Reaction Time Equipment Issues Continue on Thursday Morning at Ivy League Championships

2023 MEN’S IVY LEAGUE SWIMMING & DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS

After multiple controversial relay disqualifications on Wednesday evening in Providence, the issue has escalated on Thursday morning.

Several meetings of the Meet Committee, with the conference office getting involved, have yielded no changes to Wednesday’s results. That is in spite of there being 10 reaction times that were in the negative from Wednesday’s two relays (though only four were called for DQs).

Concerns grew on Thursday morning when the reaction times recorded on flat-starts registered as impossibly fast. The fastest starters in the world usually record reaction times in the .5-.6 second range; Ivy League results recorded dozens of reaction times faster than that, with some as low as +.22 and +.28.

The league has not released the full RJP results from Wednesday evening’s session, and have asked teams (which are entitled to them by ruled after disqualifications) not to do so either. photographs of the results obtained by SwimSwam, though, show that there were even more negative reaction times than those that were called.

Yale had two early departures measured on their 200 medley relay. Cornell had a -.37 reaction time as measured by the relay judging pad, which would be painfully obvious to the naked eye.

The results show a -.28 reaction time for the anchor of the Dartmouth 800 free relay, who was called for a disqualification, in spite of a video seeming to show that he was clearly safe on the exchange. A reaction time registering at -.28 would require dual confirmation by officials under NCAA rules.

The relay reaction pads are Daktronics brand. Product documentation for Daktronics relay takeoff pads claim to have a 0.00 set point (in other words, there is no -.03 or -.04 that other brands have where a swimmer can be in contact with the block, but not putting enough pressure to cause a DQ.

One formal protest was filed after prelims on Thursday morning, and the meet committee is meeting again at 4:00 PM before finals.

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David Baer
1 year ago

The rules permit the use of video cameras as the primary backup to the automatic relay takeoff judging equipment, You can’t use spectator video, you need to have the cameras set in the correct position and they should be certified to record 100 frames per second.

Are the Ivy Leagues not using video? the Northwest Conference Champs (and PAC-12) Champs both use video backup (those are held at a facility using Omega equipment).

96Swim
1 year ago

DQs from last night are being overturned by rules committee apparently

Ross
Reply to  96Swim
1 year ago

Results posted now reflect that. Good on them for taking the corrective action and being thorough about it.

Anonymous
1 year ago

Prelims reaction times all look around 0.15 to 0.20 seconds faster than we would expect, with some outliers (0.17, 0.22, 0.28). I wonder if the timing system would start late if it was accidentally plugged into the “NC” output of the starter instead of the “NO” output. A late timer start would yield fast reaction times, as well as fast overall times.

Helber Watch
1 year ago

FYI – ALL DQs from yesterday were reversed. Wild to do that 24 hours after the event. Updated on MM

MidMajor
1 year ago

Get rid off all reaction pads! Position quality take-off judges at Lanes 1-4-5-8 and let them independently judge and agree.

Pineapple
1 year ago

Any chance Rowdy was commentating Ivies? Would love to hear his thoughts on reaction times as low as +.22 and +.28. Probably gave those swimmers a pretty good advantage in the 500

anonymous
Reply to  Pineapple
1 year ago

Looks like Elizabeth Beisel is going to be reporting from Ivies tonight based on her IG – I’m sure she will have great reporting, as she always does.

Caleb
1 year ago

Great reporting, guys. Keep it up!

Cam
1 year ago

Is there an auto DQ for flat starts in swimming like they have in track? Should all these swims this morning been auto DQ?

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Braden Keith

Braden Keith is the Editor-in-Chief and a co-founder/co-owner of SwimSwam.com. He first got his feet wet by building The Swimmers' Circle beginning in January 2010, and now comes to SwimSwam to use that experience and help build a new leader in the sport of swimming. Aside from his life on the InterWet, …

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