Entry and qualification

You use the Entry/Qualify page to define the names of the drivers, and to assign heat and starting lanes, either by doing a qualification run, or by random or manual assignment.

Entering drivers name

You enter a name by mouse selecting the top empty “Drivers name” cell, and then fill out the field edit dialog. Pressing ENTER closes the dialog and updates the field. Alternatively you can load a pre written list by using the “Load Entrylist” button. This list could either be a previously saved list, or it can be written with NOTEPAD or a similar editor.

Attempts to load a RESULT list as an ENTRY list, will skip the initial column (the position), so that the names will fit the correct column. This could be useful if the qualification or entry order is based on a previous race.

If you select the “Driver” or the “Comment” field for editing, then you have 10 “Speed selection items” from the drop down.

This button will add the current text item to the top of the speed-select list. However if the item is already in the list it will merely be moved to the top of the list.

To delete an item from the list, use the “M-“ button. This will remove the item in the text window from the list. An empty element will be added at the bottom of the list.

The garbiage can will clear the entry field.

The garbiage can with “Enter” will clear the field, save it to the drivers list and advance to the next vertical item on the list.

The “Enter” button functions the same as pressing Enter. It will save the current field value into the list and advance to the next item.

The “Skip” will skip this field without saving, and advance to the next field.

The “X” or Esc will exit the field edit without entering any data. It will not advance to the next field.

Choosing the starting lane

Normally you use the “Assign Heat and Lanes” (Together with “Max drivers per heat” and the “Heat distribution”) to automatically divide your drivers into heats, and assign a sequential starting lane to your drivers.

However, sometimes the best qualified driver wins the right to choose first, which lane to start on, then the next etc. In that case you use the “Assign Heat and Lanes” button to divide into heats. Then you click the mouse over the lane assignment for best qualified in the heat. A prompt similar to the one below will appear.

You then click on the lane number/colour to assign the chosen lane. As an aid, the lane number for lanes already assigned is removed.

The system automatically goes to the next driver until you end the assignment by pressing ESC.

If you run in “round robin” fashion you can chose one of the sit-out positions as well. Up to 8 such positions are displayed.

If you will use more sitouts than 8, you must manual assign sitout positions by typing a numbers greater than the number of lanes, e.g. on an 8-lane track: “9”=Sitout-1, “10”=Sitout-2 etc.
You can type these numbers in the edit box. Do not type any colour indication, just the number.

Select drivers from catalogue

As a third option you can select drivers from the “Catalogue”.
The intention is that you store .jpg pictures of your usual drivers in the c:\LapMaster\drivers folder. You should name the pictures with the name of the driver followed by .jpg. Alternative you can store any file named with the drivers name and the .txt extension. Creating the pictures is outside the scope of this program.
Pressing the “Select drivers from catalogue” will open up a folder view of the driver’s catalogue. If you run on Windows XP, icons with the driver’s picture are displayed; otherwise you just have a list of files named after your drivers. You can select the drivers from this file open dialog. You can make multiple selections by holding down the ctrl key while doing the select. When you end the selection dialog, the driver’s names will be added to the entry list.

Qualification

Having completed the entry list you can qualify the drivers. Qualification is used to find the starting sequence in the real race.
You can qualify by basically 3 methods:

1. By racing.
You complete the entry list and press the OK button. You then use the Race Setup panel to determine the length and style of qualification used. Style can be best lap time or longest distance within the time allotted to qualification. You also select the lane used for qualification, and finally you change the race type to “Qualification”. When you exit the race setup, each driver from the entry list (in reverse order) will be called to qualification. The race controller can use the “Warmup” option at his digression, and then press “Start” to start the qualification round. The result of each driver’s qualification is automatically inserted into the entry/qualification list.
Pressing the “Go qualify” is a shortcut which changes the race type to “Qualification” and then starts it. You can use it if you are sure you have all the other qualifications parameters set correctly.

When all drivers have been given a one attempt at qualification. The race director returns to the Entry/Qualification panel. The qualifying result is then sorted by mouse click on the heading of “Qualifying result” a further mouse click reverses the sorting order.

Pressing the “Assign Heat and Lanes” then assigns the heat and starting lane to each driver according to the “Max drivers per heat”. If you have more “Max drivers per heat” than lanes the system will use a round-robin method where one or more drivers will be standing by and shifted in and out of the race when they are scheduled to race on lane-1.

The distributions of number of drivers into each heat are shown in the “Heat distribution” field. This field can be edited to use any alternative distribution wanted by the race director. After having updated the heat-distribution, press “Assign Heat and Lanes” again to recalculate the assignment.
Sample: Let’s say you have 8 lanes and 9 drivers. By default the system might suggest 8 drivers in one heat and 1 in another, which is not practical. You might choose to have 5 in one, and 4 in another or even 3 heats of 3. Finally you could also change the “Max drivers per heat” to 9, and run one heat round robin style.

