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Competition Planning and Course Setup

Mad Scientist

Mad Scientist

RCC Addict
Joined
Mar 15, 2005
Messages
1,721
Location
Saginaw
I've been kicking around the idea of putting together a competition (maybe), and I'd appreciaite some input from those who compete regularly, and those who are "in charge" of the competitions.


What general size area is mapped out for most competitions? I realize it isn't a straight shot from point A to point B, but about how many feet should the course traverse?

Are there a common number of gates or obstacles that you aim for?

How are comps organized? Do you have like tents and registration tables, or does everyone just show up, and maybe sign a clip-board?

Any entrance fees? How about prizes?

Are there any "standards" set for organizing and setting up a competition?

What kind of time-frame are we talking about? A couple hours, or all-day?


I have never been to a competition, so I am not familiar with how it usually goes down. If I ever do this, I'd like it to do it properly. It may be a bit much to ask, but a "behind the scenes" video at a competition would be awesome. It isn't too easy for me to take a day or two off and travel to a comp, so I have never been able to attended one to see just how it works.

Thanks a lot.
 
Mad Scientist said:
I've been kicking around the idea of putting together a competition (maybe), and I'd appreciaite some input from those who compete regularly, and those who are "in charge" of the competitions.
Click to expand...

Awesome, I am currently working on another project that will help new guys figure out how to hold their own events, but I doubt it'll be done for several months.

Mad Scientist said:
What general size area is mapped out for most competitions? I realize it isn't a straight shot from point A to point B, but about how many feet should the course traverse?
Click to expand...

Our courses usually carry a 5 minute time limit. Very few people actually time out on courses. Some take as little as a minute to drive. Courses are not very long at all measured in feet I would guess depending on difficulty 25-50 feet. I usually like to set the courses so people can watch the entire course standing in the same spot, this helps keep people interested in watching if they don't have to hike up and down the same hill 80 times.

Mad Scientist said:
Are there a common number of gates or obstacles that you aim for?
Click to expand...
Not really, some courses may be real long and technical and have like 10 gates. Other courses may just be like a huge climb with maybe 3 sets of gates. Progress points are given for each set of gates cleared, not counting the start or finish gates, it seems that our average amount of progress gates is about 5-7.

Mad Scientist said:
How are comps organized? Do you have like tents and registration tables, or does everyone just show up, and maybe sign a clip-board?
Click to expand...
We usually just wait till it looks like everyone that is going to show up does so, and I make up enough numbers for everyone to draw their running order. While we are hanging out we'll help answer any questions any newbies may have, and we'll look over the crawlers to make sure they fit into the rules for the class they are entering.

Mad Scientist said:
Any entrance fees?
Click to expand...
Not we don't charge anything, we have thought about chipping like $5 each and having that money go to the winners.

Mad Scientist said:
How about prizes?
Click to expand...
No we don't have prizes, because no entry fees are charged there isn't a pool of money from which to buy prizes. Another reason we don't have prizes is because I am not comfortable with going around and asking for them from people. Plus beating Dirk and Bender is usually a pretty good reward :flipoff:

Mad Scientist said:
Are there any "standards" set for organizing and setting up a competition?
Click to expand...
RCC does have a standardized set of rules. These rules were written by a committee comprised of the people that hold events all over the country. All though these rules only tell of how the actual scoring is done, and the vehicle classifications. But like I said, I am working on another project that will help new people such as yourself learn how to setup and run a comp.

Mad Scientist said:
What kind of time-frame are we talking about? A couple hours, or all-day
Click to expand...
We usually meet at 9am and start competing about 10am. For the most part we try to run 2 courses, then break for lunch and do 2 more courses after lunch.

Depending on the weather, the amount of people, and the difficulty of the courses we are usually done by like 2-3pm. After the events most of us usually hang out until dark just having fun trying new lines. <--That is usually the most fun of the day ;-)

Mad Scientist said:
I have never been to a competition, so I am not familiar with how it usually goes down. If I ever do this, I'd like it to do it properly. It may be a bit much to ask, but a "behind the scenes" video at a competition would be awesome. It isn't too easy for me to take a day or two off and travel to a comp, so I have never been able to attended one to see just how it works.

Thanks a lot.
Click to expand...

There are plenty of people here that have done it, and I am sure you'll get a lot of good feedback in this thread.

I know you said it is hard to do, but your best bet would be to try and show up at an event put on by another group, just to kind of see how things are ran.

Hope this helped, good luck!
 
Our stage length is determined by the terrain, and so will yours. If your crawling on a pile of rocks, you may only need 10-15 feet. Locally, we've run stages as long as 40-50 feet to get a bunch of really good but spread out obstacles all in one stage. But our average stage length is about 20 feet.

