| Using the different SSD race modes
If you have a Scalextric Sport Digital circuit and would like to invite some friends round to play, try these race schedules. You can run these using the 6-car powerbase, no computer software required. Make sure everyone has evenly matched cars for the whole event. Also, keep the same controllers plugged in to the same sockets on the powerbase and preferably use the colour-coded controller tops and/or have ID numbers affixed to them. Make sure all cars are clearly identifiable, put some coloured tape on them or invest in a custom paint job, otherwise you stand absolutely no chance of following your car in the heat of battle.
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A race meeting where drivers do not also act as marshals
To run this schedule it initially assumes you have NO TRACK MARSHALS, and drivers re-slot their own cars (or you run "crash and burn" rules), or you have a PERMANENT TRACK MARSHAL who doesn't race at all. If these don't apply to you, you can run the schedule as heats (see below). You run the whole event as up to 6 competitive sessions plus an initial free practice session (you can miss out any other sessions you don't want to do or don't have time for). There is just one race per session in sessions 3, 4, 5 and 7, and an average time to complete the whole lot would be an hour to 90 minutes depending on your lap length.
Session 1. Not a race, but just 10-15 minutes free practice for track and car familiarisation (i.e. switch on but don't press "start" on the powerbase) - make sure everyone has a chance to put in a few test laps and practice overtaking.
Session 2 . Qualifying for the Grand Prix - 12 laps each, just like Formula 1 used to be! Except that cars run singly. Run cars in order of lots or based on the results of a previous meeting, etc., best going last. Write down each car's best time, shown after the chequered flag on the powerbase display.
Session 3 . Grand Prix - whatever you have time for, anything from 15 to 50 laps* - cars' grid positions taken from Qualifying.
Session 4 . 5 or 10 minutes' Endurance race*, form a starting grid from the finishing order of the Grand Prix.
Session 5. Pursuit race - form a starting grid from the finishing order of the Endurance. Cars' power is cut as they cross the powerbase after being lapped, so someone standing near the finish line will need to be ready to take the lapped cars off the track.
Session 6. Rally Stage of 5 or 10 laps* - cars run singly, see who can keep it on the island lap after lap and do the best time for the total of laps. First car knocked out of the pursuit race runs first.
Session 7. Arcade race. Form a grid from the results of the Rally stage. Cars lap quicker and quicker as they try to beat the contintually-reducing target time. Again someone will need to quickly remove cars as they drop out.
Award points for races in sessions 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 as follows: 10 for a win, 7 for second, 4 for third, 3 for fourth, 2 for fifth and 1 for last place. No points if you don't finish the race**. Tot up all the points at the end of the meeting and see who is the winner.
* If you have a longer circuit you might want to reduce the length of each race.
** A good rule for deciding if a car is out of the race is if it rolls or just de-slots. If it de-slots and stays upright with four wheels on the circuit it can be re-slotted. If it rolls over, or completely leaves the track and jumps the crash barriers, it's out of the race. If you have non-finishers, the powerbase won't know this, so you will need to force the end of the race by pressing the lower middle button on the powerbase to get the results for the cars that did finish.
If you prefer to stick to one kind of race (e.g. Grand Prix) rather than run through all the modes, simply adjust the length of your races according to the available time.
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Running the above as heats, so drivers take turns to do marshalling duties
If you need someone to act as track marshal who is also racing, then (with the exception of Qualifying and the Rally Stage) you need to run each race session (Endurance Session, Grand Prix Session etc.) as a set of race heats of up to 6 cars, with one or more drivers sitting out each race in order to marshal a section of track. [You only need to run one round of qualifying to determine the grid order for the first of the Grand Prix races though, and also only one run at the rally stage for everyone]. All this will clearly multiply the elapsed time you need for the whole event considerably, so unless you want to race on into the early hours, you might want to miss out sessions 6 and 7, and/or reduce the number of laps or time for each race. Aim for about 3 hours to complete the event, when you tot up the points from all the races from all the sessions to find your champion!
