The Commentary view is a live feed of everything happening in the event — starts, radio-control punches, finishes, and whole classes wrapping up — written in plain language with the placing context an announcer needs. It's designed to sit on a screen in front of the commentary box and give you a running story to talk to.
On the Screens page, in the Commentary section, click Open — the feed opens in a new browser tab. The main feed runs down the middle, with the Classes panel on its left and, on its right, a panel listing every item whatever the filters say.
The Commentary view is its own web page (URL /commentary/<event-id>), so you can open it on a second machine the same way you'd open an arena screen: point that device's browser at the URL. Plain /commentary, with no event id, finds whichever event is live (with two events live at once, it asks which) — it's listed as Commentary under Settings → Server → Access links. Any commentary view that's currently open is listed in the Commentary section so you can see what's connected.
Note: If the event holds some classes' results back (Results quarantine) and Manager has a PIN, the Commentary view asks for the PIN when it opens. Enter it to see every result; Continue without the PIN shows the held-back classes' start lists only, until the page is reloaded.
Each item is timestamped and tagged by type — start, start wave (several runners starting at the same time, in one item), radio, finish, place (a place confirmed, or changed, once a card is read), status (e.g. a DNF), entry (a new entry), or class complete when a class finishes. Items carry the competitor's name and class, the placing context (for example moving into the lead, or where a finisher slots in), and a medal (🥇🥈🥉) for the podium or a status chip for non-finishers. The newest items animate in at the top, so the feed reads as a live narrative.
A radio item also shows how far round the course the runner is: a line under the punch with a dot where the control is. It replaces the rule above the placing line. The dot is placed by distance when every leg of the course has a length, and by the control's position in the course otherwise. It isn't drawn when the runner could be on more than one course, or fork, that put the control in different places — until their card is read, nothing says which one they're on.
Radio and finish items end the placing line with Still to finish: how many in the class hadn't finished when the item was shown (teams, in a relay class). A runner not taking part isn't counted, so it reaches 0 when the class is done.
A radio item carries a Predicted top 3 chip when the runner's projected finish puts them in the top three. A finish is projected only once somebody in the class has finished, and never in a relay or a score or scatter class — so early in a race, and in those classes, no radio item carries the chip.
In a relay class the feed follows the teams, not the runners. Each item names the team first, with the leg and the runner on the line underneath — "Leg 2 · Anna Berg" — and that leg's own time once it's home. Placings and gaps are between teams, and a relay class in the Classes panel counts its teams.
A relay produces some items an individual race doesn't:
Mass start — one item per class when it goes, saying how many teams went. Classes sent off at the same moment share one item.
Restart — when a class restart sends waiting runners out, one item says how many went.
Changeover — a leg is home and hands over: to whom, the team's time at the handover, and where the team stands. If the next runner had already gone out — at the restart, or by punching out on their own — or nobody is entered on the next leg, the item says so.
Finish — the team is home with a result, with the same placing wording as an individual finish. It names the leg that brought the team home: usually the last one, but after a restart, whichever leg got back last.
Class complete — lists the teams, and under each team its runners in leg order, each with their own leg time.
When a leg mis-punches or doesn't finish, a status item says so and names the leg. A ruling on the whole team, such as a disqualification, names no leg. The team keeps appearing after that — its radio punches and changeovers carry its status chip, so it never reads as still racing for a place — until its last runner is home.
An unofficial team (a composite team, for example) is announced as finishing with no placing, and never takes a place, a lead or a medal from an official team.
A changeover, or the item for the leg that brings a team home, can carry a Fastest leg N so far badge — or Joint fastest leg N so far when another team ran it in the same time. It compares only teams in the same class. A mis-punched leg doesn't count, and there's no badge until another team has run that leg cleanly, because until then there's nobody to compare with.
Mass starts and restarts follow the Starts switch, and changeovers have their own Changeovers switch. Individual classes at a relay event are covered exactly as at an individual event.
The panels either side of the main feed are for finding your way around it.
Classes (left) lists every class with a live status at a glance:
a pin to keep a class at the top — pinning also adds the class to Classes to follow closely, so smart filtering scores it higher,
⚡ for a class with recent activity,
✓ Done when everyone's finished, or an X/Y finished-of-total count,
a green count when the top 10 places are decided.
The Key under the list explains the symbols.
Click a class name to bring it up in a pop-over without leaving the feed. The pop-over has four tabs: Leaderboard (the class's results), Live top 10, Time behind Superman and Mistake heatmap — the same graphs the spectator site draws. The three graphs can't be drawn for every class (a relay, for example); the Leaderboard tab always can. Whichever tab you leave open is the one you get next time, on that computer.
The ‹ beside the Classes heading folds the panel away to a narrow strip at the left edge, giving its width to the feeds. Click anywhere on the strip to bring it back. The screen remembers which way you left it.
The panel on the right lists every item, one line each — name, class, and the value that matters (a placing, a status, a control number). The filters never hide anything from it, whatever they are set to. Items that are also on the main feed carry a faint background, so you can see at a glance what the filters are letting through and what they are holding back.
Search at the top of the panel narrows it — by name, by class, or by a control code typed as a number. It narrows the panel only; the main feed is unaffected, and it works in both Smart and Manual mode.
Click any line to open it out and read the full wording and the placing context. Click a class name on a line to bring up that class.
The › at the right of the panel's header folds it away to a narrow strip at the right edge, labelled All items. The cog and the class-feed button stay on the strip; click anywhere else on it to bring the panel back. Like the class list, the screen remembers which way you left it.
To follow some classes closely without losing the main feed, click the add a class feed button beside the cog in the right-hand panel's header. A second feed opens between the main feed and the right-hand panel, at half the main feed's width and in slightly smaller type. Choose one or more classes in the box at its top.
The class feed shows every item in those classes — starts, radio punches, finishes, status changes and the class-complete tile — with the same cards as the main feed. Like the right-hand panel, it ignores the filters and the smart rate, so nothing in those classes is held back from it. A start wave is split back into the individual starts for the chosen classes.
Its choice of classes is remembered for the event. Click ✕ at its top to close it.
The cog in the panel header opens Commentary settings, which has two tabs: Filter, which decides which items reach the main feed, and Settings, which decides what each one says about the runner it names.
On the Filter tab, the two buttons at the top — Smart and Manual — choose between two ways of deciding what the main feed shows. Neither is "off": manual filtering is a choice, not the absence of one.
Smart filter (on by default) scores every item and shows you about one every few seconds, picking the most interesting one waiting. Set:
Show one item every — pick a rate, from one second to one a minute. Five seconds is the default.
Classes to follow closely — these score higher, so their items win slots more often. Pinning a class in the Classes panel adds it here, and removing it here unpins it: they are one list. Left empty, the elite classes — those whose name ends in E, such as M21E — are followed.
Priorities — how much each kind of thing is worth (Reset puts the defaults back). A class finishing, somebody taking the lead, a podium place, a radio punch, and so on. At a relay event there are rows of their own for where a team stands — on the course, and home — and they are weighted higher than an individual race's: a relay goes off on a mass start, so the order on the course is the race. By default the leading team's changeover, the first team home and a podium team, once its place is settled, go straight to the main feed. A relay item also counts the ranking of the runner it names.
Take the next slot above — a score high enough to beat everything else waiting. It takes the next slot rather than jumping the clock: the rate you set is a ceiling on everything.
In manual mode you choose directly:
Classes — limit to selected classes.
Item types — toggle Starts, Radio controls (and pick which controls), Changeovers (at a relay event), Finishes (with a Placegetters only option to show just podium finishes), and Class completions.
While any manual filter is narrowing the feed, a line under the filters says how many items it is showing (Showing 12 of 140 feed items).
