Re: Many many question for TG (407 Views)
Posted by:
TGJB (IP Logged)
Date: March 20, 2005 09:16PM
Dodie-- yes, that's exactly why-- generally the teletimer is more accurate than hand timing, but when you get a weird one it's good to have a check. The other reason we go through the exercise is to get the lengths of the runups for their own sakes-- a short or long runup can affect final time, and keeping track of when they change things lets you know how to correlate different distances, and even different races at the same distance. At Laurel years ago, they would go with really short (like 20 foot) runups for the 7f races and longer ones (like 60 foot) for the 6f races on some days, then reverse them on other days, and have them the same on yet others. Anyone who assumed the distance relationships were a constant was in real trouble.
Of course, changes in runups will also have a dramatic effect on fractions (see Pimlico 6f fractions, where they have a 5 foot runup). But I'm sure those making pace figures are all getting race to race runups and accurate wind info.
TGJB