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However in 10 years from now, will it still be manual?
Probably. The technology to do electronic timing is hardly new. It was available 10 years ago, and we don't have electronic timing now. And I can hardly see the supply of superannuated former testers capable of holding a stopwatch drying up to the point where there's no old codgers to act as timekeepers available. In my club we've got any number of more senior members who can do the time-keeping. Trying to find one who won't die from the strain of doing pushing-off duties is the hard bit.
Brommers-
Actually the supply is starting to dry up
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Probably. The technology to do electronic timing is hardly new. It was available 10 years ago, and we don't have electronic timing now. And I can hardly see the supply of superannuated former testers capable of holding a stopwatch drying up to the point where there's no old codgers to act as timekeepers available. In my club we've got any number of more senior members who can do the time-keeping.
We're running out in mine - mainly because they all keep riding!
I reckon it will come, when the technology gets cheaper and you can do it reliably with a post at the side of the road rather than a wire across it.
I've had enough dodgy calls from timekeepers, and seen what goes on when riders have been missed to be sure which I would rather trust.
And I've seen how reliable our system has been: in 50 events over 5 years, with an average of say 30 riders doing 11 laps - that's about 16,500 passes - there have only been 3 or 4 missed lap readings.
Peter_Carter
frank9755
You're right, still need a manual time keeper. However in 10 years from now, will it still be manual? I'd doubt it. So it's a case of when and how it'll be phased in. It might be measured to seconds, but when people are chasing small advantages, it could become hundredths of a second. We're not world time trial racers, but that's times to thousands of a second iirc.