Start times

Audience: Event organisers allocating start times to competitors.

A competitor's start time is the clock time their race is measured from — their race time is simply finish minus start. This page explains where a start time can come from, how Manager decides which one to use when there's more than one, and what happens when you change a start time after competitors are already running.

Note: This page is about the rules — the sources of a start time and which one wins. The start draw (the tool that spaces individual start times at a regular interval and randomises the order) has its own page: Drawing start times.

The four sources of a start time

A start time can come from any of four places:

Source	Where it's set	Applies to
Individual allocated start	The start draw, an import, or the competitor's Edit competitor dialog	One competitor
Class mass start	Edit Class dialog → Start Time section	Everyone in a class
Event mass start	Edit event details → Starts tab	Everyone in the event
Punched start	The competitor punches a Start unit on the day	One competitor

The first three are allocated — times you set in advance. The fourth is punched — recorded live when the competitor starts. They interact through a simple hierarchy.

Which start time wins: the hierarchy

For the allocated start time, the most specific level always beats the more general one:

1. Individual allocated start (highest priority)
2. Class mass start
3. Event mass start (lowest priority)

A competitor uses the highest level that's set for them. Someone with their own allocated time ignores any class or event mass start; someone with no individual time but whose class has a mass start uses that; otherwise they fall back to the event mass start (if the event has one and their class isn't excluded from it). If none of the three is set, the competitor has no allocated start — their time will come from a punch, or not at all.

Example — a mass start event with two exceptions. Most of the field runs an event mass start at 11:00, except the Junior class, which sets off as an earlier wave (a class mass start at 10:45), and one course-checker, Pat, given an individual start of 09:30 to get round before the crowd:

Competitor	Most specific setting they have	Start they get	Why
Most of the field	Event mass start only	11:00	Nothing more specific is set
Anyone in Junior	Class mass start (10:45)	10:45	Class mass start overrides the event mass start
Pat	Individual start (09:30)	09:30	An individual start overrides both mass starts

Note: Whether a punched start beats the allocated time is a separate question, decided by the punching-start override rather than the hierarchy. See Punched starts below.

Manager resolves all of this for you automatically — you don't compute it by hand. Throughout the app the start time is shown with a small source label (individual, class, event, or punched) so you can always see where a competitor's time came from.

Event mass start

Use an event mass start when everyone starts together at one time.

Open the event dashboard, click Edit (event details), and go to the Starts tab. Switch on Mass Start and set the Mass Start Time. Every competitor whose class doesn't override it picks up this time.

Class mass start

Use a class mass start when one class starts together but the rest of the event doesn't — for example a beginners' class that all sets off at once.

Open the Edit Class dialog (click the class on the Classes page), and in the Start Time section switch on Class mass start and set the time. A class mass start overrides the event mass start for that class, and is in turn overridden by any individual allocated time a competitor in the class has.

Two related controls in the same dialog:

• Exclude this class from event mass start — shown only when the event has a mass start and this class has no class mass start of its own. Tick it to make the class start individually despite the event-wide mass start. (A class mass start already implies this, so the toggle only appears when there's no class mass start to make the point moot.)

Example — Elite opts out of the mass start. Your event has a mass start at 10:00 for the casual classes, but you want Elite to run individual drawn times instead. Tick Exclude this class from event mass start on Elite and run the draw for it: Elite competitors get their drawn times, while everyone else still goes at 10:00.

Tip — running waves: Manager has no separate "wave start" feature, and it doesn't need one. To start groups in waves, give each class (or group of classes) its own class mass start at a staggered time — 10:00 for the first wave, 10:15 for the next, and so on. Each wave is just a class mass start at a different time.

See Classes and courses for the full Edit Class dialog.

Individual start times

Individual allocated times sit at the top of the hierarchy, so they override any class or event mass start for that competitor. They reach Manager three ways:

• The start draw — the usual way to produce a full individual start list. It spaces times at an interval and randomises the order. See Drawing start times.
• Import — an IOF StartList file, an Eventor sync, or a CSV entry list can carry start times, which land as individual allocated times. See Importing event data.
• By hand — open a competitor's Edit competitor dialog. In the Allocated/Mass Start Time section the picker shows their individual time; the event and class mass starts that would otherwise apply are listed above it for reference. Set, change, or clear the time here. The time picker is a 24-hour clock with seconds (so 1 pm is 13:00:00), and defaults to 10:00:00.

