were happy if
at races back in the 80's we were happy if
at races back in the 70's we were happy if
top 6
top 10
top 15
you didn't win

-R4L

WG wannabe (in the flying 200)

It's simple Dan, it's a February race, the first race of 20 or 40 this year for most racers, it can be a lottery finish, it's 6 months before any championship event, and no one in the race should be anywhere near their best form of the season unless they just finished 'cross season.

I've come down on the hard side of this issue now - that is, I agree with Warren in principle. I'd rather bank the proposed $5 per race cost and race more... just 10 races would be $50, enough for two Velo Promo events. Give me one more shot at a top 10 rather than perfect placing of my 20-30-40somethingth places.

In practice, every effort should be made to place all racers accurately and I believe most races do try. In older forums in this topic I sided with Dan's ideal of placing every racer quickly & accurately - my experience in swimming, running and triathlon lead to think it'd be easy to do it on the road as well. My work on results for our club's criteriums maintained this fallacy and now I realize how hard it can be to place all at a course like Snelling; thanks in part to Casey's detailed narrative and his examples of bad # placement.

I suppose a 'pack finish' designation might suffice in many cases, especially in place of just being left off the results altogether.

C'mon racers, let's do our part; put your #s on correctly, don't mix in with other fields whenever possible, take pride in a 'low' finish and race a lot so you get better and the power of any one result is diminished. And if you do get a top 10 or care about your 15th, etc., stick around 1,2,3 hours and see if they got it right. Oh, Warren's tips are good too.

Dan if the question remains, try a poll.

WarrenG wrote:The results for the top 15 or so places at nearly every race in the region are fine the way they are. Snelling is one of just a few exceptions, and it's just a race in February. Perspective is useful.

By which objective standard (upgrade points, BAT, quality of T-shirts) are races in Feb less important? In any case, it appears there's a question about whether the results (timeliness and accuracy) are good enough that $5/person/race isn't a worthwhile investment in improvement.

djconnel wrote:
For ongoing expenses, I think folks would gladly support $5/rider/event as such an expense. That's no-brainer.

I don't support that idea. I must have no brain.

The results for the top 15 or so places at nearly every race in the region are fine the way they are. Snelling is one of just a few exceptions, and it's just a race in February. Perspective is useful.

casey wrote:About 90% of the current results mistakes wold be eliminated if people would just pin their numbers on in the proper place see http://www.sonic.net/~caseyk/badnumbers.html for several examples of improper number placement and an example of proper number placement.

what if we switch to a standard of frame + back numbers?

For ongoing expenses, I think folks would gladly support $5/rider/event as such an expense. That's no-brainer. I'm not sure where above that the actual threshold would be.

Remember that if we buy a finish line system like a FinishLynx or an electronic timing system there will probably be ongoing costs associated with them. Systems like that will probably need specially trained people to use them. I'd imagine we would have a handful of specially trained people, one or two who would need to be at the races where the systems are being used to transport ( since I don't think we want expensive equipment just thrown into the back of the Velo Promo van) set up and run the systems. These people would be in addition to the regular officials since you still would want the regular officials as a back up in case something goes wrong.

About 90% of the current results mistakes wold be eliminated if people would just pin their numbers on in the proper place see http://www.sonic.net/~caseyk/badnumbers.html for several examples of improper number placement and an example of proper number placement.

casey wrote:Some day maybe we will have the $25,000 or so and the support to get a FinishLynx system.

Easy:
$5 entry fee surcharge
500 riders per race data
10 race dates

Results are what separate races from training rides. People will gladly pay to get full, accurate, fast results. FinishLynx has OCR, so generates semi-automated results. Of course, nothing will solve the problem of a folded or covered number (except maybe frame numbers :)). But I guarantee there would be 95% support for this sort of investment.

What fraction of US race participants race in regions which still use our level of finish line technology?

Dan

Solo finishers can also help their cause by doing these as they finish
1) Yell "Finishing! (and your category?field)
2) Have your number CLEARLY visible, and if it is not
3) Yell "NumberXXX Finishing!"

