Thanks for all the helpful comments and suggestions', improving this sport is a
work in progress, so bear with us.
The first event of every year has glitches. They are the most noticeable in
registration. At all events last year we
opened registration early whenever possible, but sometimes it is just not
possible so we do not publish that fact.
A little background might explain a lot. If you have been directly involved in
the hosting of a Pro hit page down
now, otherwise, two field staff (one is Howard) arrive at the event site at
approximately 6:45 am on Friday to set
up. This includes all our equipment, grid, pregrid, staging, lights, the
course, etc. (the host region does the majority
of the course setup, with Howard approving and/or massaging as necessary) At
three o'clock practice starts begin.
While this is going on your other two-cracked field staff are working for part
of the day at their real jobs and
rushing to catch a plane. Usually on Thursday evening or Friday morning I
receive the latest version of the
event file, because Howard will have left the office well before most entrants
are received. While on the plane,
we finalize the work assignments and check for late cancellations, which may
send the balance of the work/run
order completely out of whack. When we arrive (Normally by 3-4pm) we print the
work assignments and
enter them into the timing and scoring program, to help in speeding up the
process. Now if we have no problems
we can open registration early, if anything throws this delicate balance out,
then we can't.
We close at 8pm (years ago we were open until 9pm, but the 8 to 9 hour was
almost completely dead)
then get a quick bite of dinner and about an hour or less of cleanup work on
the event file and then we are back
at our posts before 7am on Saturday morning. We have several ideas that will
help to make all of this flow
with the minimum of waiting, but as I said the first event of each year has it
own special problems and at the
early part of the year the sun sets earlier and then the wait seems even worse.
Hopefully in two weeks when we get to the left coast, everything will gel and
registration will fly!
paula whitney
slightly demented & cracked field staff member
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