Cairns World Cup!!

[driftking]

As I said earlier, all the cables were sourced locally...unfortunately Cairns doesn't have an unlimited supply of outside broadcast TV cable...we are only a few thousand metres short...

Just to give you some idea, I laid the timing cables for the DH... With a couple of helpers, we laid 3 lines to intermediate 2, two lines to intermediate 1 and one line to the start, it was 4200m of cable... Yes 4.2 kms...dragged up the hill and laid by hand. It was cat 5e cable...you know your standard blue computer cable, not the 20mm fat orange tv cable. The timing cables took almost 2 days to lay.

Now you want 10 cameras on the course in an inaccessible rain forest, and not a ski field where you can branch out off the chair lift. The longest runs will be over 1 km. Ever seen a 1km roll of tv cable? I only saw the guys joining rolls on reels that took 2guys to lift - maybe a couple of hundred metres per roll. How do you get that up the track in the conditions we had? There in no ATV access...it's all got to be done by hand.

I am only relaying what the tv guys I was working with said to me...the venue supplies the cable otherwise they'd be hauling shipping containers of the stuff around the globe.

As was mentioned and seen on TV the weather and possibly the spectators using the cables to climb up/down the mountain played havoc with their feeds.

We will ALL know better for next time.

Just cat5e that's interesting. Good insight too

What is the deal with going wireless, what are the restrictions in cairns or for technology for that, is it primarily a interference issue or is it also a speed and stream issue? Are there other ways without lugging 20kms of cable up a hill?

If there are other options I'm guessing that money is the limiting factor in that case.

 

[mongoosemichael]

A lot of people are bagging the track on here.
Perhaps try and be useful instead? Put forward a proposal, organise funding and host one yourselves? This track is better, that track is better? DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT.

The event was tops, the crowd massive, all the riders seemed happy yesterday.
Loads of the top guys crashed.
Lots seemed pumped to ride in a rain forest.
Sure it is not perfect but what ever is?

That track looked awesome i would love to ride trails like that .

 

[4dabush]

Drift, the guys were saying wireless is simply not reliable enough. With the weather, there were times where the clouds crossing the top of the hill was reducing visibility to about 100m. Look at what happens to Foxtel when a big storm passes- " no signal" ? On 3 Marshall points above the rock garden there is no 2 way signal to the event village, and even the phone was hit and miss ( although that could be it was waterlogged ) .

Even though we are in sight of the suburbs, the size and shape of the hills, the vegetation and weather...we could be 100km from civilisation. That was the problem for getting bikes and riders out too ala Adam Brayton...ask Dru Berryman what he thought when we told him he had to walk out with a broken collarbone, or how tough is our own Matti BW who had to walk himself out with a compound fracture to his arm a few weeks earlier - 20 minutes up the track to the ambulance.
Access is another one of the things being looked at as madflap said. But we are in a National Park, and a World Heritage one at that... It's a pretty cool place to ride and hold a race.

 

[wombat]

Even though we are in sight of the suburbs, the size and shape of the hills, the vegetation and weather...we could be 100km from civilisation. That was the problem for getting bikes and riders out too ala Adam Brayton...ask Dru Berryman what he thought when we told him he had to walk out with a broken collarbone, or how tough is our own Matti BW who had to walk himself out with a compound fracture to his arm a few weeks earlier - 20 minutes up the track to the ambulance.

Wow. What was the contingency for someone with say a spinal injury?

 

[RYDA]

Wow. What was the contingency for someone with say a spinal injury?

Walk it off.

 

[Skydome]

Interesting, thanks for the insight.

And I think you kinda blew things out of proportion a bit, I don't want 10 cameras, I'd be happy with just one extra camera to cover the whoops section.

 

[faulko]

As I said earlier, all the cables were sourced locally...unfortunately Cairns doesn't have an unlimited supply of outside broadcast TV cable...we are only a few thousand metres short...

