I agree. Regardless of some "minor" problems with the chip, using existing technlogy to "estimate" what's happening with team competition mid-way through the race is an exciting prospect. I wouln't expect NCAA XC office pools, but it would bring back the team competition, and make XC races as exciting (if not more) as relays. And not just XC - like Tom mentioned, team competition at major marathons and road races can be just as fierce - and perhaps will help to establish a japanese-type corporate team competition.
We can keep the old-fashioned hand timing at the finish line as the official result, but preliminary results can be (theoretically) announced as soon as the fifth man crosses the finish line. As to the problems with recording the time the chip leg crosses the finishing mats - this can be possibly eliminated by wearing two chips on both feet. You record the average time of the two chips, which I would expect to be close enough to the "torso" time - perhaps within a few inches - unless people are "triple-jumping" through the finish line, of course. :) Or we could time people by the time of the "last" chip crossing the line. Oleg. > The problem with this logic is that team scores are reguraly determined at a > fixed point in space, not time. Such is the finish line - they do not > freeze the race when the winner crosses and count places, rather they let > all runners finish and record their place at a fixed point in time, namely > the finish line. The same occurs for mid-race judgements; when a coach > looks at the place of his team midway through the race, unless at a very > special course with a long open stretch, he takes down the place of each > runner as they pass. While places surely do change hands after the point, I > think the notion of of a "halfway" score is a good measure which adds > excitement to the racing atmosphere for the spectators, especially those > with litle experience watching the sport. > > just some thoughts... > > john > > -----Original Message----- > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of ROBERT J HOWELL > Sent: Thursday, January 03, 2002 12:53 AM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: t-and-f: Heisenberg, Chip Timing > > > I haven't read about this yet, and since there is no college cross to > talk about, what the hell. > > Heisenberg said, "The more precisely the position is determined, the less > precisely the momentum is known in this instant, and vice versa." > > Heisenberg was talking about sub atomic particles, but this has some > bearing on this chip timing discussion. Chip timing at certain intervals > gives incomplete information, necessarily. One can determine the exact > instant that each runner crosses a certain point, and possibly determine > that person's position within the race, but one can never know exactly, > with chip timing, what the team score is. By the time the 5th runner gets > to a given point, the runners ahead of him may have and probably will have > changed positions. Chip timing mixes each runner's split(cross > section) with the team's result, wich is taken over > time(longitudinal). Because a team has five scorers who don't all finish > at the same time or cross a given point at the same time, we cannot figure > their total score by merely adding their positions at some fixed > geographical point. The team exists across time and space. We can know > the score at a given time, but not at a given point. We can know each > member's place and split at a given point, but that won't necessarily give > us the team score. Runners do change positions over time. > > What does this have to do with anything? Nothing that I know of. But > there was so much esoteric crap going around that I figured another piece > of it would have a negligible marginal impact on the list. Once I go > back to school next week, I won't have enough time to write about things > like this anymore, so don't hold your breath waiting for my next > post. Since I didn't mention this earlier, we need some indoor meets and > a new thread. > > Keeping it real. > > Out, > > Robbie Howell >