We have a tent sometimes, but usually everyone is congregating in the same area so we just announce that the clipbords are out and that everyone signs up.

Concerning entrance fees, that's up to you. Some clubs have them, some don't. It will be easier to attract people in the beginning if you don't have any fees. We don't have any fees locally and don't plan to have any in the future. Our focus is to bring people out to crawl and have fun. You may loose the fun factor for some of the competitors if you start charging fees.

Here are the official rccrawler.com rules:

http://www.rccrawler.com/rules.pdf

And score sheet:

http://www.rccrawler.com/RCC_Official_Scoresheet.doc

We start at around 9am and run till 1-3pm. Some tips I've learned:

Focus on producing the maximum amount of drive time for the competitor/driver. If you have 2 or 3 stages setup before you start, once the competitors finish a stage, you can start them on the next. Adjust how quick you push drivers through the stages according to mood of the event. Sometimes we do this, sometimes we don't. It just depends on the event.

Make sure you understand the rules. If you have a good group, you can consult the group standing around you if you are uncertain about how to call a penalty.

*****Get lots of help. You cannot effectively run an event by yourself. We always run each class at the same time. So the 2.2's and Unlimited trucks are running simultaneously. So you need at least two judges to do that. Then it's nice to have a third person not judging to take care of everything else. This may include getting the next set of stages set up and assigning a set of judges for those stages. But having help is very important.

When driver "X" is about to start a stage, let the guy who is running after him know that he is next so he can get ready. This is important because sometimes it will take them 5-10 minutes to get ready and that wastes time.

Time management is very important at a comp. You want the event to flow smoothly. Not all clubs do this, but you may want to focus on maximizing the drive time each competitor gets. That is why most people come to an event, to drive competitive stages. And it's been a complaint at many comps so make sure you get enough drive time in for everyone.

Good luck setting up your own events! :)
 
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Thanks for tossing this up as a Sticky. You guys have contributed some good info here already, this will really help me out a lot. :D Hopefully others will be inspired to organize competitions as well, so there will be more "local" events.
 
Last edited:
Excellent info gents, very helpful. I used to run a company called Adventure Sports Promotions, we promoted all kinds of outdoor adventures but never a RC crawling event. Looks like a new avenue for some promotions.
Jason, please get that going A.S.A.P. a few months?? It'll be winter again here.
 
Is there anyway one of the comp guys could put up their clipboard file? It would save me time and be a asset to anyone who wants to start a comp. I have a basic idea of what it looks like frequencies, name, class, ect. But, how does the scoring section look? Little check boxes for added points? How is the scoring generally recorded? Are the points added up after each run to give the competitor his gate score? Or is all calculating done after everyone has ran?
 
kevinlongisland said:
Your welcome :) Good luck with the summer series. I'm sure it will be a blast.
Click to expand...

Thanks again, I'm sure it will be a blast. I'm looking forward to it. ;-)
We'll be posting pic's and vids.
 
We may hold a few comps up here in the north when the temps in PHX reach 120*

Just ordered 2 of these little kits.........we will see how big the cones are but appear to be about 2" tall............any thoughts?.......The tennis balls just dont cut it in the looks dept

http://p2pitrade.com/html/products/toy/slrt.html

SLRT05.jpg
 
rockwerks said:
We may hold a few comps up here in the north when the temps in PHX reach 120*

Just ordered 2 of these little kits.........we will see how big the cones are but appear to be about 2" tall............any thoughts?.......The tennis balls just dont cut it in the looks dept

http://p2pitrade.com/html/products/toy/slrt.html

SLRT05.jpg
Click to expand...

rockwerks, it would be nice to have another place to drive to that's not 14 hours away to attend a comp. I know some of us will drive up there for a comp if you put one on. We have cones here as well. But we only use them for the start and end gates. Cones probably won't stay on allot of the spots we need to place them.
 
kevinlongisland said:
rockwerks, it would be nice to have another place to drive to that's not 14 hours away to attend a comp. I know some of us will drive up there for a comp if you put one on. We have cones here as well. But we only use them for the start and end gates. Cones probably won't stay on allot of the spots we need to place them.
Click to expand...

a lil sticky rubber on the bottom and they will hold nearly vertical

Looks like we gotta start up N.A.R.C. ;-)
 
Mnster said:
How many comps do you guys have per season?
Click to expand...

It all depends on the interval between comps you setup. We used to do every 4 weeks, now we do every 3 weeks. Most everyone is running a 6 month points series.
 
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