First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in Bear

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mattnday
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First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in Bear

Post by mattnday »

Not to sound ungrateful to all the volunteers but there were kids who got the short end of the straw today.

When the Bears started their races the first 5 or 6 heats were timing out about a .05 hundredths of a secons slower than all fo the rest of the heats. It was real abnormal as kids who times with top speeds of 220+ ended up with top speeds of 210 -215 and times much slower than all of the rest of the days heats. This seemed to last 5 or 6 runs.

We mentioned this to the leaders and they point blank said we were wrong at the conclusion of the Bears heat races. My son set the track record in the 3 heats where he was timed 10-15 heats after the "glitched" runs. Luckily he still managed third in the wolves despite beating the kids who supposedly were faster in the 1 run he went up against them .

This third propelled him to the overall where he swept his 6 heats and was over a mph faster and .15 seconds cumulative faster than the next closest car including the 2 cars who were supposedly fast than him in the Bear Heat races.

The sad part is one of the car that was in the heats where something was wrong should have made the finals but didnt because of this glitch.

At the end of the day I mention the "anomoly" to them again and was politely told again that the software / sensors are never wrong.

Anyway, my son is very happy with his 2 trophys but overall I can't help be sad for the other scout from our Pack who did not get a trophy or a chance i nthe finals because of the track timing issue.
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Stan Pope
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by Stan Pope »

They are in a state of bliss! (as in "ignorance is...")

But what else can they say? They are using stuff that they don't know how to use, and they are not alone!
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by Pinewood Po »

We experienced timing problems last week that are similar to what you explained. Our boys only get to make 3 runs with their cars and if you aren't in the top 3 that's the day for you. After all the boys had made their 3 runs the one operating the computer made a mistake, clicked on the wrong thing, and lost all data. So they had to start all over.

The first 3 times for my grandson were 2.410, 2.408 and I think 2.371. I didn't get the individual times for the "do over" but his average was 2.358. If you look at the first 3 runs there is one that appears considerable faster than the other 2. I find it hard to believe those times are accurate because my grandson's car and another car ran so close all 3 races you had to be watching close at the finish line to see who crossed first. The cars were so close my grandson won 2 and the other boy won 1. Did both cars have one great race at the same time???.....I don't think so. Then the huge difference in the 3 run averages 2.396 vs 2.358.

There were other things that happened that led me to believe there was a timing problem. This is my first year to have anything to do with PWD so I didn't question anyone about it. My grandson finished 5th overall and I feel like it was a fair placing. I'm not sure about some of the others though.
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by stang68 »

You have to cut the race committee some slack,every Pack race i go to someone feels that the race results were wrong or their was a problem with the scoring in some way.At our District race we had a dad complain that his son,s car should have been in the runoff race because it was faster than some of the cars in the finals.After the race one of the boys that lost in the finals said he would run his car against that car,we allowed this and the dad that complained son,s car lost big time.Yes Race Committee have their share of problems on race-day,some can be corrected but sometime they have to make a call to continue with the race if the problem can not be corrected. We want to know if we made a mistake,but we always get them when the race is over,at this point it is almost impossible to correct them.
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by Pinewood Po »

I know it's probably not as easy as it appears to put on the race. But when the timing is obviously off I feel something should be done at some point. Maybe that point is not during the event, but they should take notice, find out what the problem is and hopefully rectify it before the next derby.

I'm of the opinion, if there are not a lot of cars, some kind of elimination would make for better racing than timing anyway. At my grandson's district races I believe there were 23 cars. They breezed through them in roughly 20 minutes and were ready for the final. I can make reasonable arguments the timing was off that day. It would be hard to argue with who crossed the finish line first in each race, especially if it was videoed. If there was an argument about who crossed the finished line first it could be taken care of right then. The problem with timing is there needs to be a way to verify it if it's ever challenged. It appears to be one of those things that can't be proven either way, leaving the race committee no choice but to accept the timer for what it says even if the results are bad. Anyone challenging the timer only has circumstantial evidence to prove their point.
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by Darin McGrew »

Pinewood Po wrote:I'm of the opinion, if there are not a lot of cars, some kind of elimination would make for better racing than timing anyway.
FWIW, you aren't alone in questioning the use of times for determining derby results. Several of us prefer points systems to timed systems, and the reasons you've states are a big part of it: Everyone can confirm who crossed the finish line first, but there's no way to tell that the times from heat 13 are truly comparable to the times from heat 27 or heat 42.

I think elimination systems sometimes get a bad rap. Stan has described an n-tuple elimination system that works very well for district races and other large derbies. I am not at all a fan of single- or double-elimination systems for derbies, but Stan's n-tuple elimination system has a lot of advantages.
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by Stan Pope »

Darin McGrew wrote:I think elimination systems sometimes get a bad rap. Stan has described an n-tuple elimination system that works very well for district races and other large derbies. I am not at all a fan of single- or double-elimination systems for derbies, but Stan's n-tuple elimination system has a lot of advantages.
Hey! Now there's two of us! :)

Seriously, I've looked at the heat times from a number of timed races. I can tell, for instance, if the race was run with a spring-open gate or a pull-open gate. I can usually tell if there are a few equipment error heats.

I've suggested some "defect detection" analysis to be performed by race management software, but so far, no takers. Such analysis needs to happen before results are announced, of course. It probably should happen before any totals or rankings are shown to anyone, including track staff!

