South Dublin Co. Council cross-country 07/01/2012 A new year and we are back in action after a few weeks of inactivity. Hopefully you have been training anyway. Good luck to all for a healthy, fit and injury-free 2012.
It is straight down to business this coming Saturday 07 January 2012 with the South Dublin County Council cross-country races at Tymon Park, Tallaght. Registration will be at St. Jude’s GAA club. Take the exit for Tallaght off the M50 and head towards the city on the N81 before going down past the Spawell golf centre on the left. See the map on the BHAA website.
The women’s race is two miles and starts at 12 noon and the men’s race is four miles and starts at 12.30pm. As has been the case for quite a few years now, race entry costs €10 for members and €15 for non-members.
If you have never run a cross-country race before, don’t be afraid to give it a try. Ideally you should have a pair of spikes but they last for ever really.
Bear in mind too that annual membership of the BHAA is due for renewal in January each year. Cost is €15 too so if you run three races during the year, you cover yourself and become eligible for team and league prizes. The renewal template can be filled in at this link: https://bhaa.ie/members/app/membership/form. When you get to the end of the form, you are asked where you heard about the BHAA. You should click on the Submit then and you will be brought to the payment processing page which is on the RunIreland website where you may have to answer the last question again. A processing charge is added there, bringing the total cost to €15.90. Alternatively, you can print out the page and bring it with €15 to any race but we would prefer that people would renew and pay online as handling paper forms and cash creates a lot of additional work for the BHAA committee.
If you have been a member for 2011, you may renew your membership at any time up to the end of January 2012, so don’t panic if you don’t get to do it before Saturday.
One big piece of news that we have is that we have recently invested in a new electronic timing and results system. As you will be aware, the existing bar-code system has shortcomings and relies on further inputs after runners have finished a race. The new Ultra RFID system records times based on a tag that is attached to the back of each runner’s number. The data that is captured by the Ultra system is then processed within the separate race management software to produce quick and accurate results. Various BHAA members have been having training and familiarisation on the system in recent weeks and Tymon Park will be its first outing. We are confident that it will work properly but we will also be recording finishing places manually, just in case.
Some points to note regarding the timing system:
The RFID tags are stuck to the back of the runner number so please do not remove them. This integrated number and tag costs us €1 but is reusable (in comparison to the barcode numbers that cost €0.50 each for one use), so we will seek to collect the numbers at the end of the races. Take your time, the results do not depend on the recovery of the numbers. Also, if you forget to return your number, don’t worry, just bring it along to another race. We will try to set up a system to sort the returned numbers into numerical order to facilitate re-use. We will get the hang of it – we might need a bit of help doing this before they are stored away.
We will have protective mats to cover the finishing mats to avoid damage from spikes. We will be investigating whether side antennas will be necessary for cross-country races as an alternative.
The RFID tags should not be obscured when coming to the finish so please try not to hold your arms across the tag/number as you cross the finish mats. More importantly, the number should always be worn on your front, otherwise the tag won’t be read.
We will not have timing mats at the start so everyone will have only "gun time" because there would not normally be a long delay between the first and last starters crossing the start line. Similarly, we will not be providing lap times on this occasion. We are trying to keep it simple at this stage as we become familiar with the system.
Let us know if you have any feedback on the operation after the results are produced on Saturday. We are getting great support from our the system suppliers and are confident that we will be able to iron out any bugs quickly.
So, be there on Saturday for the introduction of our new technology. Don’t forget to join us in the hall afterwards for refreshments and to see how the results work out.
I hope you can make it.
The Editor