Guide Manage Events
We are now ready to create the events. Push the Maintain Events Types button on the main menu. An empty Maintain Events Types dialog appears. It is important to understand the terms used in this part of the Sports Administrator.
An Event Type refers to a type of event (say the 100m Sprint, High Jump, 4x100m Relay etc.)
An Event refers to an Age/Gender specific event (say the 14yr Girls High Jump).
A Race refers to a particular race within that Age/Gender event, whether it be a final or heat (e.g. Heat 1-14yr Girls-100m Sprint or Grand Final-14yr Girls-100m Sprint.
Each Event Type is made up of a number of Events which is made up of a number of Races. Because Races can refer to both heats and finals we need some way of distinguishing between them.
This is where Final Levels come in to it. Each Race is assigned a Final Level. Every Event has at least one Race with a Final Level of 0 (zero). This is usually the Grand Final. You can think of a Final Level of 0 as being a grand final, a Final Level of 1 as being a semi-final, a Final Level of 2 as being a quarter-final and so on. If in your carnival you simple have heats and then a final then the heats would be Final Level 1 and your final would be Final Level 0. If you do not run any heats and simple have a number of finals then all your races would be set at Final Level 0.
I know this sounds a bit confusing and you now wish you bought some other sports program but don't give up … it is not as difficult as it might seem once you get into it … and it is very powerful! Let's create an event now.
Push the Add Event button. A small dialog appears that allows you type in the name of the new event. Enter the name (e.g. 100m Sprint, 50m Freestyle, High Jump, Discus etc). Push the OK button.
A relatively empty Maintain Event Type form appears with the name of the new event entered in. On the left hand side you have an empty list of Events and on the right hand side you have an empty list of Races. Firstly we want to enter the Events.
Locate the cursor in "Age" field. Enter an age for the event. If the event is for a single age only (say 14 years) then simply enter the age (14). If the event is for all ages under and including a certain age (say 13 years and under) enter the age with "_U" added to it (13_U). If the event is for all ages over and including a certain age (say 17 years and over) enter the age with "_O" added to it (17_O). Now select the gender of the event from the drop down list in the first empty spot in the Events list. If you wish to enter a record for this event then double click on the empty record field. A records dialog appears in which you can enter the record details. Add the remaining events in this manner.
There are two ways of setting up the races within an event. You can manually add each race by selecting the Event (click in either the age or gender fields of the event you want to set up) and adding the race in the races list. However this can take a long time! Alternatively you can use the automatic creation of Races by pushing the Create Races button.
After pushing the Create Races button a small form is displayed allowing you to enter (1) the Final Level (2) the number of heats in the Final Level (3) the Point Scale allocated to the Final Level (4) the Promotion Method of the Final Level, (5) whether Results (time/distance etc) or Place should be used to promote the Final Level, and lastly (6) the number of competitors in the heat. An example or two may be useful.
Example 1: Say we are working on the 100m Sprint. Each Event is comprised of at most 6 races from which the top 8 competitors race in a single grand final. We would enter the following:
| Final Level | # of Races | Point Scale | Promotion Method | Use Results or Places | # of Comp in Heat |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 1 | FINALS | NONE | X | |
| 1 | 6 | HEATS | SMOOTH | X |
As always, the first Final Level is 0 (grand-final) and our second Final Level is 1 (for the heats). There is only a single grand-final race so the "# of Races" for Final Level 0 is set to 1. However there a 6 heats so "# of Races" for Final Level 1 is set to 6. Obviously the Point Scale options are determined by what you set up before. In this instance the promotion method doesn't matter seeing we are promoting into a single event only so we could choose either Smooth or Staggered. Lastly, we will use results to do the promoting (which is almost always the case) seeing that we are interested in the 8 fastest rather than the 8 who came first and second but may not have gained the best times. (Consult the on-line help for more detailed information about how this aspect of the program works).
Example 2: Say we are working on the 100m Sprint. Each Event is comprised of only 8 'heats' with NO grand final (this is often the case when there is insufficient time to run a grand-final). We would enter the following:
| Final Level | # of Races | Point Scale | Promotion Method | Use Results or Places | # of Comp in Heat |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 8 | FINALS | NONE | X |
As always, the first Final Level is 0. There are 8 races so the "# of Races" for Final Level 0 is set to 8. Again the Point Scale options are determined by what you set up before. In this instance the promotion method is set to "None" since we are not promoting into any event (there are no grand finals as such). Lastly, the results field can be set at either "Results" or "Places" since we are not promoting any events.
Example 3: Say we are working on the 50m Freestyle event at a large carnival. The pool has 10 lanes and there are 100 competitors competing. The first 3 (ie those placed first, second or third) in each race go into the semi-finals and then the fastest 10 go into the grand-final. We would enter the following:
| Final Level | # of Races | Point Scale | Promotion Method | Use Results or Places | # of Comp in Heat |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 1 | FINALS | NONE | X | |
| 1 | 3 | HEATS | SMOOTH | Results | |
| 2 | 10 | HEATS | SMOOTH | Places |
Once you have set up the finals the way you want them push the "Create Heats and Finals" button. In a few seconds all the heats and finals will be created for each Event you created earlier.
The last thing to do on this form is to specify the Lane Promotion. Push the Lane Promotion button to enter the place and lane into which a competitor will be placed when promoted into the next final level.
Create the rest of the Event Types by either copying the event that you just created or setting it up from scratch.