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No Response/Time Out
An official has 5 minutes to respond after the other official’s request to start the race. The units time
out if an official does not respond to an “
Are you ready?”
request within 5 minutes, or the race does not
start within 5 minutes of a ready acknowledgement. The Starter Unit will sound the busy signal and
flash the red light. The Start Race tab displays a message indicating that there was no response. Either
official must reinitialize the “
Are you ready
?” signal before continuing.
The green light blinks rapidly and the unit starts beeping for the last 30 seconds of the 5 minute time
period to indicate the system is about to abort. This is a signal that the starter only has a few seconds to
start the race. If this occurs, it is recommended that the starter aborts the process by pressing the red
STOP button. This ensures the starter has enough time to adequately start the race and the timing
official is ready. It’s also a safeguard against the units timing out just as the starter pulls the trigger.
Recall the Race
After the race starts, the starter may press the red STOP button to recall the race up to 5 seconds after
the race begins when both the red and greens lights are on. This resets the race clock and restores the
system
to the “
Ready to Start Race”
state. (I.e., READY light is solid green on the Starter Unit). The
starter then has 5 minutes to restart the race before the system times out. The officials must reinitiate
the “handshake” procedure if the starter does not press the red STOP button within the recall period or
if the unit times out before the restart.
Whenever the timing official clicks the ABORT button on the capture screen the race clock resets and
units are set to the
Idle
state. This also occurs if the STOP capture button is clicked. If the timing official
resets the clock within the first 5 seconds of the start, the Starter Unit sounds a siren warning signal.
This indicates a possible issue with the timing device and the starter may recall the race.
If there is a malfunction and the race clock does not start on the capture computer, the
FlashTiming
software can calculate the times of all the runners from the video based on one hand time. The
resulting times will not be FAT but the video will determine the order position and all runners’ times will
be based from the one hand time. The protocol for the timer to recall the race should be discussed
before the race. If FAT times are not necessary, you may decide not to recall the race and use the
calibrated hand times from the video.
10.6
Race Clock Inadvertently Starts
The race clock starts after the units are in the
Ready to Start Race
state and the Starter Unit detects the
loud bang from the starting pistol. The race clock may inadvertently start due to a loud sound, from the
unit being bumped, or high winds. The Starter Unit beeps and the green and red lights both turn on
when this occurs. The starter can press the STOP button within 5 seconds of this occurring and the unit
will go back to the ”
Ready to Start Race”
state. Otherwise, the timing official may stop the race clock
from the capture computer and the units are reset to the idle state.
10.7
Radios Do Not Communicate
The Start Race tab notifies the timing official at the capture computer if the radio units are unable to
communicate and the red light flashes on the Starter Unit along with a rapid busy signal. It is
recommended that the timing official test the radio communication whenever the starter moves to a
new starting position on the track and before the next race.
There are several reasons why the radios may not communicate:
