raceamerica

The Race Through America is finished!!! The following are the winners based on the logs posted by midnight last night: First place (all 50 or the most states visited) - Tobsas's Berti Most distance - Team Geodillo's Lowracing Land Luge Most caches - bazzle's Haulin Cache Least distance - chstress53's April's Weiner Mobile Fewest caches - Cache on the spot's Prancin Dancer Those were based on the bugs that were still active at the end of the race, i.e., can't give a prize to a dead horse. Previous awards: Most creative or unique TB hitchhiker - bazzle's Haulin Cache Best logo design - Dirty_Bird

The race started with 27 racers. There seems to be currently 12 or 13 that are missing, so only about half survived the year+ of the race :-( Given that, the survivors have done well to last this long. Berti has done very well and may get 30 states, if the current holder places Berti by/during this weekend. The race ends 4 Jul. With Haulin Cache's recent cross-country trip, Haulin acquired a many addional miles. Combined with its previous travels there and back again, it's far and away the mileage leader. Well, today anyway.

It's been a while since anyone posted to this race, but the race is due to finish in a few short months (July). Things have changed a lot. Berti is still in the lead, but is up to 28 states followed by Lowracing Land Luge with 20 then Flaming Mustang Mach 1 with 19. Lowracing Land Luge has put on a lot of distance in its travels though so is the leader in the distance category. It doesn't look like Berti will hit all the "lower 48" or all 50, but he may get 30 or 35 ??? I wonder if tobsas is taking bets?

For a TB race, I don't think power is a big issue since it's mostly about geography :-) I don't want to change the rules this far into the race. As far as I'm concerned, DC is either part of Maryland or it doesn't count at all, like the US possessions: Guam, the Mariana Islands, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Palau, Puerto Rico, and Samoa. ... for deciding the border of Jesusland, that's another story.

Race clarification now that one of the bugs has been placed in the District of Columbia. DC is not a "real" state, but is in MD, so I added the following to the race description: "The District of Columbia counts as Maryland." ... I'll sure that will upset somebody, but Mr Red M&M is now tied for 3rd.

Finally updated the stats and maps this morning. Lowracing Land Luge and Team Snoogz: Turn-N-Burn! Jett Threatt TOO are still neck and neck and moving in on Haulin Cache, who is in second place. Berti still has a 4-state lead over them though.

Not too many people have commented about the problem rule, but all of the owners with bugs that violated it don't like it because it's too restrictive and too confusing. With the new wording is not so much a rule but an instruction: << Racers can be placed by any cacher (including any racer bug owner), can be placed multiple times by the same cacher, and placements can include in-out placements. Racers should be carried from cache to cache by cachers, but grabs sometimes happen when cachers meet. >> I've credited the bugs for their placements that were not race inventoried because of this rule. Berti (currently 1st) and Haulin Cache (2nd) were not effected but a few others were: Lowracing Land Luge and Team Snoogz: Turn-N-Burn! Jett Threatt TOO are now tied for 3rd and journey across america is now 6th. journey across america had a prior grab that was already inventoried because it was placed at least twice (in Colorado), per my previous method of handling the rule. How many states would Berti and Haulin Cache have if they hadn't been restricted by this rule?

A problem with one of the rules has come up a number of times since the beginning of the race. At the beginning of the race, the first rule was: "Racers may not be mailed, shipped, transported, etc between cachers or muggles after the race starts, but must be carried from cache to cache by cachers. Racers can be placed multiple times by the same cacher." Later that was clarified to: "Racers may not be mailed, shipped, transported, grabbed, etc between cachers or muggles after the race starts, but must be carried from cache to cache by cachers. Racers can be placed by any cacher (including any racer bug owner), can be placed multiple times by the same cacher, and placements can include in-out placements." In the course of the race, a number of bugs have been transferred between cachers (logged as a grab), which violates this rule in its old and new form. Both versions say the racers "must be carried from cache to cache by cachers". The cacher who grabbed the bug has it "illegally" so I have been handling this by not counting the (first) placement by that cacher. I have been notifying the owners when it happens, so they know why the placement wasn't included. If the outlaw cacher then retrieves the bug, then it's theirs and their subsequent placement(s) are not a problem. This means that a grabber needs to place a racer bug in two caches in a new state for that state to count. The bugs are supposed to travel through caches, so the intent of this rule is to prevent bugs from being transported otherwise. The bottom line: is this a stupid rule and I'm being pedantic in upholding it or should I drop it and let them travel at will?

Berti is now up to 16 states. Several of the racers have been placed in event caches, but that issue was not mentioned in the rules. It is now. Event caches are not a problem, e.g., pizza places usually have enough room for a few travel bugs. (Virtual caches have no container.) Keep the bugs moving ... Haulin Cache certainly has been.

You're right. It does. I added a column for the distance, but my lack Perl skills means you can't sort by the different columns yet. I'll have to figure out how to add the ability to sort by column later.

journey across america was placed in a Colorado cache, so the first, unlogged one is not as important now, and the "journey" list now has two states... and its map too

I cleaned up the line work on all the maps (copy/paste) yesterday, which involved some repainting of the visited states, while trying to keep up with ALL of JNJ Walla's logs of Turn N Burn. I missed a couple states. I won't be doing that again. Berti's map was missing Iowa too, but all the maps are correct now.

Early this morning I sent an email to the cache owner, the new TB finder, and the old TB finder to confirm the drop and retrieval of geojed's racer, but no response from anyone yet. ... it was the first TB find for both of the finders.

The voting for the most creative racer has ended. bazzle's Haulin Cache was the overwhelming winner! Thank you to everyone who voted. In other news, Berti's up to 12 states today (tomorrow is another day) and is back in New England.

Berti's up to 7 now. Blazing a trail toward New England. That's a lot of driving. Coach Z has been moving around too so has 3 states, including being busy with Moun10Bike and his camera.

The Bumble Buttons arrived on Friday (very fast service there), so those have been sent out to racer owners who replied with their addresses. For those in the States, you should be getting them this week.

Hmmm. That wouldn't be Berti, would it? Berti jumped from New England to Colorado. Berti is up to 4 states.

Rewrote the rule again on the web page to clarify further: << Racers may not be mailed, shipped, transported, grabbed, etc between cachers or muggles after the race starts, but must be carried from cache to cache by cachers. Racers can be placed by any cacher (including any racer bug owner), can be placed multiple times by the same cacher, and placements can include in-out placements. >>

Adding new entries now that everything is set up is a pain... The web page now shows: Late entries will be only be accepted until 15 May. ... call me lazy.

Racer Nuts is now in the lead: 2 states. The rest of you are in trouble now.

Oops... Thanks for the domain name. I forgot that part. ... I'm gonna late to work today. ... though the domain name doesn't do anything for me, because my interaction with the pages is through ftp

Team Snoogz: Turn-N-Burn! Jett Threatt TOO (RTA 2004) has been added to the list.

Y'all like rules... The rules have been rewritten, or added, to hopefully clarify these issues: << Racers may not be mailed, shipped, transported, etc between cachers or muggles after the race starts, but must be carried from cache to cache by cachers. Racers can be placed multiple times by the same cacher, and can include in-out placements. Racers may only be placed in regular/micro caches, no virtual or locationless caches. Some micros are pretty big, so they can't be ruled out, but hopefully the racer could fit in the cache, even if the drop is an in-out. Cache owners will be asked to check the physical log books in the case of questionable placements, i.e., did Transam really travel through 5 Western states in one day? >>

Ok. Voting for the most creative is online now. Please go to the racer page (with the pictures) to pick one and vote through the link at the bottom. http://users.rcn.com/brad.32/raceamerica/rtaracers.htm

Most everything's updated to get the race started. Including a new page for the state rankings. Still need to add a way to vote for the most creative racer. (Probably a copy of the CircumConUS scheme, unless email voting works for y'all.) Six of the 20 racers are actually in states, including geojed's journey across america in Alaska.