Best Race Method for 40 kids and 2 hrs. to Run Race

[RMoose]

THANK YOU STAN

We had our church race this evening and raced 46 boys and girls in under 2 hours. We ended up using a No Chart 3E method and it worked great. Racing moved along well with only a few delays. We used posterboards to keep track of the race winners and losers and the few times there was any question of where we were this backup proved most helpful. We had quite a few people who did not believe we could do anything other than 2E and race that many kids in two hours time. Again, thank you for your help, even though you weren't there, you were a big part of our success.

[Stan Pope]

Congrats, RM!!!

Now that you know how it works, how many rounds could you have run? What would you do differently next time? What were the hardest issues?

When it was all over, was there anyone who thought that they deserved a higher finish place? Did anyone say "How about a 4E next year?"

If you would, send me a copy of you post race review.

[RMoose]

Stan,

Sorry to take so long to respond, I have been very busy the past week and will likely be busy next week getting ready for our Association Race.

When I get a chance to study our video of the race and go over the posterboards we used to document wins and losses, I will let you have a more detailed analysis.

In answer to you question, "did anyone ask for 4E?" the answer is no, in fact, just the opposide! Most of the comments I got before and during the race were, "don't you want to do 2E?" Most people were afraid we could not finish the race in 2 hours unless we did 2E. In fact, we did 3E in less than 2 hours. Our race was scheduled for 6PM - 8PM. But we opened with announcements and devotions (apx. 10-15 mins.) and ended with presentation of awards (apx. 5 mins.) so actual racing time was more like 1 hr. and 45 mins. - definitely well within the allotted time we were given.

[Stan Pope]

In answer to you question, "did anyone ask for 4E?" the answer is no, in fact, just the opposide! Most of the comments I got before and during the race were, "don't you want to do 2E?" Most people were afraid we could not finish the race in 2 hours unless we did 2E. In fact, we did 3E in less than 2 hours.

I meant if they asked after they saw you accomplish the deed.

[clemsontigerfanatic]

We just ran our Pack race 38 kids 2 hrs. I helped by staging the cars for the first time. Our Pack Leader had done a few in the past so we knew to go fast. He called out the numbers so that evry body got to race 4 or 5 times. Then we took the top group from each den and determined the den winners. And then had the top overall cars raced off. The only problem was very little time left to determine overall winner.

I felt like we tried to be fair to everybody. Sons car first in den but 3rd overall lost to other boy in den(probably due to crack in sons car). Oh well live and learn. Can't complain since I did the staging.

Luckily we are going to get a multilane track next year hopefully with a timer. I think 2 hours is just too long to hold the boys attention unless they are one of the winners.

Oh I want to say thanks to Stan Pope and his website ,Derby Talk, and Maximum Velocity. All 3 overall cars were Maximum Velocity Designs go Wedge. We will fix that crack and get back in there at District. Son got a nice third place trophy.

[RMoose]

Now that you know how it works, how many rounds could you have run? What would you do differently next time? What were the hardest issues?

When it was all over, was there anyone who thought that they deserved a higher finish place? Did anyone say "How about a 4E next year?"

I finally had a chance to set down and review our tape of the race and can now make an attempt to answer some of your questions!

We ended up with an average time for each race of 48 seconds, but I noticed on the tape a lot of "dead" time, so we could definitely cut this time a lot, I don't think 30-35 seconds per race would be out of the question at all using the exact same setup as this year. That would mean plenty of time for 4E, maybe even 5E with the same number of racers.

One thing we would definitely do different next time is move the table where tokens were being drawn. This year it was right in the middle of the seating for all the racers! Way to difficult to hear. We also had distractions with kids asking questions during the race, which almost led to a mistake in the advancement of the tokens. Having a written backup saved us there. Another thing would be more practice time for the crew manning the track. It was interesting to see how things were running much smoother and quicker at the end than at the beginning. Practice does make perfect!

Hardest issue before the race was getting understanding of the method by everyone involved. We had a lot of skepticism that it would work. During the race being heard was the biggest problem. Everyone had troble hearing the announcer and knowing who was racing next, who had won, etc. This was solved halfway through when one of the parents got the mikes in the room working.

Believe it or not, after the race we had some parents talking about how well things went who said it would be even better if we could do it that way, only using double elimination.

I'm embarassed to say that we never sat down afterwards and did a formal evaluation of what went right or wrong, so I have nothing other than my own observations to share. That would be another good idea for next year - get our race helpers together sooner, practice more, & then discuss things afterwards in a more systematic way.

One final observation: Talking to some of our parents whose kids advanced to the association and then the state races, they told me the best organized event and the one they enjoyed the most was our event.

[Stan Pope]

I finally had a chance to set down and review our tape of the race and can now make an attempt to answer some of your questions!

Excellent! Tapes, even partial event, are an excellent resource for the organizer, unless the tapes are too "close-up".

We ended up with an average time for each race of 48 seconds, but I noticed on the tape a lot of "dead" time, so we could definitely cut this time a lot, I don't think 30-35 seconds per race would be out of the question at all using the exact same setup as this year. That would mean plenty of time for 4E, maybe even 5E with the same number of racers.

If you increase from 2 to 3 lanes, then you will add a few seconds to the average time (if the participants are staging their own cars) It is hard to go much below 30 sec/heat if only the youngsters handle their own car, since starting line to finish line transit times are not compressible!

One thing we would definitely do different next time is move the table where tokens were being drawn. This year it was right in the middle of the seating for all the racers! Way to difficult to hear. We also had distractions with kids asking questions during the race, which almost led to a mistake in the advancement of the tokens. Having a written backup saved us there. Another thing would be more practice time for the crew manning the track. It was interesting to see how things were running much smoother and quicker at the end than at the beginning. Practice does make perfect!

One of the beauties of the method, as I run it, is that most crew jobs are dependent on only a very few inputs, so they can run "flat out" without very much coordination. For instance the starter is dependent on inputs from the queue of racers (which racers, which lanes) and on the finish line judges (ready/not ready). As soon as the current cars are released, the starter goes on to the next cycle from the queue.

Hardest issue before the race was getting understanding of the method by everyone involved. We had a lot of skepticism that it would work. During the race being heard was the biggest problem. Everyone had troble hearing the announcer and knowing who was racing next, who had won, etc. This was solved halfway through when one of the parents got the mikes in the room working.

Detail communication during each heat is an essential ingredient in the method as you have implemented it. As such, it is a limiting factor for the heats/minute measure.

Believe it or not, after the race we had some parents talking about how well things went who said it would be even better if we could do it that way, only using double elimination.

I guess I don't see the advantage to going from 3E to 2E ... unless you only want to have decent discrimination for 1st and 2nd place! What am I missing???

I'm embarassed to say that we never sat down afterwards and did a formal evaluation of what went right or wrong, so I have nothing other than my own observations to share. That would be another good idea for next year - get our race helpers together sooner, practice more, & then discuss things afterwards in a more systematic way.

The method is a finely balanced system and, as such, needs to be changed only with lots of very careful analysis! The post-event review is a good time to document facts related to method details because the details of specific problem situations is fresh in everyone's mind.

One final observation: Talking to some of our parents whose kids advanced to the association and then the state races, they told me the best organized event and the one they enjoyed the most was our event.

That sounds like a big "pat on the back" for you!!! You may have a job for life!