SportIdent in Australia

SportIdent Controls
 

 

What's in a SportIdent Control?

Each control contains a small computer and enough memory to hold information about the last 4,000 runners that visited the control. Powered by 3 alkaline AA cells, a control should last for 20-30 events on each set of batteries. All of this is sealed inside a perspex case - with a rubber seal providing an improved seal to help keep water out. If you look carefully inside the hole in the control, you will see a copper coil; this is used to communicate with SI cards.

 How do they Work?

The control detects that an SI Card has been inserted and energizes the coil. The electric field generated by the coil provides enough energy to power up a tiny computer in the SI Card. On waking up, the SI Card computer sends its Card Number to the control. The control responds by returning its control number and the current time. All of this takes about one quarter of a second.

Do I need different controls for each function?

No. Any control unit can be programmed to act as :

  • A Clear Station – erases the SI Card.
  • or a Check Station – checks to see if the SI Card is blank (i.e. cleared correctly)
  • or a Start Control – writes the runner’s start time into the SI Card.
  • or a Field Unit – placed in the field. Writes the Control Number and the current time into a competitor’s SI Card.
  • or a Finish Control – writes the finish time into the SI Card

The diagram below shows the sequence in which these controls are used.

Why store the SI Card number in the control?

In the event of protest, it is possible to confirm that a control has been visited – both from the SI Card and from the Control. If a runner has visited a control, then details of the visit will be in both the SI Control and SI Card.

Note, that this feature could also be of value to investigate a missing runner - if the runner had failed to download, the SportIdent software (OE2000) will report him as still out on the course. To double-check this, one can read the contents of the Finish controls – if the runner has finished successfully (and then gone home without downloading), his SI Card Number will be there. If the runner has not finished, one could then bring in the controls from his course and interrogate them to see which controls had been visited and when.