Day 1 - Training Day. It is raining. I hadn't considered whether a kitchen stopwatch would or would not be waterproof. It is not waterproof and the display goes funny. I can read the display however if I rub the screen in the right way. The stopwatch on-off switch appears to work all right though. I manage to time myself down the run although the time is meaningless as we don't quite know where the start or finish line is going to be.
Day 2 - Racing. It is still raining but the stopwatch is still working. As the day gets drier, the track gets dustier and the display gets harder to read. However, the the stopwatch is still working.
Run #1 - I forget to start the stopwatch until halfway down the first straight.
Run #2 - Faster run. In my excitement, I forget to stop the clock as I cross the finishing line.
Run #3 - Success. However, I crash halfway down and finish with a slower time than the training run.
Run #4 - Can't read display. Decide to concentrate on the riding instead. End up with personal fastest time of the day.
Summary
The system worked, and probably would have worked better had a) it not rained and b) I'd remembered to use it. Attaching the clock to the upperside of the deck, whilst a very safe place to put it, is slightly wasted as in no part of the riding did I feel that I was in a position to look down and read the numbers - I could have just of easily dropped it in one of my pockets or somewhere similar. Plus, the actual numbers are almost meaningless anyway - the ATBA have almost got the timings down to a fine art form with overall run times produced very, very quickly.
Epilogue
Couple of days back home and the stopwatch unit dries out. It totally works! I still chopped it off the board though - too much trouble to be worth bothering with. GPS, that's the future.
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