Luciano bailey
We would all like to race at the tour where the numbers are smaller etc..
Lets be serious most of these tour riders are so publicized in europe they
are recognizable without numbers. But here in obra land only Candi is
qualified to pick almost all the racers on sight. This seems like a whole
lot of hub-bub for not. I have worked as an official for four years and work
hard to be very accurate when it comes to results. I cannot believe there is
such a problem with placings that it has come to a hundred e-mail disscusion
on replacing officials with a chip. For officials like myself who relish
being able to train under Candi feel we are taking our jobs seriously and
are appreciated. It's seems that ego's are getting the best of some to wit
I say I personally will work as hard at being a pro official as you have to
be a pro racer.
From: Erik Voldengen <eri-@fusium.com>
Reply-To: eri-@fusium.com
To: ob-@topica.com
Subject: [OBRA Chat] ok then how about bike numbers?
Date: Wed, 1 Jun 2005 14:17:27 -0700
Well I sure hope the chip solution comes sooner than later. Sounds like a
great answer to the problems voiced recently.
In the mean time, have any of you race official types tried reading numbers
mounted on frames instead of on bodies? Mounted to the underside of the
top
tube (or maybe seatpost?), it seems like they'd always be orientated
correctly (i.e. horizontal) and not have the same wrinkle/wind
flapping/wrong side/under jacket/not sideways enough/upside down/ problems
the jersey numbers have.
___
Erik Voldengen 2037 NW Lovejoy 503-226-7099
Fusium, Inc. Portland, OR 97209 www.fusium.com
-----Original Message-----
From: mike.m-@obra.org [mailto:mike.m-@obra.org]
Sent: Wednesday, June 01, 2005 1:50 PM
To: don-@bendnet.com; ob-@topica.com
Subject: RE: [OBRA Chat] chip timeing
Don is incorrect in his assumption that chip timing is entirely
accurate.
It fails and has done so rather famously at big events where there was
little back up for it. Even if reliability and cost were not a problem
there
are other issues. I have been watching the chip timing issue for many
years
and it is really not a "ready for prime time" technology in my opinion.
I
am questioned about this so frequently that I have put together a stock
answer, which is below, for those interested in details.
Bottom line is that a race organizer might elect to rent chip timing
from
a
company that does this but the cost will be, as Damian noted, fairly
high.
In addition, something that Damian did not note, is that someone will
need
to pay the cost for the inevitable lost chips.
One of the OBRA members is currently working on developing a chip system
that MAY address some of the problems with the commercially available
systems. If it does, OBRA will fund that.
Mike Murray
I have been following the use of transponders in bike racing (as well as
in
running, triathlon, motor sports, model car racing, etc.) for several
years.
Although the transponders can work very well for some applications they
have
created major timing disasters at several bike races. Sea Otter was
evidently an example of this one year. As I understand it, the
transponder
signal was disrupted by metal structures in the finish area and the
results
produced were inaccurate.
There are several companies that produce these devices and systems.
They
vary in costs, reliability and set up requirements. They don't have an
actual radio transmitter. They use a chip that is energized by passing
through an antenna field at the measurement point. This causes the chip
to
emit a radio signal at that point that has an identifying code. There
are
systems that use a mat that is placed on the finish line and other
systems
that use a set of vertical antennas at the side of the road. There are 2
types of chips; active and passive. Active chips are more reliable and
transmit better but are substantially more expensive. Passive chips are
cheaper but transmission is unreliable for the types of finishes
generally
done at bike races.
For racing at a single location where the set up of the finish area
antennae
system can be consistent many of the reliability issue can be tested and
resolved. If the set up is different for every race, as it would be for
bike racing, the reliability goes downhill significantly.
There is also more benefit for events where there are large numbers of
competitors that all need to be timed, like running or triathlons. In
this
case the costs of the system (not only monetary) seem small compared to
the
costs of manual systems. For bike racing the field sizes are smaller
and
generally the timing requirements are less because generally all the
competitors are not timed. (In fact, for road races there is generally
only
a time for the leader and order of finish is all that matters. Even in
stage races bunches of riders are given pack times.)
The main monetary cost is the cost of the chips. There are 3 basic
systems
for managing these:
1) All competitors purchase chips - This is the motor sport model
generally.
This probably causes them less problems for motor sports since the chip
cost
is small relative to equipment costs. For bike racing, this would
significantly raise the cost of participating. This would likely have a
negative effect on participation.
2) The organization purchases the chips - If OBRA were to do this we
would
need to purchase a minimum of 400 chips. Even for the lowest priced
chip
systems (which are less reliable) this would cost ~$10,000+. It would
also
require us to institute a system of collecting the chips after each
race.
At running or tri events this is easier because the finishing
competitors
can be funneled into a corral and not let out until the turn in their
chip.
This is far harder to do at a bike race. The Atlanta Olympics used
chips
and they lost them so you can be assured that "shrinkage" would be a
major
issue for OBRA. A deposit would need to be charged which would
complicate
the system and be a disincentive for participation.
3) The organization buys some chips and the competitors buy some - This
is
what some running events do. The competitor gets an advantage in having
an
easier registration process and he eliminates the need to pay deposit,
collect and turn back in the transponder, etc. For this convenience
they
pay the cost of the transponder. The organization benefits by
decreasing
the number of transponders that they need. This is probably the system
that
would work best for OBRA. Unfortunately it would also require a
standard
registration system, purchase, maintenance and training of computers for
registration, etc.
Currently, the cost of using these systems for running and tri races is
too
high for individual races or even series of races. When they use them
they
hire a timing company to provide the chips and run the system. This
would
be available to bike races too but, at this point, there are few that
have
thought that the benefit justifies the cost.
I have no doubt that we will eventually be using this type of device but
I
do not think that the technology is yet to the point where they make
sense
for most races. I will be continuing to follow this subject and when
there
is a product that makes sense from a practical and cost point of view we
will get it.
Mike Murray
-----Original Message-----
From: Don Leet [mailto:don-@bendnet.com]
Sent: Wednesday, June 01, 2005 13:22 PM
To: ob-@topica.com
Subject: [OBRA Chat] chip timeing
I personaly would donate a large sum of money for chip timing. Though I
don't like raffles and prizes don't mean much to me (as I have a whole
store
full of them) I want a national cyclo cross medal and last year in my
group
they lost me and put me down a lap. With chip timeing this would not
have
happened I could have retired from racing again ( this would have been
the
4th time) I did two races wtih chip timeing this year and both were
awsome
in how fast and accurate the results were. With all of our members it
seems
we could a one year surcharge and buy a system.
Don Leet
To respond to the whole group send to ob-@topica.com.
To respond to the list manager send to cmur-@obra.org
To unsubscribe send to obra-uns-@topica.com
To respond to the whole group send to ob-@topica.com.
To respond to the list manager send to cmur-@obra.org
To unsubscribe send to obra-uns-@topica.com
To respond to the whole group send to ob-@topica.com.
To respond to the list manager send to cmur-@obra.org
To unsubscribe send to obra-uns-@topica.com
_________________________________________________________________
Don?t just search. Find. Check out the new MSN Search!
http://search.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200636ave/direct/01/