1st year with software.....HELP QUICK - Race tomorrow

[walters007]

I know, I'm a procrastinator.... But we use this software where I work and I thought I'd be good to go. But this new version is different than what we have. This is how we ran our races in the past -

Everyone raced in all four lanes and it would be divided into four heats. After each heat, the software would "pause" show the results (meaning each car had raced) and then you could start the next heat. We always had an intermission after the second heat (each car had raced twice) and then continued to the end.

This set up is a little different. I have the schedule set up and all my racers registered. I'm using Perfect-N, I have 36 racers all racing in each of the 4 lanes. This gives me 36 heats. So here's my question -

How do I know when to break, since this software uses "heats" differently? Should I break it down into rounds to accomplish what I'm trying to do? I don't want an angry mob of parents on my hands not understanding what's going on.... you all know how that goes..

Thank you
April Walters, Cubmaster

[ngyoung]

Is the problem that not all cars will have run 2 heats by the time you run heat 18? I guess I don't understand what is preventing you from taking the intermission halfway through.

[gpraceman]

As with many decisions, there are compromises to be made. What is your priority, to have even breakpoints in the schedule or to have a more fair scheduling method? For me, it is having the more fair scheduling method, so I would just stop at the halfway point.

With Perfect-N Type scheduling, some racers may have raced one more heat than others at the halfway point, but once you are done racing, everyone will have raced equally. I find that if you explain things to the parents up front, that there is far less griping.

[Vitamin K]

Once you're in 'race mode', the software will display the current heat, and then wait indefinitely for the heat to actually run...be that data that comes from the timer, or manual entry. So you can 'pause' anytime by simply not running more cars.

Are you planning to have a "finals" round after the first schedule is run? And are you running by points, or by times?

[walters007]

The boys (and parents) have always been able to see who is in first place at the half way (each car having raced twice). We always participate in districts, so the boys start getting pumped at that point.

[walters007]

Sorry, we run by times and we have no finals round. We always just ran 4 heats and at the end the software averaged the 4 heats and placed everyone 1st through - . Top 4 move on to districts and get trophies.

[BallBoy]

The boys (and parents) have always been able to see who is in first place at the half way (each car having raced twice). We always participate in districts, so the boys start getting pumped at that point.

If using GPRM one possible solution would be to set how the race is scored to only the fastest heat per car. At intermission you can show the standings based only on the fastest heat. After that you can change the scoring method to whatever you were originally planning (e.g. cumulative time, average time, points, etc.). I don't have it in front of me at the moment, but it's in one of the settings screens. When choosing the fastest heat, you will still show a relavent piece of information during intermission despite the cars not running an equal number of times.

[gpraceman]

If using GPRM one possible solution would be to set how the race is scored to only the fastest heat per car. At intermission you can show the standings based only on the fastest heat. After that you can change the scoring method to whatever you were originally planning (e.g. cumulative time, average time, points, etc.).

Or just show the average time, without throwing out the worst times. Then switch back to your preferred scoring options after intermission.

[Stan Pope]

Note! With PPN schedules, if you do two runs per lane, then there is a "nice" break point half way through. (Don't use any of the sorting options, though!)

That would get you up to 8 runs per racer ... a much more palatable number!