Below are some example "fixture grids" that show how you might run each of the sessions for 4 to 6 or more competitors, with up to 6 cars on track and everyone else acting as marshals depending on the size of your circuit ( in the grid, r=racing, m=marshalling). At the end of all the heats, everyone will have had the same number of races and you can tot up the points to get a session winner. Obviously if you have an excess of marshals then you don't need to use them all - some can be getting the coffee ready!
For each session after Qualifying, you need Driver Numbers to be allocated. These place people on the grids below. Driver numbers are allocated in the order of the results of the previous session; so the slowest driver(s) are first to marshal the next session, and the fastest driver(s) have the nerve-wracking test of sitting out the final race of the session! Given the patterns below, you should be able to work out other permutations (a final one for 10 racers and 4 marshals is also shown); just remember that [racers - marshals] <= 6.
For each race heat, you need a Starting Grid (where applicable). For any heat, this could either be the results of a brand new round of qualifying, or maybe the finishing positions of the preceding heat, except that everyone behind the car(s) dropping out to go marshalling move up, and the returning driver(s) start at the back. This means that everyone except the previous session winner gets at least one chance to work their way through the entire field. If you have more than one driver rejoining the next heat, you can order them by their results in the last heat they took part in (which may be from an earlier session). The starting grid for the first race of the Grand Prix session is as per the Qualifying session. For the rally stage, the last place finisher from the previous entire session is first out on track.
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Results sheets
Also remember that you will need pen and paper for all of this. This sheet, together with the grids below, will help you to plan out a session of up to 8 heats and up to 10 drivers with up to 6 racing at once. |
If you think it's a bit complicated, this sheet is an example filled out for a 7-racer 6-car 1-marshal session. Everything in RED can be filled out before you start racing, once you know your driver names and draw of lots, then as you go along just fill out the BLUE stuff that relates to the heat results. The example also shows you how to record non-finishers (DNFs) and how to base starting grids on the results of the previous heat with returning marshals starting at the back. The very bottom row on the page gives you the positions for this session and thus the driver number order for the next session (flip a coin to separate any ties if you can't separate the drivers by other means, e.g. number of 1sts, 2nds, etc.)
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Car ID reprogramming
Remember that if you have 7 or more competitors, and each person is driving their own car they brought with them, (as opposed to everyone sharing a set of six "house" cars) the cars of the person(s) re-joining the racing after marshalling, will need to re-assign their Car ID(s) to those of the person(s) who stepped down. So for example after a race, John (who may have been on Car ID 2) is scheduled on the fixture grid to leave the track to go marshalling and is replaced for the next race by Jane. So now controller ID 2 has no car attached to it, therefore the car that Jane has in her hand now needs to be assigned to Car ID 2 as per the SSD instruction manual.
The most efficient way to do this is to buy a second separate power base with half-straight, not connected to the main track, plug it in and sit your cars on it one at a time to re-program them. Doing it this way saves having to ask all the drivers to pick their cars up whilst re-programming takes place. If there are two or more people sitting out a heat, one can be marshalling the current heat while the others are preparing the car IDs for the following heat.