Field sprints are made more difficult when other categories are riding with your finishing group. The pack should encourage them to separate well before the finish line. The camera may also have problems on rainy days and hand scoring would need to be consulted. This could delay the results even more. And hand scoring records the stragglers, who may be more than 20 minutes behind the leaders.

Finally, it's always a good idea to have a few numbers memorized of those who finish with you.

An hour for results?

I would almost eat red meat for results in an hour...almost.

Let's see:
15 minutes for your cool down spin back to the parking lot.
15 - 20 minutes getting changed and drinking recovery drink.
15 minutes BSing with teammates, friends, and others.

That leaves 10 minutes for waiting for results.

As Warren said, unrealistic expectations. Welcome to bike racing, here's your sign.

Casey,
Did you even take a breath in all of this? Fantastic writing, as usual.

I got an email from someone who had a complaint about incorrect results. The funny ( or sad depending on how you want to look at it) part of his letter was the fact he felt having to wait an hour after his finish to see results was totally unacceptable. If this is how this person truly feels then I have a suggestion, stop doing flat road races. From my experience getting results out within an hour is doing pretty good for most of the flatter road races.

For a Crit where you are only dealing with one finishing group and you can review the finish video in an uninterrupted session it will normally take 15 to 25 minutes to get the results posted. That is with the reg table within a short walk of the finish ( since most of the time it is the race staff at the reg table who puts the rider names to the numbers for posting).

At flatter road races where you have a lot of bunch finishes you rarely get to review the finish video in one shot. Normally you will get part way through reviewing a bunch when the next group comes along that needs to be filmed. The more you get interrupted in reviewing the various bunch finishes the longer it takes to compile the results. Once you have the bunches figured out ( since in large fields you may have 3 or 4 bunches that need to be filmed for a single category) you have to consult the hand scoring of the other officials to figure out who the stragglers were either in between the bunches or after the bunches. After you have most of the finishers from a category written down you need to find someone who can run the initial results back to Reg which might be a couple of miles away. Of course while you are looking to find a runner to take the results to Reg some more stragglers from the group you are working on will have finished and need to be added to the results. Once you have finished up the first group you start the process all over again for the next group that has finished. All the while you are dealing with new finishes, trying to chase riders out of the road so the next group of finishers can have a safe race, dealing with riders who come across the line well after the winner but who instantly want to know what their place is etc etc.

Some day maybe we will have the $25,000 or so and the support to get a FinishLynx system. The nice part about FinishLyynx is that you can set it to an automatic mode where it will automatically record every rider who crosses the finish line so that you don't have to interrupt your finish review when another group is finishing. The system will allow you to keep reviewing the previous finish while recording the current finish. Also with FinishLynx you can enter the results directly into the same computer you are using to review the finish so you drastically cut down on the possible transcription errors. Of course the last major discussion we had about results errors and slow results had a bunch of people saying that it wasn't worth the money for a FinishLynx type system, or the more expensive electronic scoring system.

Note even with a FinishLynx or an electronic scoring system it is still going to take a while to get the results out at flatter road races just because you tend to have short gaps between finishes and you have bunch finishes. The road races where you can get the results out the quickest are the Hilly road races like Pescadero and Berkeley Hills since you almost never have to review finish video due to the finishes spreading out on the final climbs. cutting out the need for review of finish video speeds up the process a bunch but still the ability to get results to the Reg area for posting depends on having gaps in the finishes so you can transcribe the results onto the results sheets and then get that Info to Reg for processing and posting.

I was thinking the same thing. It's like deja vu all over again.

It's mostly the newbies who have an expectation that Snelling will have results scoring like there is at most criteriums, but it doesn't, and it probably never will. Maybe it's part of a lesson about what's relevant in bike racing.

As long as you beat the poser wearing red shorts you're doing fine, so go ahead and write a few paragraphs about that in your blog.

