Before I begin this short series of blog posts, I want to wish all and anyone who reads this our very best wishes during this challenging time. Whether it’s health or employment, or coping with the pressures of being under lockdown, I hope you’re staying positive, keeping safe, healthy and keeping in mind that we will and are getting through this.

Since before this unfortunate pandemic came about, I had wanted to write a short series of blog posts to share over the quiet season outlining what we get up to when there’s no racing on. Perhaps there are some out there who wonder do we do anything when we’re not listening to a beep for every passing during a race weekend, calling people up to the tower with transponders not working and producing hundreds of sheets of paper showing the times and results that you worked hard to achieve on track.

Since Timing.ie was officially established in 2014, this year was shaping up to be our busiest season to date. By this point in the year we should have covered over 12 events, but instead we’ve covered just two so far! Hopefully this series of posts will give you some light reading to enjoy as we all eagerly await a return to the tracks around the country.

Many of you will be quite familiar with the work we carry out during the season from the many social media posts we put out, and also the events that you attend and avail of the services that we provide. What isn’t so clear is what we do in the off season away from the track. Our 2019 season finished with what we see as the highlight of our year, the Fiesta 6 Hour Endurance race. This event is the most technically challenging for us, as we now deliver a fully automated endurance racing system that monitors every aspect of the race. From sector times, to pitstop times, driver stint times and who’s in the car at any time. We can monitor every second of the race with pin-point accuracy for the benefit of officials, event commentators and of course the teams and drivers to optimise their relevant areas. I’m glad to say the 2019 event was another huge success for us, but having literally just completed the post event tear down and pack away, on Tuesday morning I was on a red-eye flight to Amsterdam for the MyLaps Customer Conference – the first part of our extensive off-season programme of works.

We are very proud to have such a strong link with MyLaps Sports Timing, one of the leading providers globally of sports timing technology. We are Ireland’s Official MyLaps Partner for Car & Bike Sports, and this event was a great opportunity to attend their head office in Haarlem for a two-day conference to hear from some key industry speakers, learn about the MyLaps roadmap of hardware and software developments and network with other timers from around Europe to share experiences and knowledge.

Over the course of the two days, we learned so much about what is happening on a global scale in terms of tracking, circuit safety solutions, the global launch of their new TR2 transponder, and finally a chance to attend a local karting circuit on day two to see a lot of this software and hardware in action. The other huge gain from this event was a chance to network with other timers, and to share experiences within their location or discipline. These included representatives from The FIA World Endurance Championship, Formula E, BTCC and the 24 Hours of Le Mans. This is the second of these events that we have attended and I can say with confidence that they have both helped to accelerate the growth and development of our company in a number of areas to directly benefit our customers.

That’s it for his part of the series. In the next blog I’ll write about our 2019 review and our initial planning and preparation for the 2020 season.

Stay Safe.

Paul.

PS: If you like what your reading so far, we’re always on the look out for new members of the Timing.ie Team. If you would like to find out more, please get in touch by contacting us today.