Columbus 10K

I was out of town this weekend and did not run the race, but have in the past and I have always liked this race.

On the other hand I had a friend run a race in Dublin last Saturday and they used chip timing but his time was off by over 2 minutes…how can that happen?

Frank, is that you?

I will be moving to th Columbus area soon, and would appreciate some recommendations of good races in the area.

Doggie - wasn't everything about Columbus discussed in that other thread?

I'm a (retired) chip timer. Give more details, if you can, and maybe we can figure it out.

-Was his time faster or slower than he figured it should have been (you don't say).

-Why is he sure his time's off?

-Were other times correct?

-Has he contacted the timing company for an explanation, and if so, what did they say?

-Start/Finish setup -- were there start mats? Is it possible that he started his watch with the gun, but is looking at chip times (or that he started it when he actually crossed the start line, but is looking at gun times)?

-Is he sure he ran with the actual chip assigned to him?

Chip timing isn't perfect -- obviously -- but 2 minutes is a large discrepancy. In my experience, discrepancies that large are most often chip/gun time misreadings in large races where it takes minutes to cross the line, or registration problems (in the largest sense).

We need more information here!

My friend said there were about 300 runners. He said his chip time was over two minutes faster than his watch. He said this was the case for the entire field. They used an AMB chip timing system.

I ran the race where the times were off. Everyone's time was listed as about 2:00 faster than actual, but they have since fixed it. Hard to understand, since the clock at the finish line had the correct time.

The same timing company did a race a week earlier where the results were right but the clock at the end of the race was about 1:30 slow.

Have you ever had the chip time over 2 minutes faster for the entire field? How could this happen?

Well, the Dublin race in question did update the results. It looks like they added 2:05 to all the times. I've been told by friends who e-mailed the race director that he hasn't responded with any reason. I don't know the mechanism of chip-timing, but here is what I assume.

When the race begins, the finishing clock starts, and a computerized clock somehow connected to the chips is started. In this race, perhaps they just forgot to start the clock that is connected to the chips for a couple minutes. I was told that there was no sensor that we ran over at the start, just at the finish (they weren't the exact same place) so perhaps they expected that clock to start automatically and it didn't. Or something like that. Maybe someone who has used these systems can verify.

Great to see the top three Ohio marathoners in one race and looks like the women’s race was the best in Ohio in a long time

MALE OPEN

1 MATTHEW FOLK M 31 CANFIELD, OH 30:23

2 JOSH ORDWAY M 26 DAYTON, OH 30:37

3 JIM JURCEVICH M 31 COLUMBUS, OH 31:21

4 JOE PURPURA M 19 PATASKALA, OH 31:40

5 NATE RITZ M 24 WESTERVILLE, OH 32:20

6 MIKE SAWACKI M 23 CLEVELAND, OH 32:20

7 VICTOR GRAS M 21 ANN ARBOR, MI 32:22

8 ROBB KESTNER M 31 WEST JEFFERSON, OH 32:24

FEMALE OPEN

1 17 LYNDSI BENEDICT 26 NEW ALBANY, OH 34:26

2 21 NICOLE GLIEM 22 BEECH GROVE, IN 35:03

3 23 LEIGH DANIEL 28 ASHLAND, OH 36:07

4 24 MELISSA CONVERSE 29 BLACKLICK, OH 36:15

5 32 LARISA MIKHAYLOVA 38 MAINEVILLE, OH 37:10

6 38 KELLY NEWSAD 26 COLUMBUS, OH 39:05

7 39 ELAINE BINKLEY 22 COLUMBUS, OH 39:07

8 41 BRIDGET BALDWIN 20 OMAHA, NE 39:26

9 43 SARA WHITIS 30 GILLETTE, WY 39:35

Columbus Runner, did Flagpole Willy run this race, or was the $22 entry fee too high?

miamiredhawk wrote:

Doggie - wasn't everything about Columbus discussed in that other thread?

Actually....What was discussed was how bad the racing scene can be. I was just curiou what some of the better races, like this one, are.

Other good 10k races in ohio are:

Youngstown peace race 10k

Rite Aid 10k in cleveland - had some major problems this year. I wouldn't expect that to happen again.

Minster October fest 10k

These and the Columbus 10k being talked about are likely the top 4 10k races in Ohio. The columbus 10k gives travel money to the winner to go to the road 10k USATF nationals race. That is a nice touch.

Ed Alyanak

Not sure who Flagpole Willy is. If you know who he is, maybe you can find his name in the results - http://www.runohio.com/results/searchable.html

I've never used the AMB system (I was a ChampionChip timer). But Gregas is on the right track, I think. At some point, the timer has to submit the race time to the chip electronics.

This might be done from a keypad, maybe from another device -- I don't know how it's done with AMB. I'd guess that the human being thought that he'd started the time at the gun, but actually hadn't. Too light a push? Wrong button? Something like that.

If that's done incorrectly, then of course the times are incorrect.

This is why the careful timer always has at least two timing devices that start at the gun.

Sometimes the finishing clock is actually started by the timing electronics, but usually that's a separate job.

Another top race in Ohio is the Johnnycake Jog in Painesville. Usually a few guys under 24 for 5 mile.

http://www.johnnycakejog.com/

Thanks for your response about the Dublin race. It is my understanding the Columbus 10K does the pull tag system and had now trouble with results