Once a competitor's start time passes, Manager automatically marks them On Course even before any punch arrives — which is what the safety check relies on to know who's out in the forest.

Punched starts

At many events competitors start by punching a Start unit rather than to a fixed clock time. That punch is the punched start. It's how you run a start-when-ready event: don't allocate any times at all, and each competitor's start punch becomes their start time.

When a competitor has both an allocated time and a punched start, the punching-start override decides which wins. (When only one of the two exists, that one is always used — the override only matters when they disagree.) The override is set at three levels, most specific winning:

1. Per competitor — the On start punch dropdown in the competitor's Allocated/Mass Start Time section, with three choices:
   • Use event default — defer to the event setting (the default).
   • Always use allocated start — ignore any start punch for this competitor.
   • Allow punching start — the start punch wins; the allocated time is the fallback if no punch is recorded.
2. Per event — Allow punching starts to override allocated starts on the event's Starts tab. Applies to every competitor who's left on Use event default.
3. New-event default — Punching starts override allocated starts on the global Settings page, copied into each new event.

The competitor dialog spells out the live result in plain language beneath the dropdown — for example "Start punch at 10:23:14 is used. Allocated start of 10:22:00 is the fallback." or "Start time of 10:22:00 is used. Start punch at 10:23:14 is ignored." — so you can confirm at a glance which time the competitor will be timed from.

Example — late to the start. Your event leaves Allow punching starts to override allocated starts off, so allocated times win. Robin was drawn to start at 10:14 but was late to the start and was allowed to do a punching start at 10:16:03:

• With the override off (the default here), Robin is timed from the drawn 10:14 — the two extra minutes are Robin's loss, exactly as a fixed start list intends.
• Robin was late to the start through no fault of their own, so you open their Edit competitor dialog and set On start punch to Allow punching start. Now Robin is timed from the 10:16:03 punch, and 10:14 is kept only as a fallback in case no punch had been recorded.

(If Robin had no allocated time at all — a start-when-ready event — the override wouldn't come into it: with nothing to conflict with, the punch is simply the start.)

Punched starts arrive when a card is read (see Downloading cards) or via a radio Start control.

When you change a start time

Start-time settings stay editable throughout the event, and Manager re-applies changes automatically — there's no recompute button. A change to the event mass start, a class mass start, an individual allocation, or an override flows through to the affected competitors within a few seconds.

What that means in practice:

• Changing one level moves only the competitors who use it. Each competitor's start comes from a single source in the hierarchy, so a change reaches just those competitors. In the score-event example above, nudging the 11:00 event mass start to 11:10 would move most of the field — but leave Junior (on its 10:45 class mass start) and Pat (on a 09:30 individual start) exactly where they are.
• Race times are recalculated for anyone already finished. Changing a start time is usually a correction, so Manager re-times finished competitors against the new start rather than ignoring the change.
• A start later than the finish has no valid race time. If a change would put a competitor's start after their finish punch, their race time can't be computed and Manager sets them to DNF. Watch for this if you push a morning class to an afternoon mass start after they've already run.

For working through a specific competitor whose time looks wrong, see Resolving issues on the day.

Common mistakes

• 24-hour clock. The time picker has no AM/PM — afternoon starts are 13:00:00, 14:30:00, and so on.
• A mass start that doesn't move everyone. If some competitors don't pick up the mass start you just set, they almost certainly have an individual allocated time (from an earlier draw or import) that overrides it — individual always wins. Clear those individual times if you want the mass start to apply.
• A class that's excluded — or not. A class with Exclude this class from event mass start ticked won't inherit the event mass start; a class you expected to start individually but didn't exclude will pick it up. Check the toggle when a class's start times surprise you.
• Punching override set the wrong way. Allocated times being ignored (or punches being ignored) usually traces back to the punching-start override — check the event's Starts tab and the competitor's On start punch choice.
• Start after finish. Setting a start time later than someone's finish drops them to DNF (see above).

Related

• Drawing start times — the tool that allocates individual start times in bulk
• Classes and courses — setting class mass starts and the event-mass-start exclude toggle
• Competitors, clubs and teams — editing a single competitor's allocated start
• Importing event data — bringing start times in from a start-list file or Eventor
• Status and race time rules — how a start time feeds into status and race time
• Resolving issues on the day — fixing a competitor whose start time is wrong