If you have 6 or fewer racers then you may want to make driver number equal to car ID number throughout - might help you keep track of who's who. |
Driver rotas
If you just want to stick to one type of race, such as GRP, throughout your event, you can rotate drivers according to the following patterns: |
| 4 racers | | HEAT # | | 1 marshal | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | DRIVER #: | 1 | r | r | r | m | 2 | r | r | m | r | 3 | r | m | r | r | 4 | m | r | r | r |
| | 5 racers | | HEAT # | | 1 marshal | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | DRIVER #: | 1 | r | r | r | r | m | 2 | r | r | r | m | r | 3 | r | r | m | r | r | 4 | r | m | r | r | r | 5 | m | r | r | r | r |
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| 6 racers | | HEAT # | | 1 marshal | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | DRIVER #: | 1 | r | r | r | r | r | m | 2 | r | r | r | r | m | r | 3 | r | r | r | m | r | r | 4 | r | r | m | r | r | r | 5 | r | m | r | r | r | r | 6 | m | r | r | r | r | r |
| | 6 racers | | HEAT # | | 2 marshals | 1 | 2 | 3 | DRIVER #: | 1 | r | r | m | 2 | r | r | m | 3 | r | m | r | 4 | r | m | r | 5 | m | r | r | 6 | m | r | r |
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| 7 racers | | HEAT # | | 1 marshal | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | DRIVER #: | 1 | r | r | r | r | r | r | m | 2 | r | r | r | r | r | m | r | 3 | r | r | r | r | m | r | r | 4 | r | r | r | m | r | r | r | 5 | r | r | m | r | r | r | r | 6 | r | m | r | r | r | r | r | 7 | m | r | r | r | r | r | r |
| | 7 racers | | HEAT # | | 2 marshals | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | DRIVER #: | 1 | r | r | r | m | r | r | m | 2 | r | r | m | r | r | r | m | 3 | r | r | m | r | r | m | r | 4 | r | m | r | r | r | m | r | 5 | r | m | r | r | m | r | r | 6 | m | r | r | r | m | r | r | 7 | m | r | r | m | r | r | r |
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| 8 racers | | HEAT # | | 2 marshals | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | DRIVER #: | 1 | r | r | r | m | 2 | r | r | r | m | 3 | r | r | m | r | 4 | r | r | m | r | 5 | r | m | r | r | 6 | r | m | r | r | 7 | m | r | r | r | 8 | m | r | r | r |
| | 10 racers | | HEAT # | | 4 marshals | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | DRIVER #: | 1 | r | r | m | r | m | 2 | r | r | m | r | m | 3 | r | m | r | r | m | 4 | r | m | r | r | m | 5 | r | m | r | m | r | 6 | r | m | r | m | r | 7 | m | r | r | m | r | 8 | m | r | r | m | r | 9 | m | r | m | r | r | 10 | m | r | m | r | r |
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Spreadsheets
Cary Reeves has kindly produced some Excel spreadsheets that assist with organising these race schedules, try them out and let us know if you have any problems.
Example 1 - Example 2 - Blank sheet
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Club events
If you are starting a Digital Racing club, you could have too many people on your hands for the above system to be feasible, so if you want to guarantee everyone a drive within a set time period then a knockout competition would probably be more sensible. Knockout competitions provide the additional incentive for drivers to perform well, because they get more races as a result, and you will have plenty of potential marshals so marshalling rotas can be allocated separately. The example below shows you how to run a knockout championship for 36 people in just 13 races. If you allow 10 minutes per race plus a few minutes changeover time between races, this means you can fit the whole event into about two and a half hours, a typical timeframe for club race meetings. ROUND 1 Heat A | Heat B | Heat C | Heat D | Heat E | Heat F | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 | 6 |
5th and 6th place drivers from each heat are eliminated leaving you with 24. ROUND 2 Heat A | Heat B | Heat C | Heat D | Pos 1 R1A | Pos 1 R1B | Pos 1 R1C | Pos 1 R1D | Pos 2 R1B | Pos 2 R1C | Pos 2 R1D | Pos 2 R1E | Pos 3 R1C | Pos 3 R1D | Pos 3 R1E | Pos 3 R1F | Pos 4 R1D | Pos 4 R1E | Pos 4 R1F | Pos 4 R1A | Pos 1 R1E | Pos 1 R1F | Pos 3 R1A | Pos 3 R1B | Pos 2 R1F | Pos 2 R1A | Pos 4 R1B | Pos 4 R1C |
Here only the top 3 drivers from each heat progress to the last 12. ROUND 3 (semi final) Semi Final 1 | Semi Final 2 | Pos 1 R2A | Pos 1 R2B | Pos 2 R2B | Pos 2 R2C | Pos 3 R2C | Pos 3 R2D | Pos 1 R2D | Pos 1 R2C | Pos 2 R2A | Pos 2 R2D | Pos 3 R2B | Pos 3 R2A |
Top three drivers from each heat go on to the FINAL:
Semi Final 1, Positions 1, 2, 3; and Semi Final 2, Positions 1, 2, 3. The overall winner will have come through four races.
If you are trying any of these systems out, please email over any notes for possible improvement. |
Ask questions on our forum
If you have any questions about SSD, hop over to our forum. |
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