-R4L wannabe

Why are you guys dredging up this thread for last year?
Or was 2006?
Or maybe 2005? 04? 03? 1992?

X - you're right about the t-shirts! If I was in the "t-shirt money" I would have hung around instead of spinning out the cramps oon the way back to parking. Oh well, there's always this weekend.

Hey Metz - sorry we didn't get to suffer together! Seems I saw you placed in an earlier version of the results, maybe you were corrected out of your true finish! Yes, this is a perennial topic... luv the VeloPromo races, but not their results (or lack of). I expected an improvement using the SBO database. We use SBO for our one race a year with over 500 riders and seem to get nearly every place right. Oh well, as some will say, if you're not in contention for the t-shirts, who cares :P

SO, who/how to repair the missing Marcus Smith's rockin' 3rd in the 13-14? It was on the results sheet day of race. Watch that kid grow!

another p.s., if the Davis guys I chased with weren't so cool I'd hate that team!

Two team mates and I finished 10,11,12 or 11,12,13 in the M35+4/5 A flite after we worked our butts off to stay in group of 15 or so guys that finished together. My two team mates also worked like dogs to stave off DBC attacks - they had 14 guys in a field of 50, which is maybe a topic for another thread. Anyway, the 11th place finisher is listed as "unidentified" but how do you miss three guys from the same team in a strung out finishing group of 15? We all got DNP's. I sent a pic of us finishing to Velo Promo but I am not holding my breath. I really appreciate all the great races Velo Promo puts on but this should not happen. I realize I am talking about a Masters' 4/5 race but we train hard just like everyone else and like to see whatever meager results we achieve :D

I must apologize, Anthony Coando, for suggesting your number was on upside down. I checked the photo again and it was #179 who in fact had his number on upside down. This time I won't mention any names.

Those bib numbers I mentioned were gotten from SBO's list of registered riders. Either way, Nikka was second JR 13/14 girl, not second in the men's cat 5 field. You'd think SBO would at least get the date right before publishing the results they received and could track down those unknown riders when the bib number is listed.

I won't go into the details of specific errors that I see but I will say that riders who finished strong with the remainder of the 3s pack (and in other races) are listed as DNP. If riders (with properly applied numbers, casey) can't get properly placed or recognized, how can we get BAT, BAR points?!

And by the way...
Quote:Anthony Coando, number 159, had his number on upside down.
...Anthony Coando was not at Snelling

I'm sure many of these are early season hiccups. But seriously, we need to be able to trust the results. We can accept errors for 40th place but when various points are on the line, c'mon.

and no, waiting around all afternoon to verify they are correct or to hear, "we'll work on that later" is not ok.

My son, Josef Nygaard, who finished third in the 13-14s will vouch for the fact that Marcus finished in front of him, as did Katrina, actually.

Where do I start? With the Juniors 13/14 race. There is no Marcus Smith, number 969 listed, though he finished in the top three. Number 959 was Katrina Howard (also in the top three) and number 971 was Dominique (Nikka) Van DeRies, who is listed as second (as #159) in the cat 5 race. Anthony Coando, number 159, had his number on upside down. In the cat 4 race, number 475 would've been Kevin Rusch.

The most obvious glitch is the race date is listed as 02/16/08!! That can't be blamed on the officials!!

It looks like the problems with missing groups and misidentified groups has been fixed. Mr RED Shorts is still missing though.

Kevin,

When did you switch teams? I didn't know you rode for 3rd Pillar. :wink:

You mean like these Red Shorts
http://cyclefreak7.smugmug.com/gallery/4399719_hrdt3#258387010

casey wrote:Gee not like we aren't already discussing these issues in other threads :)

Yeah, but did anybody in those other fields have RED shorts on?

I'm just asking...

Kevin

casey wrote:Gee not like we aren't already discussing these issues in other threads :)

Okay -- I'm not doing well here recently :).

It's in the "Race Announcements, Photos, and Videos" forum. I'm not sure it qualifies or any of those subjects, but anyway....

Gee not like we aren't already discussing these issues in other threads :)