Discussion: Importance of prompt results

Has anyone else noticed this trend? Recently in most of the US Orienteering events I have attended results are not being posted promptly at the meet site. Of the 13 days of O competitions I have attended in the past 6 months, only 3 of these days had prompt and accurate results available for the competitors to view. (5 different clubs). This included 4 A-meet days that had no results available for view on the day of the event.

If it continues I fear this lapse of meet quality may be having a detrimental affect on O-meet attendance, as serious competitors get turned off.

From my point of view, we meet organizers deserve a special place in O heaven. but maybe it's time to remind ourselves of that prompt results are a basic element of our competitions.

Sort of along the same line; for all that we in this sport like to address some issues (computer programs, mapping, a logo, shoes) there doesn't seem to be much discussion of the actual athletic performances.

yeah, prompt results at the meet site, and prompt results posted to the event website the same day

I cannot stand delayed results. Ive often noticed that small events usually have quite prompt results. Sometimes, last year in fall, after a night event, I could expect to see results at 9 in the evening the same day. That was pretty swell.

Yes, and its also important to get Route Gadget for an event up as soon as possible. But after organising an event, and collecting controls and then driving home, I can understand why someone might let it slip a little.

While e-punching has expanded our enjoyment of eventually perusing results, the simplicity of a "results string" by course and class I think has been lost to the orienteering world. These strings would quickly accumulate stapled hang-tags showing only total times. But at least they'd quickly tell you how you stand. And early finishers could eagerly await results of later runners to see if their time would hold up.

Lacking more detailed print-outs, does anyone else mourn the demise of immediate results hanging from strings?

But after organising an event, and collecting controls and then driving home, I can understand why someone might let it slip a little.

I think it's more than just being a little tired. I think that organizers, for all the planning they do to make the map and set the courses and start and finish people, don't do much (if any) planning as to how they are going to post results at the site and on-line and have award ceremonies (and what sort of problems there might be, and how to deal with them). And so these things are often done in a half-assed way.

They don't have to be. But you have to put some thought into them. And I don't think many people do.

Just to be a little more specific, for an awards ceremony, have you thought about the following (just for starters)?

-- weather considerations (protection from rain or wind or sun)
-- a good announcer and a loud speaker
-- how many helpers are needed to move things along quickly and efficiently
-- what order to announce awards in to move things along quickly and efficiently
-- when stuff needs to be set up in order to start on time
-- what is needed from the results crew, and when

It's not hard to do it well, but you have to plan.

Ditto with posting results.

And being tired is no excuse.

Results on strings can be (and has been) done with epunching.

For those reading this thread who were not at the US (various) Champs this past weekend, results were in fact posted at the meet site--and reasonably quickly--via printouts, just like you'd usually see with epunching. There was an issue with M21 on the Long on Sunday due to one of the control units having died, and so all the M21s were shown for the longest time as having mis-punched (the organizers were aware of the problem pretty quickly, and it just took a while to get the problem taken care of in the software so that correct results could be printed out, I believe.)

Yes, I was not referring in my above comments to the US Champ events in Washington. Which I sadly couldn't attend.

"Being tired is no excuse"
Well, that depends upon the size of the volunteer force at hand. Volunteer numbers have been declining for quite a few years, especially in the finish tent. The introduction of electronic timing has slimmed the pool of finish organisers. Meanwhile, the number of major events has been growing. Once we had only a Championship. Now we have sprint, middle and long championships together with a National League. Sometimes the unfortunate situation arises where someone takes on the position of organiser under pressure, often with a small pool of assistants. In that situation, I'd say the 'fault' is more widely spread. Rather than finding any fault, its more constructive to harness the power of empathy to diagnose the root cause of the issue and address that.

may be it is some sort of punishment for those who did not attend the meet :)
(no results on the web)

Go ahead and flame me, but if you don't have results up (online) within 24 hours of your event, you don't belong in the modern world of race promoting. I agree with whoever said tiredness is no excuse. Yes, of course it is a lot of work to put on an event, but your job is not over until the results are online (maps can come later).

Great, and I have no idea how to do that (other than type it in by hand).
No doubt there is a USOF manual on this which I should read.

Yes, I love to see the results as soon as possible, and I get frustrated. And I do my best after events I have organised to get results and RouteGadget up the same evening if at all possible. But I have experienced enough problems with event software, very late changes to entries and more to know that sometimes you have to face quite a few hours at the computer. So when I am waiting for results that are late, I am more tempted to ask not 'Where is my result" but "I wonder what went wrong and how can we help to ensue this doesn't happen in the future".
A very close contact in orienteering recently organised his/her first event. It was a tough baptism as it was a regional championship. Afterwards his/her reaction was 'why do people volunteer for this job?'. Its a good question. Any reaction to the failings of organisation needs to keep this question in mind. She was your age Alex.

