Each Car Raced Down Each Lane 4 Times?

[RaceFan]

My son and I went to our district derby a few days ago and I helped out. I didn't run the races but did enter most all the names into the DerbyMaster software. So, no doubt, DerbyMaster was used.

I'm a little confused on how it was run. Each car ended up going down each lane 4 times. There were 3 lanes on the track so obviously that meant each car went down 12 times.

Wow! It was fun when your car was racing but the whole thing lasted about 6 hours! My son and I were there about 4 hours before any of our cars even got onto the track.

Due to the fact that we were exhausted when it was over, and we left with trophies, I didn't ask the coordinator why each car had to race so many times. There were no disputes nor upset competitors, either so everybody was in agreement it was run fairly.

That would've been a great method with a small group but we had at least 100 cars competing. For example, each and every Tiger car would be lined up and raced down each lane once. (3 cars competing each race, of course.) When the last Tiger car was done, we'd start over at the top of the list and the entire rank was run again. Then, again, then again....it's painful thinking about it The same for Wolves, Bears, Webs, Siblings, & Adults.
Any insight on what kind of race that was?

Conversely, when I conducted the derby for our pack, each car went down each lane once and the times were averaged and cars ranked 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place. Actually, my race went too quickly! Naturally, I was using a different track with totally different software. I don't think the software our pack has will even allow us to conduct the derby the way the district was conducted.

Would racing each car down each lane, averaging the times and ranking the cars, then do it again averaging and ranking the cars again be a good idea? (I'd have to average the averages by hand since our race sofware can't do that) I don't want to go to quick or make it excruciatingly long next year....am looking for somewhere in the middle. Thanks, guys.

[RaceFan]

Oh yeah, I also wanted to add that on top of everything, we had a championship race. Same method....each car down each lane 4 times.

WWWAAAAYYY too long!

We had fun, though. I'm not knocking the event, but am looking for ways to improve and speed up the Cub Scout events for the future.

I welcome your views!

[Darin McGrew]

According to the DerbyMaster site, the default race method is the Stearns Method, which is a chaotic-rotation method.

Do you know whether they were basing the results on time (cumulative or average) or on points?

For 100+ cars at a district derby, 6 hours doesn't sound too unreasonable (especially racing each car 4 times in each lane), but everyone should have known the schedule in advance. With 6 classes, they could have scheduled an hour for each class to race, and everyone could have planned their day accordingly.

FWIW, we use a points-based chaotic-rotation method for our local derby, racing each car twice in each of 4 lanes (8 races total per car). We schedule an hour for each class to race: 4-5pm for 2nd grade and under, 5-6pm for a potluck dinner, 6-7pm for 3rd-6th grade, and 7-8pm for All Comers. We have roughly 20-30 cars in each class. It works well for us.

[Stan Pope]

Would racing each car down each lane, averaging the times and ranking the cars, then do it again averaging and ranking the cars again be a good idea? (I'd have to average the averages by hand since our race sofware can't do that) I don't want to go to quick or make it excruciatingly long next year....am looking for somewhere in the middle. Thanks, guys.

With only 100 cars racing, it does sound like a long period! Staggering the group starts as Darin suggested would make it much less excruciating for the racers. Still it is a long day for the organizers! Another positive approach is to run one or more additional track(s). Start the oldest group out on track A. After a stagger, start the next oldest group on track B. Etc. (Our district races run this way for 5 age groups on 4 tracks with a 1 hour stagger. Allows a common inspection staff to server 'em all!)

The choice for 4 runs per lane (12 total runs) suggests that durability is one of the aspects of interest! Who decides what aspects are important? Many racers would be satisfied with fewer, perhaps 6 or 9 runs, because by then they would know that they were way out of the running. On the other hand, many racers built their cars to race, and the more racing the better!

[RaceFan]

Thanks for the quick repies, Darin & Stan!

This year at the pack race that I coordinated, in my opinion, the cars didn't race enough. I agree, after all the time and effort building the cars, they were made for racing and the more the better.

I am limited by our pack's software, which is DOS based and was "homemade" by some genius IT guys/cubmasters about 10 years ago. Our track is also passed around from pack to pack so I've got to work with what's available.

I can't get more than 1 track unfortunately, but that is a good idea. I also can't do the Stearn's/Chaotic Rotation method with our current software. I don't know if DerbyMaster will work with the "homemade" relays and such that are rigged up on our community track.

What I can feasably do, I guess is run each cub scout rank (each car goes down each of the 3 lanes once and the times are averaged and the cars are ranked as 1st, 2nd, & 3rd) like a normal race. Then, I could just repeat the race and "average the averages" to determine the winners.

That'd give each scout's car six runs down the track. I think I could pull that off with our archaic software.

Does that sound OK?

[Stan Pope]

What I can feasably do, I guess is run each cub scout rank (each car goes down each of the 3 lanes once and the times are averaged and the cars are ranked as 1st, 2nd, & 3rd) like a normal race. Then, I could just repeat the race and "average the averages" to determine the winners.

That'd give each scout's car six runs down the track. I think I could pull that off with our archaic software.

Does that sound OK?

Summing is equivalent to averaging for ranking results and needs no division! But, then, you are probably going to stuff the numbers into a spreadsheet, so you don't worry about complexity of computation.

If you stay with the existing hardware and software, your plan is certainly workable. Of course, get someone to write a program to massage the results and recruit an extra set of eyes on raceday to check the processing. (I have never let "We've always done it that way!" to keep me from exploring and evaluation alternatives!)

[RaceFan]

hmmm, maybe the night before the race we'll conduct a practice using old cars. That'll give an idea on how long it's going to take.

It went so fast last year, that doubling the "board time" might just might be acceptable to everybody in '08.

I'm thinking about 3 cars at a time, each car down each lane once. Then, repeat. Yeah, we could have somebody entering the times into a spreadsheet, too.

That would mean each car makes 2 runs per lane down each of the 3 lanes. Each boy would see his car compete 6 times as opposed to the marathon 12 times that was done at the District. That would be OK with me if I were 9!

[PWD]

In our pack and district race the kids cars run ones down four different lanes. So a total of four runs. Always seemed exceptable to the kids and the parents.

So I would think six runs would be fine. I do think twelve is a little much.