Venue Racing Application - .RAC file description

RACE                         // file type signature
107                             // file format ver 107 including class.
0                                  // team config (singles=0, doubles=1, fours=2, eights=3)
T0830aF02                // race name; see note 1

100                             // distance in meters

0                                  // duration type (distance=0, time=1, biathlon distance 3-lap=3, biathlon distance 5-lap=5)

0                                  // always zero

1                                  // enable stroke data

500                             // splits distance in meters

120                             // splits time seconds

4                                  // actual # of boats in this race (2-40)

Randy Heigel // participant name; see note 2

687                             // identifier (bib number)

E4F1                          // class; see note 3 

63                                // country code; see note 4

02101957                  // DOB; can be left blank

Nick Rockwell            // next record

254

E5F1

63

02101947

Bob Hobkirk

11

E5F1

63

02101949

John Harbaugh

146

E5F1

63

02101945

0

 

Note 1: Race Name is shown on the PM3 monitor. This must be limited to 16 characters or the application will not allow you to start the race.

 

Note 2: Rower Name is shown on the PM3 monitor during WARMUP.  This is approximately 12 characters long, but it is also dependent on width (names with wider characters such as “W” and capital letters take up more space, which will result in fewer characters displayed on the PM3.  Rower Name will be also displayed to the user while rowing. While rowing, the name is a bit shorter, (about 11 characters; as few as 8 characters with wide characters and CAPS).  You can make this string long if you like (but please avoid punctuation, especially commas) the PM3 will truncate as needed.  Finally, this string is also shown on the TV's.  You can make the string longer, and add in class information like "Scott Hamilton 36 HW" although this does not set the class as it is for display only. 

 Note 3: For class—If you are running a single class race, make this string the same for all records (using a blank line is acceptable). If you have 2 classes, then make the string the same for everyone in Class 1, and the same for everyone in Class 2.  To keep it simple, you could simply use "Class1" and "Class2,"  but any string will do.  ErGO! uses class names such as E5F1 which represents Event 5, Flight 1.  This string is only displayed to the computer operator in the class-view options.  Finally, DO NOT mix up the order! Keep them all grouped properly.

 Note 4: This is assumed to be country code. AFG is the default. This variable has no active function and is just a placeholder. Please note that in the example above (pulled from Eileen's documentation) this is a number. At one point it seems that numbers were used, but in any actual files viewed at Concept2, this value has been a 3-digit string containing one of the following: AFG ARE ARG ATA AUS AUT BEL BHR BMU BRA CAN CHE CHN CZE DEU DNK EGY ESP EST FIN FRA FXX GBR GRC GRL GTM HKG HRV HUN IND IRL ISL ISR ITA JAM JPN KOR LUX LVA MAC MEX MWI NCL NER NIC NLD NOR NZL OMN PER PHL POL PRI PRT RUS SAU SGP SWE THA TTO TUR TWN URY USA VIR YUG ZAF ZWE

 In addition, the following Country Codes have been added as “Set Language” codes in a .RAC file.  Only these codes will cause a PM3/PM4 to change language if the appropriate settings are chosen:  CHI=Simplified Chinese (PM4 only), POR=Portuguese, FII=Finish, DAN=Danish, SWD=Swedish, DUT=Dutch, ITL=Italian; GER=German; FRE=French; SPA=Spanish; ENG=English

 Note 5: Only US ASCII is accepted. If you are using other applications and embedding diacritics (letters with dots and other marks above, etc.), most of this information is lost or converted to some similar but still strange characters (for example, boxes, quote marks, and so on).  Try to stick to standard ASCII. Test your race files by loading them into the VRA.

 

Testing Your Race Files

If you are generating your own .RAC files, or even using ErGo, it is advisable to load all the race files in advance and test them to be sure they work acceptably.  To do this:

·        Run the VRA (even without ergs hooked up)

·        Cancel the wizard (and any other popups that appear)

·        Open the race

·        When the Modify Race window is displayed:

·        Check the meters or time, and grouping 

·        Ensure the race name is less than 16 characters (or the race will not load)

·        Click Cancel. The race is now loaded.

 

Things to check for:

·        Do all the names look ok?

·        Are all the names there? Be sure to check the first and last name on the list.

·        Multiclass Races: Are ALL the boats in order (1, 2, 3, etc).  (If classes are not done properly, you can end up with boats out of order.)

 

Format For Race Results File

file type signature ("Race Results")

file version ( currently 101)

blank line

header

boat results: (Place,Time Rowed, Meters Rowed, Boat/Team

Name,Avg. Pace,ID,Bib Number,Class)  - repeat for each record

 

blank line "Detailed Results"

blank line ' boat results (place,boat,boat/team name,finish time,finish

distance,avg. pace,rower's ranking ID,class)

individual results (,,,Rower

Name,Class,Distance Rowed,Avg. Pace) . . . notes: Boats are sorted by place.

For detailed results, the section of repeated for each boat/team.

 

Stroke File

In eRow, this recorded data for every stroke the user took.  In the Venue Racing application, the data is taken periodically.  The default period is about 500mS (1/2 second).   This data can be used with third party programs to re-play the race from start to finish.

 

Splits File

Shows the splits for each participant.

 

LogData Files:

Transaction logs files are created for every race which shows all the data flowing. If you have a problem with a race, we would encourage you to save these log files (they do get VERY big, sometimes 4-5 megabytes!) and send them to Concept2 with some notes as to what happened.  This allows C2 programmers to diagnose the problem better.