Advice for Travelling Championships

If your series travels around to different venues, it’s really important that you are fully prepared and have all relevant connectors, cables and connection settings well in advance of your event. We often receive calls once clients have arrived at a venue asking for help connecting, or asking for connection settings which we simply don’t have. Whist Alpha Timing provides the software, we don’t manage physical installations at tracks, including their networks and other cabling. This is always the responsibility of the individual venues, and often they will change settings or connections without informing us, making it impossible for us to provide assistance.

It is also really important that your staff fully understand how to connect to decoders, displays etc. including adjusting network and serial port settings. This support site contains the advice needed for:

• System Checks for Connected Devices
• Setting a Manual IP address
• Decoder Settings
• Photocells
• Connecting to an eFlag
• Timing Displays (e.g. Lap counters and clocks)
• TV Screens and Playlists (e.g. large TV screens and scoreboards)

Bringing your Own or borrowed Decoder(s)
If you’re are using your own decoder(s) to connect directly to the circuit’s loop(s) we recommend that you have a 75ohm Coax Cable of at least 2 meters and a 75 ohm BNC inline connector or BNC T-piece as it will make it easier to connect to the track’s main loop. You will need to know the IP address or names of your decoders - Alpha will not know this information. 

Using a Venue’s Decoder

If you don't have your own decoder, you will need to contact the venue(s) you are racing at to ask if you can hire their decoder and compatible transponders.  If they are able to supply you with a decoder, you will need them to give you the make, model and connection settings (usually a network IP address) so you can connect to it.  If they also have sectors, and you want to run these you will need the sector connection details as well - this varies depending on the make and model of decoder. Please note, you will need to provide your own laptop with our timing software installed and configured on it - it's not possible to use another venue's timing computer with your Alpha account.

Printing

We would advise using your own printer, rather than relying on the availability of a printer at the venue. To use a printer with the timing, it must first be installed in Windows before selecting in the Printer settings of the timing app. 

Venue Checklist

Equipment List

The following is a list of cables and equipment you are likely to need. It is important not to rely on just one cable or assume the venue will have them. 

	A 75ohm Coax Cable and a coax BNC T-piece connector  To connect the decoder to the circuits loop you may need a 75ohm Coax cable, as sometimes the loop cable is not long enough to reach your decoder. This is what transports the signal from the track loops detection of a transponder to the timing decoder.  A BNC inline connector or T-piece will be required if you need to extend the tracks loop cable.
	Network Cables You should have multiple network cables as these are the most commonly used form of communication cable. If you are using a variety of devices (Decoders, eFlags, Printers) it is often a good idea to colour code them so if you need to diagnose a connection issue, you can quickly identify which cables is connected to which device.
	Network Port Adapters If you plug your timing laptop directly into the decoder (be it the venue’s decoder or your own) it is likely that you will not have another ethernet network port on your laptop. This will make it difficult to connect to other network devices like an e-Flag or the internet if Wifi is unavailable. A simple solution would be to use a USB to Ethernet adapter. Each adapter can only have one type of connection (and IP Address) so you may need multiple adapters to connect to different devices.
	Adding more ports/connections If your laptop is short on USB ports you can use a USB hub to give you more ports.  Another solution for the internet is to use a USB 4G Dongle or a portable 4G Router/Network Switch. Using a 4G router can provide multiple network ports (once configured) and the internet – providing there is sufficient 4G Signal. If you need some advice on 4G routers, please speak to the Support team.  A network switch can give you the additional network ports you need, but relies on an existing network to provide the internet.
USB A (left) and USB C (right)	USB A vs C Another consideration is a lot of newer devices come with the new style USB C cable and port. Check your devices and your laptop and ensure that you have the correct cables and adapters to fit your needs.
	Serial Port to USB adapter (RS232) An additional piece of equipment you may need is a Serial Port to USB adapter. New Laptops and PCs are unlikely to have these old ports that are required to connect to some types of display equipment i.e. race clocks and lap counter displays.

Try and buy the best quality cables you can as cheaper cables tend to not be supported with drivers for Windows 10 or Windows 11.

Below is a typical example of a timing setup to illustrate the amount of equipment and cables you need. It is not a given that the circuit will provide you with anything more than access to the timing loop, so you must confirm with the venue if you will have access to a working decoder, the internet or the provision for printing. Not all venues have compatible displays or have track loops installed at sectors, pit entry and exits points.