The finish is the one line you cannot redo. A split can be reconstructed from a finish and a pace. A missing finish is somebody's whole race.
A finish is the first read, and that is deliberate
A mat reads a chip several times as somebody runs across it, and then keeps reading them while they stand behind the line getting their breath back. The moment they crossed is the first of those reads, so that is the one Podium takes.
The gate is what stops the standing-about reads becoming a second finish. See Timing points.
Give them somewhere to go
The single most useful thing at a finish is a funnel that keeps moving. It is not about tidiness:
- People who stop on the mat sit in the read zone, which is work the system has to undo.
- People who wander back across the line can collect a read that looks like a second crossing.
- A bunch that bunches gets screened — bodies between tag and antenna is the main way a read is lost (Where to put the mat).
Walk them through, out the far side, and only then collect tags, hand out water, or take names.
Bunch and sprint finishes
Two people crossing together is not a problem for the mat — it is a problem for the read. The timing is fine to the millisecond; what fails is one tag being screened by the other body.
Three things help, in order of how much they help:
- A wide enough line that shoulder-to-shoulder arrivals are not stacked front to back.
- Tags worn on the outside and on the front (Where the chip goes on a competitor).
- Somebody writing the order down, which is the only thing that saves you when the first two were not enough (Back everything up).
Do not settle a close finish from the chip times alone if a placing is in dispute. Go back to the reads themselves — The raw reads, and changing a result by hand.
Watch the results as they come, not at the end
A mat that has stopped reading looks exactly like a course with nobody on it. The difference is that you can still fix the first one while the race is running.
So keep the results screen in front of somebody, and treat a gap as a fault until proven otherwise:
- Nobody at all for a while — check the mat is still delivering (The box is connected but nothing is coming through).
- Several people from the same wave missing — the mat, not the runners (Somebody is on the sheet with no time).
- One person missing — usually the tag, and usually how it was worn.
Collecting tags
If you are taking tags back, the collection point goes after the funnel, not on the line. People stopping to unfasten an ankle strap in the read zone is the thing you were trying to avoid.
Before you take the line down
- Is everybody accounted for? Anybody still out on course, and anybody marked as not finished who actually did.
- Has the backlog reached zero? That is the count of reads still to reach the server. Packing up mid-count is how a race arrives incomplete.
- Only then unplug anything.
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