Just to give you some idea, I laid the timing cables for the DH... With a couple of helpers, we laid 3 lines to intermediate 2, two lines to intermediate 1 and one line to the start, it was 4200m of cable... Yes 4.2 kms...dragged up the hill and laid by hand. It was cat 5e cable...you know your standard blue computer cable, not the 20mm fat orange tv cable. The timing cables took almost 2 days to lay.

Now you want 10 cameras on the course in an inaccessible rain forest, and not a ski field where you can branch out off the chair lift. The longest runs will be over 1 km. Ever seen a 1km roll of tv cable? I only saw the guys joining rolls on reels that took 2guys to lift - maybe a couple of hundred metres per roll. How do you get that up the track in the conditions we had? There in no ATV access...it's all got to be done by hand.

I am only relaying what the tv guys I was working with said to me...the venue supplies the cable otherwise they'd be hauling shipping containers of the stuff around the globe.

As was mentioned and seen on TV the weather and possibly the spectators using the cables to climb up/down the mountain played havoc with their feeds.

We will ALL know better for next time.

So part of the issue is access?

So the owner/builder of this land just laid/made a track and left it at that. Sounds like a short cut to me.

Surely now they could afford and have time to atleast make a better access path if not for spectators then atleast for medical staff.

How that is not part of the deal to hold an event is beyond me.

Apart from that no doubt thanks is needed for efforts exerted.

 

[takai]

Drift, the guys were saying wireless is simply not reliable enough. With the weather, there were times where the clouds crossing the top of the hill was reducing visibility to about 100m. Look at what happens to Foxtel when a big storm passes- " no signal" ? On 3 Marshall points above the rock garden there is no 2 way signal to the event village, and even the phone was hit and miss ( although that could be it was waterlogged ) .

Even though we are in sight of the suburbs, the size and shape of the hills, the vegetation and weather...we could be 100km from civilisation. That was the problem for getting bikes and riders out too ala Adam Brayton...ask Dru Berryman what he thought when we told him he had to walk out with a broken collarbone, or how tough is our own Matti BW who had to walk himself out with a compound fracture to his arm a few weeks earlier - 20 minutes up the track to the ambulance.
Access is another one of the things being looked at as madflap said. But we are in a National Park, and a World Heritage one at that... It's a pretty cool place to ride and hold a race.

802.11 Wireless would be hell up in that area, at least in the standard access point form. I ran a couple of simulations last night assuming heavy foliage and using the 1arc-second (90m) topology, and the only models i could get to communicate more than about 1km from a handheld device were either HF radio (low bandwidth) or some variants of 3G/4G. 2.4ghz and 5ghz are just lost completely within ~90m (could actually be less, but without loading the 1/3AS topo map i cant tell).

What would work is a MANET design a-la what we used to design and build: http://wirelesspt.net/arquivos/docu...g.with.mobility.and.direcctional.antennas.pdf That way you only need wireless connectivity between nearby devices, and with thousands of people on the hill (and realistically if MANETs were implemented, all could run a routing app), then you could route from device to device rather than having access point issues.

But that would rely on a whole bunch of specialist hardware. Realistically the 'easiest' way to do it would be to put a rebroadcast amalgamation station equidistant from all the points you want cameras on the course, then you only need shorter cables. But its still a complete headache.

 

[tasty.dirt74]

802.11 Wireless would be hell up in that area, at least in the standard access point form. I ran a couple of simulations last night assuming heavy foliage and using the 1arc-second (90m) topology, and the only models i could get to communicate more than about 1km from a handheld device were either HF radio (low bandwidth) or some variants of 3G/4G. 2.4ghz and 5ghz are just lost completely within ~90m (could actually be less, but without loading the 1/3AS topo map i cant tell).

What would work is a MANET design a-la what we used to design and build: http://wirelesspt.net/arquivos/docu...g.with.mobility.and.direcctional.antennas.pdf That way you only need wireless connectivity between nearby devices, and with thousands of people on the hill (and realistically if MANETs were implemented, all could run a routing app), then you could route from device to device rather than having access point issues.