Great, and I have no idea how to do that (other than type it in by hand).

You ask around and recruit one of the several people who know how. I don't know all of the steps, but I do know some of them, and I can find people who know the others.

USOF, oops, excuse me, Orienteering USA, has repeatedly asked how they can help promote and/or support orienteering. Perhaps "they" (which is "we") could identify a standardized format that would be easy for meet results people to hit and would make it trivial to publish the results at the Orienteering USA web site.

Especially for US Championship events.

I don't know the magic that happens, but we have shipped our SID results to Ken and they appear as splits on AP way quick. And when e-punch is used, there is no retyping necessary - a quick way to get results up is to send them to PDF, instead of a printer (a boatload of free tools do this) and slap the PDF file anywhere that can be linked. (OK, I know PDF sucks as a means of sharing results, but it can be done very quickly).

OA put together a results system a couple of years ago that works pretty well - takes SI CSV format, or tab-delimited text files for events without e-punching, and stores all the results for every state.

I don't know how the other states do it, but in WA one person (me) uploads the OA results and runs the local RouteGadget page, so all the RG maps have splits with them without two people having to chase down the admin person independently. Works pretty well, except that I get angry, angry emails if the results are up a day late. :)

Here are a couple of documents that might be useful:

* How to upload to the COF's RouteGadget database
* How to upload results to WinSplits

I find that after hosting a race it takes me about 45 minutes to create and upload all the files necessary for both RouteGadget & WinSpits. With more experience I'm getting faster. The key, as PG says, is to plan for this (and practice it on smaller events). If I'm really pressed for time I will at least try to get the WinSplits loaded as that entire process takes only about 5 - 10 minutes.

But I try to get RouteGadget up quickly too, to encourage runners to draw their routes (great feedback / learning for the course planners).

AZ - you guys let the setters upload events to RG themselves? I wouldn't trust our lot not to draw blood/crash the server/break the internet if they did it. :)

We have made a few customized security "tweaks". For example we have disabled the "delete event" feature.

I'd prefer if RouteGadget had a similar security to WinSplits - where the person that creates an event would get a code that allows them to edit / delete the event. But we've had pretty good luck so far, with our database admin guy only being called in occasionally to fix up messes ;-)

To me, the most important thing for a succesful A-meet is to have a high-quality map, challenging and fair courses and correct control placement. Everything else –timely online results, awards, string-O, child care, etc- is secondary. True, I would like to have them all but I will always enjoy myself if the first criterion is met.
If we were to put a soft “requirement” that A-meet results be available online within, say, 24 hours, I see at least three possible outcomes:
1) Clubs will somehow find the extra volunteers, knowledge and/or time to make it happen
2) The club’s limited resources will be diverted away from course design and hanging controls leading to a possible errors in that area
3) Clubs on the margin of holding an A-meet will decide it isn’t worth the hassle and opt out of hosting an A-meet.
Items 2&3 are fatal errors, in my opinion, and I am willing to live with less than timely results if the courses are done properly.
Perhaps those who disagree and feel that 24hr results are very important can form an informal committee to provide whatever manpower is necessary at all A-events to ensure that posting of online results meets their standards.

We have a number of people who upload to our club RouteGadget. No problems so far. Some of you need to learn to trust a bit more... I agree with Adrian about the strategic importance of getting RG up early so routes will be drawn. Its a great resource for building the skill of course setters. I regularly volunteer to do this for other people's events for that reason. I let them worry about their results.

Some of you need to learn to trust a bit more...

I don't trust most orienteers to write an email without breaking something, and it's easier for me to upload every event's RG than deal with the stupid questions from other people trying to do it.

from my experience, the people that complain most, aren't the ones that are organising the events.

2) The club’s limited resources will be diverted away from course design and hanging controls leading to a possible errors in that area

Course design and hanging controls is preferrably done BEFORE the meet.

I can´t see how getting results done by someone working for one hour AFTER the meet could possibly affect the courses...

Juffy, I wish you'd get your comments up in a more timely manner, it's frustrating to say the least to have to wait so long for your responses. And, can you please help me with the letter 'N' - I can't seem to use it so well these days. I thik the keyboard is broke n?

You ask around

That's key to making everything a success. Sadly few organizers do. A lot intentionally resist "outside interference". It seems quite logical that the more brains you pick, the more good ideas you'd get (you, the organizer, have freedom to filter out the bad ideas). Events that have been spectacular successes have used multiple course consultants, Event Consultants, advisers, and a couple phone calls to Valerie/Sandy.

