2009 & 10 NCAA Rule Book wrote:
toro wrote:"There is no rule mandating HT in case of FAT failure, that's a myth and a lie. If FAT fails to get a start signal the race is recalled."
What happens if FAT fails in the middle of the race or has a malfunction at the end?
Will the race not have results?
I don't know about official rules or how it has been practiced but it seems like a pretty bad idea not to have official hand timers for every race.
Rule 5-12.4
"Hand times must be rounded using Rule 4-12.2c (rounded up to nearest 10th) before adding a conversion factor. The conversion factor of .24 seconds between fully automatic timing(FAT) and manual timing (MT) must be used when conversions are desired. (i.e., MT + .24 - FAT). In championships meets, .24 shall be used in all events to determine seed times."
Rule 5-12.5
"In the event that fully automatic timing is not available in one or more of several heats or sections, the following procedure shall apply: Hand times must be used for all heats or sections to determine advancement or final placings, or heats or sections are to be rerun."
Rule 5-12.3f
"An alternate finish-line crew shall operate to judge and provide manually operated timing results to supplement the FAT system." (This is in regards to the championships equipment which also includes 3 FAT systems.)
These rules are specifically set for NCAA Championships. If you look at the title of that section, it's "CHAMPIONSHIPS EQUIPMENT REQUIREMENTS", and are negotiable by the initial guidelines of Article 3.
I should add that I've been using FinishLynx to time meets for 10 years. I attempt to get races longer than 1500-1600m with a stopwatch just in case, but it doesn't always happen.
I'm not sure why all of this got started. Flash Results timed the meet, the results are all indicative that it was FAT through the whole thing, it doesn't seem like it's even a debatable point, German ran 3:55.02 FAT, not 3:55.0, and 3:55.02 is faster, by rule, than Waldrop.