But that would rely on a whole bunch of specialist hardware. Realistically the 'easiest' way to do it would be to put a rebroadcast amalgamation station equidistant from all the points you want cameras on the course, then you only need shorter cables. But its still a complete headache.

I have no idea what you just said ?? :faint2:

 

[madflap]

Access was a major problem. Both for spectators and medical.
That is earmarked for immediate attention based on whether not we are officially back here in 2015. Nothing is official yet but there are behaviours from both CA and Trade Teams that indicate that is the case. We can only speculate until they make an official announcement.
That said the protocol for a spinal injury was that the injured would be choppered out. Several Winch points through the rainforest canopy were identified for that area, and if required the emergency chopper has experience in winching through canopy. They work in rainforest all the time.
The large amount of rain also played havoc. Making hill sides slippery etc.. thus hampering vehicle access.
In fact you could say the worst that could have happened happened here for our first event in 20 years. The event dodged several bullets cyclones, major incidents and so on.
That said we are through it, the event ran smoothly, and those things will be addressed.
Extra cable will be brought in. Broadcast rights and earnings are very lucrative and will need to be accommodated. The media love the rainforest they continually told us there is nothing like this anywhere in the world.
Extra entry points (known and used by locals) will be formalised and work done on them to ensure that they can bring a vehicle up through them.
Any negotiations on future races will hopefully see them held in May or June to ensure dry conditions.
The base track was originally built in 1994 for the World cup and later modified for 1996 World Champs. It was built in a quarry that was purchased by National Parks Qld in around 2000. National Parks have received a crash course in MTBiking and Trail Building in the last 12 months and their support has been paramount to this event. They acknowledge their part in the future preparations and guarantee they will do what they can now they know what to expect. This goes for Council as well. It is apparent that local and State Govt didn't realise what this was and how big and important it was and did not take it seriously. They will now.
I have no idea how to respond to that electronic stuff other than support 4dabush, sometimes my phone works and sometimes it doesn't when I am up there on the hill.
Lots of locals, like 4dabush, were involved in this event volunteering both on the day and in the lead up to the event. Their knowledge and local experience was paramount to ensuring the success of the event. Yes there were problems and we can dissect them to the Nth degree but things go wrong in big events, nothing ever really goes smoothly and the UCI were happy. They thought it ran smoothly and were happy with the venue despite the rain.

 

[4dabush]

Interesting, thanks for the insight.

And I think you kinda blew things out of proportion a bit, I don't want 10 cameras, I'd be happy with just one extra camera to cover the whoops section.

Nope, I reckon 10 would be about the number, I wasn't being flippant or a smartar$e. This is what I reckon needs to be covered...
Start,
Switchbacks
Rock garden
Alien Tree
Triple double triple to ski above speed trap
Cyclone
Whoops
Vines x 2
Ronnings ramp
Finish/ finish straight

Even I can't count...that's 12....
You all can tell I am extremely one-eyed and biased. Overall it was a great event and went very well...as madflap said, we had contingencies in place for a spinal injury AND we had one...albeit a spectator. We worked it out. It wasn't much more of a delay than Cam Coles crash at Vallnord last year, except we'd just had a delay for a rider too.
See you all up here next year!!! And the best bit is you can bring the family, mates, partner and you only really have to get a 1 day leave pass and you can have a great holiday too...and probably bump into international riders on the reef, in the tablelands, feeding crocs - you get the drift, Start saving

 

[Ivan]

On that note:

Thanks to all the people who made it happen. :thumb: I couldn't make it up there this time, but I spent the whole weekend watching it on the couch.