2. By random.
For a quick race without actual race qualification, a randomly selected qualifying result number can be generated by pressing the “Random qualification” button. Note that this will delete any previously recorded qualifying result.
It will also sort the drivers according to the random number, and finally assign heat and lanes. If you are unhappy with the distribution. Edit the distribution key and press “Assign Heat and Lanes” again.

3. By manual.
You can use mouse click to select the “Heat” and “Lane” fields yourself, and enter any order you want.

Lead laps

It is possible to setup the counter to start from a different value than the default of zero. You might use this to provide a positive handicap, or to continue a race from a given position. In fact when you are racing multiple accumulated rounds, the LapMaster program automatically transfers the previous result to the “Lead laps” when you start the next round.

Lead points

It is also possible to setup the counter to start from a different point value. You might use this to provide a positive handicap, or to continue a race from a given position. This might come in handy if you race on multiple tracks and i.e. at midpoint want to exchange tracks and continue the race from there.

Clear, Load & Save, To and From Clipboard

Clear All: This button clears all entries (names, qualify-result, heat and Lanes) from the Entry/Qualification panel.

Clear (Except name): This button clears all but the Driver names and Comment from the panel. (That is, both Qualify-result, Race-result as well as Heat and Lane info is cleared.)

Save Entrylist: This button opens up a file select dialog. You can then choose a directory and a filename, into which all the information from the Entry panel is saved. This file can later be loaded, or alternatively imported into a spread sheet like EXCEL as a TAB-separated text file for further processing.

Load Entrylist: This button opens up a file select dialog. You can then select any TAB-separated file and load the Entry panel from that. The file can either be a previously saved file, or it can have been created by an editor like NOTEPAD, or saved from EXCEL as a TAB-Separated file. Attempts to load a RESULT list as an ENTRY list, will skip the initial column (the position), so that the names will fit the correct column.

To clipboard: This button saves a copy of the current entry list in the windows clipboard. This is very handy for pasting the current entry list into a spread sheet, text document, web-forum or blog.

From clipboard: This button replaces the current entry list with whatever is on the current window clipboard. This is handy for pasting from a spread sheet or text document.

Alternative Edit. (Notepad or Spread sheet)

The edit facility of the driver’s entry panel is rudimental, especially if you need to delete large sections of drivers. This is easier accomplished using Notepad. Fortunately “notepad” is just one click away. Click on the button in the top right corner, and LapMaster allows you to edit the data in a Notepad session.
If you prefer to do the editing in a spread sheet (i.e excel), that is also only one click away. (This option is only available if you have selected a spreadsheet program in the Program Setup)

Max drivers per heat

This field controls the maximum number of drivers that race in a single heat. If number of drivers are greater than number of lanes, then a round robin principle will be used. This means that a number of drivers stand by while the others race. One(*) driver are then changed IN and one OUT of the active set of drivers after each stint. This is the driver that otherwise should have raced on lane-1(*), and the new driver therefore enters at lane-1. It is important that the driver changing into the set starts with his car where he last was when he was called off the track. He should not restart from the starting line except for the first time.
Note(*): The lane number used for this IN and OUT operation is determined in the Track Setup. You might also chose to exchange two drivers at the same time, from the track setup.

Heat distribution

Let’s say you have a 4 lane track, and 6 drivers. This means that you can race a semi-final of 2 and a final of 4 drivers. However it might be more fun to race two heats of 3 drivers, or you might even want to race a round-robin race with 6 drivers rotating on 4 lanes. You use the heat distribution to guide the Assign heat and lanes function on how to distribute the drivers. You enter numbers separated by blanks representing the number of drivers in each heat. However you cannot enter more drivers than Max drivers per heat. So if you intent to do round-robin racing, you need to modify the Max drivers per heat which can convenient be done right here as well as on the race setup menu.

As of version 3.17 you can skip assignment of a number of drivers from the list by putting the number in parenthesis.

E.g. You have qualified 50 drivers. The top 4 goes straight to a final, the next 24 goes into 3x8 semi’s and the rest is out of it. To prepare for the semi’s you could use the following heat distribution: “(4) 8 8 8 (100)”

Go buttons

There are 2 easy “GO” shortcut buttons. What they do is the same as the OK button, but they also modify the Race Type, so that you can go directly to that stage without having to go through the Race Setup panel.

However “GO” buttons are disabled during a race to prevent accidental erasure of the race. If you really want to start over, use the “Reset” button, and then one of the “GO” buttons.

Movie clip

Behind this button, you will find a short movie that introduces how to work with the driver entry panel.

(This clip will be played using the “video program” configured in the Program Setup)