2014 fsa

[mech5496]

A bit late on that one, as the statics are already over! Seems that the scrutineering was slow and thorough, which created a bit of frustration during the first day. Today is the first day of dynamics, and there is a live timing available here:

http://timekeeping.fsaustria.at/

Teams also tweet fairly often:

https://twitter.com/hashtag/FSA2014?src=hash

[mech5496]

I think thet FSA overtook FSG today, at least in my mind! http://today.fsaustria.at/

[BeunMan]

Except the javascript error in Chrome Beta which prevents te page from loading ;)

[TMichaels]

I think thet FSA overtook FSG today, at least in my mind! http://today.fsaustria.at/
Hi Harry,
in which regard? Please be more specific, otherwise we cannot keep up :)

[mech5496]

Nah, I think that others struggle to keep up with you, you have set the bar too high! I found the microsite really really useful, as it gathers all info regarding the particular event together. Most probably is a not-needed feature, but it is cool and allows to have a complete view of the competition. I am also pretty sure that it could be developed/implemented in a very short time, so it is a good idea to keep in mind for next years' FSG. BTW did anyone took a look at the FSH mobile app? It is out since yesterday and I was keen to test it, but there's no Windows Phone version out yet.

[BeunMan]

App have advantages and disadvantages, mainly compatibility. Though the today.fsaustria.at site did cause javascript errors due to an old version of jQuery used, but this is only on development versions of Chrome and Firefox.

I think it was a nice addition, even for us not in Austria ;)

[JulianH]

FSA was really nice. As always way more relaxed compared to Germany but not unprofessional!

Scrutineering was mainly done by FSG guys and alumni from "the big teams" from Germany and Austria. Of course it helped that nearly all of the cars were scrutineered in Germany before but still, they were very efficient! Zurich draw the last place in the scrutineering order and still managed it to be ready for the dynamics the day before. That shows how good the scrutineers are!

Judging was also mainly done by alumni (here four guys from Switzerland supported the mentioned alumni from Germany and Austria). It was my first time design judging, was a lot of fun.
They used a "new" model where every team got a random set of design judges (we were devided into 5-6 categories so that every team got a suspension guy, drivetrain, chassis and so on...) so that there was no real judging group. That eliminated the problem of "balancing the judging groups" but of course introduced a bit of a luck factor because some judges are giving out more points compared to others. But we all tried to use the whole point range to rank teams.

The Top 3 in both classes made it to Design finals where all judges asked every team the same question and ranked the teams afterwards. After adding those points up, the teams with the lowest number won.
It was quite stressful to judge six teams in one hour but was great to see even the best guys struggle just a little bit ;-)

Dynamics were really good as always. The AutoCross / Endurance track is the most beautiful of the year. Really nice job by the dynamics guys!

Sadly the Award Ceremony (was held on the camp ground) as well as the party was a bit "trashed" by reaaally bad weather but the atmosphere was still great!


Once again, I can only recommend FSA to every team around the world. Hopefully they can increase the number of teams for the next years. This year there were 64 teams on the waiting list for 40 starting slots.
Really sad was that I think 5 teams didn't show up without giving one of the waited teams a chance to get their slot because it was too late...

[Bemo]

Hi all together,

I also think that this year's edition of FSA was a great event. Scrutineering took a bit long in the beginning as we had quite a couple of new scrutineers who had to be trained by the more experienced people. Also the entrance of the teams took too long, so when scrutineering started, the teams weren't ready. After these issues at the start I think it went quite efficient and smooth. As said before Zürich was last in the order and they had their sticker by the end of the second day of the event. For me that means that a well prepared team had no issues to be done with all checks by the beginning of the dynamics no matter which spot they had in the scrutineering order.
What helped us here was the fact that in average the teams were quite well prepared for scrutineering. In the end all 37 cars which were present at the event had all their stickers!!! As there weren't any serious incidents on the track, I assume this was really due to good cars not due to low inspection quality ;-)

During the dynamics we had quite a lot of luck with the weather. Only the first teams during the morning session had to run under wet conditions in Endurance. The afternoon session was completely dry. Unfortunately there was heavy rain during the award ceremony which converted the area into a mud bowl, but the teams made the best of it. We are really sorry that we couldn't let the entire teams on the stage during the ceremony, but there was just not enough space and the risk to damage the band equipment was too high. Next year the award ceremony will surely be held in a different spot to improve this and not to be dependant on the weather.