Good News, Bad News

[RacingRicki]

Originally Posted by Larry Sullivan

Short answer - it takes several races for a new reporter to work together with an experienced reporter and become familiar enough with the reporting software and the sometimes recalcitrant interface with the timing system to "solo."

Most of the guys (and occasionally gals) who do this for us have been doing online drag racing reports since the CompuServe and AOL days in the mid-eighties.

The reporting software has evolved to take advantage of the data feed provided by the CompuLink timing system, but it takes experience to know what can go wrong, how to fix it and, if necessary, how to do the job by manually keying in all of the race data from the printed reports produced by the timing system.

It's time-consuming, detail-oriented work that requires full-time attention. It doesn't fit in very well with a typical racing family's daily schedule at the track. Their focus is usually on the race car and their daily routine depends on when that car is scheduled to be on the track. Our focus is on getting the results posted as soon as possible, but not until they have been proofread to make sure they match the official results.

I was afraid of that answer. I still think its sad that in this information age, the data coming from Compulink is so unreliable and problematic. I remember talking to the guy from iCard several years ago and him telling me all the troubles of interpreting the data feed, etc. so I understand what you mean.