If defective heats are identified in that manner, it is easy to have the heats rerun. Race management software developers could establish a reputation that makes such reruns a ho-hum affair rather than raising eyebrows all over.

Race crews should have a procedure in place that qualifies their track setup and the race operations crew shortly before the start of racing. Issues detected can be addressed and the qualification repeated until all is good! This would also prevent some of the anomalous timed race results.

Lastly, just because you got a timer doesn't mean you have to use the timer. It is just a tool, and if not used well, it can produce poor results.
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by FatSebastian »

Stan Pope wrote:Lastly, just because you got a timer doesn't mean you have to use the timer. It is just a tool, and if not used well, it can produce poor results.
Agreed, although having raced both with and without a timer, my experience has been that timers are more blessing than curse. Being a finish-line judge is not easy in competitive races! Eye-judging can result in lots of re-runs of close races, the outcomes of which are no more obvious, and which only adds to everyone's anxiety.

To keep the timer honest, a supplementary high-speed electronic camera triggered by a timer's finish-line photosensor sounds like a potential solution to concerns brought about by the anecdotal observations from onlookers. Perhaps such a product already exists?
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by Stan Pope »

FatSebastian wrote:
Stan Pope wrote:Lastly, just because you got a timer doesn't mean you have to use the timer. It is just a tool, and if not used well, it can produce poor results.
Agreed, although having raced both with and without a timer, my experience has been that timers are more blessing than curse. Being a finish-line judge is not easy in competitive races! Eye-judging can result in lots of re-runs of close races, the outcomes of which are no more obvious, and which only adds to everyone's anxiety.

To keep the timer honest, a supplementary high-speed electronic camera triggered by a timer's finish-line photosensor sounds like a potential solution to concerns brought about by the anecdotal observations from onlookers. Perhaps such a product already exists?
Oops! Don't confuse my comments about "timers" with electronic "order of finish" devices!

Regarding your "high-speed electronic camera" ... such photofinish cameras are already available for sporting events. These are line-scan cameras oriented on the finish line to show each contestant's appearance at the finish line. (They also measure heat time if the "frame-rate" is stable and the start signal is available.)
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd place in

Post by FatSebastian »

FatSebastian wrote:Perhaps such a product already exists?
Stan Pope wrote:Regarding your "high-speed electronic camera" ... such photofinish cameras are already available for sporting events.
I think this is a bit closer to what I had in mind!
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd place in

Post by Stan Pope »

FatSebastian wrote:I think this is a bit closer to what I had in mind!
I knew that! :)
But they are really just repeating what the electronics tells you. And they can only hint at which cars finished 2nd, 3rd, ... They aren't definitive!
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd place in

Post by FatSebastian »

Stan Pope wrote:But they are really just repeating what the electronics tells you. And they can only hint at which cars finished 2nd, 3rd, ... They aren't definitive!
The shutter snaps relative to when the electronics are tripped; beyond that the information collected is seemingly independent? Because the cars may have actually changed placements between the time they crossed the finish line (sensors) and the time the image was captured, the outcome is not quite definitive.

But it is probably more definitive than the eyeballs of a line judge, which is what this gadgetry seems to be trying to get around. If there is discrepancy between the (non-definitive) timer and the (non-definitive) snapshot, then someone has a decision to make. If there is discrepancy between what Johnny's dad certainly saw from 27 feet away compared to the snapshot and the timer placement, odds are he won't argue the definitiveness of his personal observation like he did last year. Both situations seem to be improvements.
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by Stan Pope »

The angle is no good for the cases you really need it for... unless the human who is supposed to watch the finish line was distracted.

I'm gonna hold out for a true photofinish picture! Come on, developers ... line scan cameras aren't very expensive and the electronics to feed the pics through USB2 aren't that tough. Time and pic for all cars in the heat to ms. accuracy! And the software is a Junior College CS project at most.

The pic does one good thing ... it shows an image of the cars close to the finish line so you can go back and check that the correct cars were running!
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by FatSebastian »

Stan Pope wrote:The angle is no good for the cases you really need it for...
:? Am I wrong to assume that one may place the camera anywhere one likes, at any angle? In the photos displayed by the manufacturer, I think the camera was (oddly) placed to prominently feature their finish-line timer. In practice, one would likely opt to place the camera elevated over or beside the finish line looking down - like a finish-line judge.
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Re: First Place District.........However, just 3rd palce in

Post by Stan Pope »

FatSebastian wrote:
Stan Pope wrote:The angle is no good for the cases you really need it for...
:? Am I wrong to assume that one may place the camera anywhere one likes, at any angle? In the photos displayed by the manufacturer, I think the camera was (oddly) placed to prominently feature the finish-line timer that they also market. In practice, one would likely opt to place the camera elevated over or beside the finish line looking down - like a finish-line judge.
Dunno ... might depend on details of the camera, such as flash interference with sensors? Using a video cam as in their pic, that wouldn't be an issue.

Regardless, the image is a valuable adjunt to the race documentation and allows both immediate reminder of what we just saw as well as post race review / validation of results. I've looked at a few timed race records and wondered why one or two heat times were "uncharacteristic". Without the images, I could only guess at the cause. (A key post race review item missing from most documentation is whether or not the correct racers were run in a heat and whether or not they ran in the correct lanes. The picture omits showing that #13 ("crash and burn") ran in place of #1 ("king of the hill") and finished so far behind that he is not in the picture. Provided that the audience is shown the racer names and places/times awarded, the owner of "king of the hill" would promptly object and the heat would be rerun... we hope.)
Stan
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