Standing in the pouring rain and cold yesterday, waiting for a man with very cold fingers, pencil, paper (soggy) and some maths to give us race results for a DH I had an idea.
Two tablets or phones, in otter boxes, that you can “pair”, and record start and end times. At the end of the race you simply Bluetooth or data them together and get the timings…

Ideally :

– enter rider info on something like Google docs before the start.
– a simple pairing button/setup
– a big ‘start’ or ‘stop’ button, alongside a keypad to enter a riders number
– a simple ‘right, sort out the times’ button

Maybe I am guilty of over tech-ing things, but the timing chips seem silly expensive in comparison and this might be halfway house?

The local clubs round here used to use something setup in Filemaker that you basically entered the race number and hit NOW as they crossed the line. They have all been moving away to the RFID stuff as it’s just easier. There are some cheaper kits becoming available these days and the reliability is decent. Somebody still needs to setup all the tags and numbers and names beforehand but it’s been working well.

The other way is to fix start times and you start on time or your time starts anyway and only record the finish time.

FileMaker – can you enter a race number if a competitor had been overtaken?

on time or your time starts anyway and only record the finish time.

As is normal – but also has its shortcomings such as yesterday the field dropping out, and due to horrendous weather rather than wait, we just cracked on with riders at minute gaps…

yeah they were just entering as they crossed the line, few setups around for doing it.

For the 2 device thing you need to get their times synced and hope they stay synced and in the pissing wet I found my otterbox kept the phone dry but once the screen was covered in water any precise entering of info was interesting.

Google race timing app – several already exist

http://www.raceresult.co.uk/en-uk/shop/rentals.php
Depending on the size of the field how does the rental price work out for you?
250/weekend

@greybeard – none seem to do point to point like a dh or enduro, they all seem aimed at laps or mass starts.

@mike – a field of 78 yesterday would be £400+, that would add a lot to the entry cost for the kids/families.

fair enough, the guys here put a lot of races on and can loan/rent out the kit so it makes it worth doing long term. If it’s a club look at grants and the like (also how a couple of kits got paid for)

The bit you will struggle with is a paired system. Some of the aps do fixed start times and probably doing a fixed start & manual correct would be the next best thing using one of the aps to give you finish times.

None of these situations help with the cold & wet weather aspect of doing timing.

Why not set a Strava segment over the timed distance?

Not sure what software they used but that is how they times the Mondraker gravity enduro series last year, seems to work pretty well though results did take a while to come through.

Why not set a Strava segment over the timed distance?

Device inconstancy (1-3s intervals), lack of accuracy, can’t pick an accurate start/finish line, making everyone carry a phone or GPS in a piss wet DH race would be my main reasons for not using strava for that sort of race timing.

matt – to ensure it worked you’d ideally want both start and finish to have data access so that riders could be easily registered etc. How likely is that in your typical locations? Bluetooth etc are just too painful for a reliable user experience.

It doesn’t sound that complicated from an app point of view, even the bluetooth bit sounds fairly simple.

What I’d be concerned about is how to use it – the start time is pretty easy, as you have full control over the racers, but the end time could get complicated when two riders come in at the same time. You definitely need someone writing down the end times as a backup, which implies you need to be able to manually enter times too. Also your phone is not going to be that easy to use if it’s pissing down.

@greybeard – none seem to do point to point like a dh or enduro, they all seem aimed at laps or mass starts.

Matt – are you sure? I haven’t used them, but they do seem to be used for interval and variable starts, eg:

http://support.racesplitter.com/article/63-how-to-time-an-interval-start-race

http://support.racesplitter.com/article/49-variable-start-races

The problem with the above app is that the riders have to start at very strict intervals.
How likely are 2 downhillers going to cross the finish line at the same time?

How likely are 2 downhillers going to cross the finish line at the same time?

You get plenty where it’s closer than you can enter 2 numbers and hit stop. Though it’s the choice of cheap/free and paid for/expensive timing solutions

Depends how the finish line thing is implemented. Just press a finish button twice and then leisurely assign a rider to each finish event.

as good as that would be I can see it being a PITA on a touch screen/phone/tablet. If you get 2 riders close there is every chance that you will have another in 30s (typical DH) which gives you about 10s per rider to scroll back and enter the 2 rider numbers then be ready for the next ones, at that point you are onto the written record anyway (perhaps using a go-pro etc to log numbers through and the timing button for times to be matched later)

Having seen a couple done as soon as one rider doesn’t get tagged it can descent into chaos soon after with scribbled backups being taken.

You get plenty where it’s closer than you can enter 2 numbers and hit stop.

Thinking about it… if you know the start order (and you should do) you can just show an ordered list of the riders that have yet to finish, and you can just tap their numbers as they cross the line. That way you’d only need to tap twice on the screen, which would be pretty simple – assuming the phone’s not wet, of course…

You’d need a refresh option to clear finished riders from the screen, not massively complicated either. (You don’t want them clearing automatically as that would change the positions on the screen and lead to confusion).

Cheers all

Seems there are some then greybeard!

The ‘issues’ that are there are only opportunities if you look at it another way 🙂

..from this thread I’ve made an app (not quite finished tho) does anyone fancy having a play with it and give me some feedback?

I reckon it’s a little bit better than paper and pen.

Cheers.