 

[Skydome]

Nope, I reckon 10 would be about the number, I wasn't being flippant or a smartar$e. This is what I reckon needs to be covered...
Start,
Switchbacks
Rock garden
Alien Tree
Triple double triple to ski above speed trap
Cyclone
Whoops
Vines x 2
Ronnings ramp
Finish/ finish straight

Even I can't count...that's 12....
You all can tell I am extremely one-eyed and biased. Overall it was a great event and went very well...as madflap said, we had contingencies in place for a spinal injury AND we had one...albeit a spectator. We worked it out. It wasn't much more of a delay than Cam Coles crash at Vallnord last year, except we'd just had a delay for a rider too.
See you all up here next year!!! And the best bit is you can bring the family, mates, partner and you only really have to get a 1 day leave pass and you can have a great holiday too...and probably bump into international riders on the reef, in the tablelands, feeding crocs - you get the drift, Start saving

I see. Well I don't really know the track, and the only thing me personally would have liked to see was the moto whoops really.

But now that you mention it, those jumps i'd have liked to see too.

So for me personally, that's two extra areas I'd like covered.

 

[bell.cameron]

In all serious you guys need to get realistic. Sure you may want more cameras, then you will want more footage. This requires more time because your'e showing every riders almost full run. This means youre going to either miss every second rider or the results arent going to be even close to live. This then means you bitch and complain even more than you already are, hence we have then done a full circle.

 

[4dabush]

Brendan Fairclough on the last of the triples and the ski jump... on his qualifying run. Why I think it would be a good spot for a camera. 50-60kmh jumps, getting to 70+kmh in the trap...most riders were playing it up on these jumps all weekend, even in the race quite a few were styling it up for the cameras and crowd. bell.cameron makes a good point; I guess we'll see next time.

 

[johnny]

In all serious you guys need to get realistic. Sure you may want more cameras, then you will want more footage. This requires more time because your'e showing every riders almost full run. This means youre going to either miss every second rider or the results arent going to be even close to live. This then means you bitch and complain even more than you already are, hence we have then done a full circle.

I care less about it being live than I do about it being worth watching at all.

 

[foxpuppet]

I care less about it being live than I do about it being worth watching at all.

This.... Live is nice but better coverage edited together would be the best scenario. I'm not talking a highlight reel here but a condensed version of very riders run with all the best angles, some telemetry or at least speeds shown. That said I love the on the edge feeling of watching the riders hit the splits and seeing where they are..... Without that we wouldn't have Warner's "look at the time!!!"


Sent by courier pigeon

 

[Skydome]

Without hurting live viewing and missing riders, I think adding two or three extra cameras in won't hurt any thing.

At worst, all you'd have to do is increase the intervals they leave off at, not by much, and that should give enough time to see most of the previous riders run before the next rider hits the track.

With a track Cairns, in the dry, they'll be getting up to speed.

 

[akashra]

Just to give you some idea, I laid the timing cables for the DH... With a couple of helpers, we laid 3 lines to intermediate 2, two lines to intermediate 1 and one line to the start, it was 4200m of cable... Yes 4.2 kms...dragged up the hill and laid by hand. It was cat 5e cable...you know your standard blue computer cable, not the 20mm fat orange tv cable. The timing cables took almost 2 days to lay.

I noticed this when we were doing the course inspection on Wednesday, that it was just standard CAT5e all the way up to the intermediate decoder. I can't quite understand how they're reliably using it given the distances involved, unless there's repeaters somewhere in the middle. Prior to the event I had been informed they were running fibre so I was rather confused when I saw copper everywhere.

I know there were a few cameras that had issues significant enough that they dropped them from broadcast use - they couldn't consistently, reliably get signal from them.

 

[slowmick]

this was only the second race i have seen on the television. the other was the SBS coverage of this years nationals. both made me want to go out and ride my bike - regardless of how many shots of trees i had to watch waiting for the riders to come into view. it was exciting watching big names bin it and what looked to be very quick runs.

Thank you to everyone who put in time and effort to make the Cairns event possible. It helps make MTB a little more acceptable/understood. my better half has no interest in what i do in the bush on my bicycle but even she was drawn in by the downhill coverage. even if she thought the riders were nuts :thumb:

Didn't hep me convince her to honeymoon in Carins though so she could relax and i could ride though out: