This is John Jordan and I was the Chief Judge at the Las Campanas Regional Championship Road Race. I have to second your thanks and kudos to Charlie, who, in my opinion, did a fantastic job setting this race up and managing it during the event itself. He treated the racers, the officials, and the spectators in an exemplary and personable manner. It was a pleasure being at this event.
(Warning, the rest of this is much longer...feel free to stop reading now if you don't care one way or the other about things like this)
Being the Chief Judge, however, not so much fun.This event was far and away the most stressful CJ assignment I have had in over 15 years of officiating, including being a judge at the Tour of the Gila. Being thrown under the bus, so to speak, in regards to not having the results instantly and accurately isn't very fun either. Yes, the results could have been done better. Do you have any idea how that could be done? Especially since you helped with one stage at one race, quite a few years back, perhaps you could shed some light on how we officials could do a perfect job under extremely challenging conditions so that the providers of the podiums could get their money's worth. I have been dedicated to the NM cycling community for many years now and have come to see why this sort of inaccurate, off-the-cuff remark is the very real "straw that broke the camel's back" when it comes to calling it quits and letting someone else learn to officiate, pay the extra licensing costs (I still carry my racing license as well), buy the clothes, take the time ( I was literally the last race person to leave the race venue), and forgo racing yourself so that others can race. For the paltry sum we receive it is hardly worth the grief we often have to deal with when things don't go flawlessly or to the liking of those who do little more than kibitz. Is it any wonder that it can be hard to find officials willing to work events when this is the thanks that are offered.
Still, I think the racers are owed an explanation as to why the scoring took so long and why your somewhat overly simplified description of the situation demands to have at least some further actual information. First and foremost, the safety of the racers is what we USAC officials are charged with being concerned with. To make it otherwise is a disservice, and a possible danger to the racers. They are the ones most at risk during the event and therefore we, the officials, are charged with doing our utmost to deliver a safe event. So, that lead to me having to ensure that the racers had a clean finish line (the actual finish line, not something figurative) that afforded both a safe setting *and* the ability to capture the finish order. We also had to deal with the loss of one of the motorcycle officials (his bike wasn't able to be ridden safely due to a mechanical problem) who caused the Chief Referee (Al Waters, who did a great job), to have to shuffle officials around to ensure that all groups would have an official assigned. This left the judging solely to me until the next finishing official could help. The problem was that the finishes of the races all happened in a very short time span (all the main groups came in within a 20 minute window). I cannot adequately explain just how intense it is to have racers (which group is this coming across now????) blazing across the finish line while cars are streaming by, while spectators are chattering and bunching right beneath my camera (mine, supplied by me, along with my laptop, along with my truck as a platform, along with my yada, yada, yada...you get the point) so that even as I replay the video what I hear is relentless noise and little in the way of accommodation from anyone except those who know how stressful this was. Then, once the race was over, I hustled back to the awards area trying to get the results as quickly as I could, only to have a blaring bullhorn calling out names and such for doorprizes causing me to not be able to hear the audio I was counting on for confirming placings. Add to that the incessant parade of "I think I came in 13th but would you please confirm that for me right now" racers, and it went from stressful to infuriating. Yes, everybody left, including you. Not me. I sat there still running through a 33 minute video trying to tease out the accurate results while the temperature inside that building just went higher and higher. When the gracious young man who worked there gently asked if I could please leave, well, I thought it was time to go. Then I spent about 6 more hours over the next two days (yes, I could have told my wife to take a hike, I don't need to work, I have to meet the needs of the racers first, but probably more than a few of you know how that sort of thing turns out), working at night until I felt that I had done justice to the racers, the promoter(s), and my fellow officials. Again, I cannot begin to explain how stressful, aggravating, and, now hurtful it is to do the best I can do and still come up short.
Here's what can be done to improve this situation.
1) Have two assigned judges at the finish. This will cost the promoter more (unless someone donates their officiating time) but that way one judge can keep track of the laps and the top five (at least, since you have to prepare for some of the top finishers to be ineligible for medals) while the other judge keeps track of the overall finish placings and the other myriad things that happen at a finish line.
2) Have a better camera system that enables the reviewer to download to a laptop in real time. The transfer time alone on my personal setup took about twenty minutes. Too many technical issues to go into here, but your NMBRA dues are what could provide this.
3) Keep all finished racers and spectators away from the immediate area around the finish line. This alone could have allowed for a clearer audio as well as level of chaos below what it was.
4) Time out the race laps so that finishes aren't all bunched together. There was one 3 minute time slice when there were two separate groups finishing while other groups were still riding through and if you think that is easy to go through, then I have a bridge out in...never mind.
5) Have a dedicated, quiet place where the officials can work quickly and with no interruptions.
6) Have dedicated race radios so that the on-course officials can let the finish line judges know the current race situation. This is not as critical as the other issues, but it will make a difference.
There's much more to this. This is enough though to let you know that, while the responsibility fell to me to get the results, not getting them right away was a result of many, many issues, some small, some large, some you, some me, some avoidable, some unavoidable, some downright dangerous, some merely infuriating. I am deeply sorry to the winning racers that you were not able to get the immediate peer accolades that you earned. I wanted very much for that to happen. Many of you who won are my friends, many of you I respect immensely for your dedication to racing, and I fell short of providing something you worked so very hard to achieve. I am sorry. Perhaps instead of throwing folks under the bus, we can work more closely as a racing community and all enjoy an event like this. Perhaps.
With respect and frustration,
John Jordan, Chief Judge for the 2015 Las Companas Regional Championship Road Race