Note one: Geoman has overseen something like 8 different A meets in the last 4 years. He's done a lot to improve the quality of our meets here, and his observations are worth listening too.

Note two: I'm sick of hearing people claim "the declining volunteer pool," and "limited resources," are a reason to cut volunteer jobs. Such a short sighted view. Sometimes you've got to think about the really big picture. Making things easier on volunteers is good. Making the volunteer experience more enjoyable is good. But finding ways to use less volunteers? Not so smart. Short term it sounds great, but long term you are reducing the number of people who are invested in the program. For long term club health, you'd be better off recruiting 5 newbies to tally results by hand than one expert to run an unreliable computer. I can almost guarantee that there are people out there who would like to help, but are just waiting to find out how.

Everything else –timely online results, awards, string-O, child care, etc- is secondary

Secondary are things that are secondary to the prevailing expectations of the competitors. Prompt results are not, in 2010.

How to get results up quickly at the event- some approaches used here. Each has advantages and problems. Some are more suited to events of certains scales. Maybe there are other solutions as well? Maybe we can come to a consensus on the best approach for events of various scales?

1. Print out the results from OE (or other event software). Then hang the pages in plastic A4 pockets from a line using pegs. If you are using all computers at the event for download and there is a steady stream of finishers, then the finish organisers have to choose between a lengthening queue of finishers waiting to download and regular results print outs. The more people at the event, the more difficult the compromise becomes. It is desirable to print in large font. This means more pages of results and a longer time between each cycle of printing and hanging. Given a large enough event, there will come a point where the printing will be happening almost continuously. This may explain the observation that results are slower getting up at bigger events. A computer dedicated to results is almost unavoidable on any but smaller events. Of course, getting an extra computer for printing results means networking, more strain on the power supply, so more infrastructure etc

2. Printout a result slip for each competitor and a volunteer team places these on slats and hangs them on the results board. This has some similarity with the pre-electronic system. Its probably the best compromise for larger events.

3. Print splits direct from OE for the competitor. Give competitors the responsibility for writing out their own time and have an old slat system where they can place their results. This will always be quicker than printing out from OE, but it may not be fully accurate. Some may not put up their times (often elites who don't like their result) and some may misread their print-out. The more competitors, the more difficult it wikll become to maintain some semblance of order on the results board. My guess is that this will fall over for more than 250-300 competitors. One compromise is to have the competitor write out the result but hand it to organisers at the results display. This uses the competitor to overcome what was once a persistent problem... transport of results between finish and results board.

4. Use a single computer for downloads and a separate printout box for splits. Again give competitors the responsibility for writing out their own time and have an old slat system where they can place their results. The print-out box can act as an independent backup of the results using SIME to interogate. Its a simple system for smaller events... less than 200 competitors. I think the printout box has a maximum capacity of about 400-500 downloads.

My club, Ajax, in Ireland has started to use a monitor attached to the results computer to display a scrolling set of results. That way, results are instant, require no human effort and do not interfere with people downloading. The system works pretty well for a few hundred competitors.

With an indoor venue, some clubs have used a projector which gives a nice big image.

We generally upload results to the internet before leaving the event. Barring a major disaster, the results are usually posted within 10 minutes of the last finisher downloading. We also have started making results available 'live' during the event (approx 5 min delay) so people can check their standings on their way home. All this requires mobile internet access at the event site but requires no extra effort.

Martin

I prefer Invisible's option #2, but I'll also encourage the results to be posted horizontally, not in a vertical stack. One of the downsides of some of the modern ways of doing results is that there's a tendency to print results on a page, and there's not enough room for people to jam in and read that page. By printing a card for each competitor, it becomes easier to make the printing larger, and putting them on a horizontal string or rail also makes it easier to insert a result into the middle. Vertical stack of results really only work if there's a very large display board (such as you might find at an elite race).

Leaving the responibility for posting results on the competitors means it basically won't happen.

jj: I love to see 200m of results string at the next bigger event ;-). But enough space is certainly important. Printing each course (class) on a separate sheet and hanging them far enough apart from each other does the trick quite ok.

You also can have wifi box and a local web server running on a result computer and publish live result there, local network. People can browse live results & splits with their wifi capable cell phones at even center even if there is no cell network.

I love to see 200m of results string at the next bigger event ;-)

For large enough events this would be a problem, but in the context of the USA, I've never seen enough participants to make this not work. Even so, I could see 200 m of results at an event with 2000 people as being a reasonable way to work things. I've seen people clustering around a page, and it's not to my liking.