Either way, the right-hand panel still shows everything — so if you think the feed has swallowed something, that is the one place to look.
The Settings tab adds who the runner is to the top right of each item in the main feed, beside their name and what just happened. Four switches, all off to begin with:
Show country flag — the flag of the runner's club's country.
Show club logo — the club's badge, if one has been uploaded for it (Settings → Clubs).
Show club name
Show bib
On a relay item these describe the team: its club, its club's badge and its country — a team of runners from several clubs shows the team's own. The bib is the runner's when the item names one, and the team's when it doesn't. The team's name needs no switch: a relay item is headed by it.
Switch on only what you need — each one takes a little width from the item's own sentence. A runner with no club or bib shows nothing rather than a blank line. These are a property of the screen you are sitting at — they stay when you reload it, and they do not follow you to another machine. They never change the right-hand panel, which stays one line an item.
Keep it on a dedicated screen. Open it full-screen on a second monitor and let it run; it updates itself.
Pin the classes you're following so the ones that matter stay at the top as the field thins out.
Use it alongside the live views. Commentary gives you the running story; pair it with Tracking and Live view for the spatial picture of who's where on the course.
Commentary
Audience: Commentators and event narrators.
The Commentary view is a live feed of everything happening in the event — starts, radio-control punches, finishes, and whole classes wrapping up — written in plain language with the placing context an announcer needs. It's designed to sit on a screen in front of the commentary box and give you a running story to talk to.
Opening Commentary
On the Screens page, in the Commentary section, click Open — the feed opens in a new browser tab. The main feed runs down the middle, with the Classes panel on its left and, on its right, a panel listing every item whatever the filters say.
The Commentary view is its own web page (URL
/commentary/<event-id>), so you can open it on a second machine the same way you'd open an arena screen: point that device's browser at the URL. Plain/commentary, with no event id, finds whichever event is live (with two events live at once, it asks which) — it's listed as Commentary under Settings → Server → Access links. Any commentary view that's currently open is listed in the Commentary section so you can see what's connected.What the feed shows
Each item is timestamped and tagged by type — start, start wave (several runners starting at the same time, in one item), radio, finish, place (a place confirmed, or changed, once a card is read), status (e.g. a DNF), entry (a new entry), or class complete when a class finishes. Items carry the competitor's name and class, the placing context (for example moving into the lead, or where a finisher slots in), and a medal (🥇🥈🥉) for the podium or a status chip for non-finishers. The newest items animate in at the top, so the feed reads as a live narrative.
A radio item also shows how far round the course the runner is: a line under the punch with a dot where the control is. It replaces the rule above the placing line. The dot is placed by distance when every leg of the course has a length, and by the control's position in the course otherwise. It isn't drawn when the runner could be on more than one course, or fork, that put the control in different places — until their card is read, nothing says which one they're on.
Radio and finish items end the placing line with Still to finish: how many in the class hadn't finished when the item was shown (teams, in a relay class). A runner not taking part isn't counted, so it reaches 0 when the class is done.
A radio item carries a Predicted top 3 chip when the runner's projected finish puts them in the top three. A finish is projected only once somebody in the class has finished, and never in a relay or a score or scatter class — so early in a race, and in those classes, no radio item carries the chip.
Relays
In a relay class the feed follows the teams, not the runners. Each item names the team first, with the leg and the runner on the line underneath — "Leg 2 · Anna Berg" — and that leg's own time once it's home. Placings and gaps are between teams, and a relay class in the Classes panel counts its teams.
A relay produces some items an individual race doesn't:
When a leg mis-punches or doesn't finish, a status item says so and names the leg. A ruling on the whole team, such as a disqualification, names no leg. The team keeps appearing after that — its radio punches and changeovers carry its status chip, so it never reads as still racing for a place — until its last runner is home.
An unofficial team (a composite team, for example) is announced as finishing with no placing, and never takes a place, a lead or a medal from an official team.