Printing a separate sheet for everyone is such a waste of paper!

What they do at some of the bigger races is set up a local network as suggested so people have instant access, kinda like what Martian said but used instead of a screen - saves a few hundred people attempting to view a single A4 sheet.

For smaller races though, the screen is a great idea. Ajax in Ireland are pretty much leading the way with instant results and experimenting with technology to get results to people faster.

Printing a separate sheet for everyone is such a waste of paper!

Maybe not. One label per person, stuck to a piece of cardstock that could be reused on a subsequent day. Each person gets printed only once, rather than the early ones getting printed repeatedly on subsequent updates.

"Leaving the responibility for posting results on the competitors means it basically won't happen."
North Americans must be different to Australians. With the few exceptions (disappointed elites) I mentioned, it has worked very well here. Most orienteers want to see their results on the board.

I disagree, having seen many people at Easter 2010 just wander from finish past the anonymous table with the self-serve stickers on. Those who care about on the day results will more likely do it, those who don't will go home and wait till they appear in full on the web. Probably a layout issue rather than concept issue though.

In response to the discussion above, I achieved a first today, getting the local event on route gadget before course closure.
In response to Tooms.. I think its a cultural learning issue. We have run our events for many years giving responsibility to orienteers to place their own results. It works fine. The same system has been used at State Championships in Victoria with success. The rest of Australia may just have to get used to the idea.

Agreed, we do exactly that for our summer series and have done so for the last 14 or so years - but although we get 95% compliance it's never a full set of results, mainly newcomers who aren't indoctrinated who are missed. So, it works locally when people aquire the habit, but not at major events unless you nanny the competitors?

OK, so maybe States other than WA and Vic need to be indoctrinated? ;-}

I thought the 2010 Easter Carnival conducted by ACT cemented the process of competitors placing their own results. Initially sceptical, it seemed to run very smoothly. Subsequently variations of this have been employed by some NSW clubs for major events, especially useful where helper numbers are low. If the Finish chute is effectively designed the results posting is almost instantaneous and minimal in fuss.

Would you like to amplify the Aust Easter process? What's the flow of actions from the finish chute? I like the idea of using competitors. Seems to be self-correcting, no action then no result:-))

Competitor finishes:

* Download into computer, receive sticky label still on its backing paper.
* Over to second table with a pile of battens on it, stick label on batten. (They had a couple of people helping here if you looked particularly unco)
* Exit finish area, over to results, hang batten on results frames.

I thought it worked very well - the only problem was trying to muster enough coordination at the end of long runs to get the sticky label off its backing.

Competitor finished/downloaded (hence officially in system)/downloaded 2nd time for personal splits printout + results block sticker. Continued on in chute to table with results blocks available/ stick results to block/ proceed to results stand/ hang own block. This also ensures block placed in correct class - sometimes a minor problem. This method wasn't foolproof as I saw 1 Elite who was unhappy with his run-time screw up his result slip and discard it. Was informed that the sticker was fairly expensive but at a major carnival the expense is worth it. Easter 3 Day had about 800 competitors so good system. ACT team may correct any inaccuracies in my representations of their system. It worked very well!
Another system used subsequently in NSW was for finish/download into system/ download 2nd time for personal splits slip/ walk along channel to results stand where Official transcribed your result to block already hanging. Needed 2 Officials, but fast service, no extra printing or block running. Results block system was magnetic so easily adjusted for changes in placings. This was used for about 250 runners.
The essence is to make a fence or channel so the runners "can't" escape without attention to their results.

This method wasn't foolproof as I saw 1 Elite who was unhappy with his run-time screw up his result slip and discard it.

I don't really see this as a problem, although I have very little sympathy for elites and their dummy spits in the finish chute after helping to run the finish at WA's last Easter carnival. Anyone who's that unhappy with their run is unlikely to be troubling the leaders.

The vast majority of competitors (you know, the other 750 people there :) ) seemed happy to go through the process, and if it makes life easier for the organisers then I'm all for it.

Data projector. At the recently run 2010 Paddy Pallin Rogaine a data projector in combination with an indoor space was linked to the event computer/s which transmitted results in a scrolling and refreshing format 'real time'. Entrants seemed to like it. Originally considered for 7WRC 2006 Warrumbungles however environment, time and opportunity did not really allow for development. Works in some circumstances. The projectors themselves are becoming cheaper and smaller all the time.

Re disappointed elites, the traditional Australian method is to quit the course before finishing. A mp seems to have less stigma than a slow time ;-}