A changeover, or the item for the leg that brings a team home, can carry a Fastest leg N so far badge — or Joint fastest leg N so far when another team ran it in the same time. It compares only teams in the same class. A mis-punched leg doesn't count, and there's no badge until another team has run that leg cleanly, because until then there's nobody to compare with.
Mass starts and restarts follow the Starts switch, and changeovers have their own Changeovers switch. Individual classes at a relay event are covered exactly as at an individual event.
Narrowing the feed
The panels either side of the main feed are for finding your way around it.
Classes (left) lists every class with a live status at a glance:
The Key under the list explains the symbols.
Click a class name to bring it up in a pop-over without leaving the feed. The pop-over has four tabs: Leaderboard (the class's results), Live top 10, Time behind Superman and Mistake heatmap — the same graphs the spectator site draws. The three graphs can't be drawn for every class (a relay, for example); the Leaderboard tab always can. Whichever tab you leave open is the one you get next time, on that computer.
The ‹ beside the Classes heading folds the panel away to a narrow strip at the left edge, giving its width to the feeds. Click anywhere on the strip to bring it back. The screen remembers which way you left it.
The right-hand panel is the whole feed
The panel on the right lists every item, one line each — name, class, and the value that matters (a placing, a status, a control number). The filters never hide anything from it, whatever they are set to. Items that are also on the main feed carry a faint background, so you can see at a glance what the filters are letting through and what they are holding back.
Search at the top of the panel narrows it — by name, by class, or by a control code typed as a number. It narrows the panel only; the main feed is unaffected, and it works in both Smart and Manual mode.
Click any line to open it out and read the full wording and the placing context. Click a class name on a line to bring up that class.
The › at the right of the panel's header folds it away to a narrow strip at the right edge, labelled All items. The cog and the class-feed button stay on the strip; click anywhere else on it to bring the panel back. Like the class list, the screen remembers which way you left it.
A feed for chosen classes
To follow some classes closely without losing the main feed, click the add a class feed button beside the cog in the right-hand panel's header. A second feed opens between the main feed and the right-hand panel, at half the main feed's width and in slightly smaller type. Choose one or more classes in the box at its top.
The class feed shows every item in those classes — starts, radio punches, finishes, status changes and the class-complete tile — with the same cards as the main feed. Like the right-hand panel, it ignores the filters and the smart rate, so nothing in those classes is held back from it. A start wave is split back into the individual starts for the chosen classes.
Its choice of classes is remembered for the event. Click ✕ at its top to close it.
Choosing what reaches the main feed
The cog in the panel header opens Commentary settings, which has two tabs: Filter, which decides which items reach the main feed, and Settings, which decides what each one says about the runner it names.
On the Filter tab, the two buttons at the top — Smart and Manual — choose between two ways of deciding what the main feed shows. Neither is "off": manual filtering is a choice, not the absence of one.
Smart filter (on by default) scores every item and shows you about one every few seconds, picking the most interesting one waiting. Set:
In manual mode you choose directly:
While any manual filter is narrowing the feed, a line under the filters says how many items it is showing (Showing 12 of 140 feed items).
Either way, the right-hand panel still shows everything — so if you think the feed has swallowed something, that is the one place to look.
Showing who the runner is
The Settings tab adds who the runner is to the top right of each item in the main feed, beside their name and what just happened. Four switches, all off to begin with:
On a relay item these describe the team: its club, its club's badge and its country — a team of runners from several clubs shows the team's own. The bib is the runner's when the item names one, and the team's when it doesn't. The team's name needs no switch: a relay item is headed by it.
Switch on only what you need — each one takes a little width from the item's own sentence. A runner with no club or bib shows nothing rather than a blank line. These are a property of the screen you are sitting at — they stay when you reload it, and they do not follow you to another machine. They never change the right-hand panel, which stays one line an item.
Tips for live commentary
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