Measures Annex H How to Create an Excel Points file to Load Entry Level Competitors

This document explains how to create an Excel points file to load competitors into Measures for a Nancy Greene race so that the kids run by club, by gender within the club and youngest to oldest within each gender group.  I find it much more efficient to load the kids from a points file, the same way that competitors would be loaded into Measures for a U 14, U 16 or Junior race.

  1. Enter all the competitors in an Excel spreadsheet to create the points file.

The format of a normal points file is as follows:

U 16,JONES,Louise,SUNSH/ALTA,22077,F,1991,999,378.85,511.32,999
U 16,SMITH,Bert,SUNSH/ALTA,22129,M,1991,999,304.46,302.21,678.38

Column 1:    Category Column 2:    Last Name Column 3:    First Name Column 4:    Club/Division Column 5:    Competitor Number Column 6:    Gender Column 7:    Birth Year Column 8:    Downhill Points Column 9:    Slalom Points Column 10:  GS Points Column 11:  Super G Points

For a Nancy Greene race where I want the kids to run

1.     By club 2.     By gender within the club 3.     From youngest to oldest within the gender category

I set up the data as follows:

1.     I enter the competitor’s actual gender in the “Category” field 2.     Competitor’s last name goes in the “Last Name” field 3.     Competitor’s first name goes in the “First Name” field

4.     The “Club” field is 5 characters, the first two characters are the club number (randomly drawn and assigned to each club to determine the order in which the clubs will run) and the last three characters are used to designate the club name (normally the club name is five characters, make sure the three characters you use are unique and can easily identify the club).   Since the club numbers are two digits, make sure you preface the number with a zero if the club number is a single digit.  For example, club number “2” must be entered as “02”.  THIS IS IMPORTANT TO GET THE CLUBS TO SORT PROPERLY ON THE START LIST.   The “Division” name (“ALTA” for Alberta) is appended to the club field with a slash separating club and division. 5.     I assign “99999” as the competitor number for all competitors 6.     Since all kids are going into one race file and the race must be designated as “M”ale or “F”emale, all the kids must have the same gender.  I normally use “M” and say it stands for “Mixed”!  Make sure when you set up the race file that you designate the gender of the race as “M”.

7.     Birth Year is the competitor’s four-digit birth year.

8.     Since we will not be using the seed points to sort the start list enter “1” in Column 8, “1” in Column 9, “1” in Column 10, and “1” in Column 11.

The data should look like this:

F,JONES,Louise,02SUN/ALTA,99999,M,1992,1,1,1,1
M,SMITH,Bert,03BVQ/ALTA,99999,M,1992,1,1,1,1

Save the file as a “.csv” (comma separated value) file.

2.     The next step is to create the race file in Measures.  Once you’ve created the file follow these steps:

  • Select “Prepare Race Header Information” from the Main menu
  • Select “Race Titles and Parameters” and set the gender field to “M”
  • From the Main Menu select “Prepare Race Entries”
  • Select “Add Racer to Race”
  • Respond “Yes” to the prompt “Add Racers from a Points File”
  • A screen will be displayed where you will tell Measures where the points file is located.  In the “File Type” box click on the drop down and select “All Files (.)”.  Locate your file and click on the file name
  • When the “Add Race” screen appears, double click in the “Name” field. This will bring up the “Select Racer” window
  • Click on the button next to “Select All Racers”
  • Click on the “Select” button
  • Click on the “Exit” button.  You will get a prompt that says all racers will be added to the Race File.
  • Click on “Continue”

You will now have the race file with all the racers loaded.

Note: All kids will be in one race file since the boys and girls are running together.

(Loading from a points file – if you have both genders (M and F) in the points file IN THE GENDER FIELD but your race is designated as “M”ale, you will only be able to load the “M”ale competitors from the points file.  That’s why the gender goes into the “Category” field).

Measures has a “Group” field that I use to store the age group for the competitors.  This field cannot be loaded from the .csv file, it must be manually entered in Measures for each competitor after the competitors have been loaded from the points file.

The Group field allows me to put competitors of multiple ages into a single age group, for example I can combine kids who are 7 and 8 in a single group for medals/ribbons by setting the group field to “8” for all 7 and 8 year old kids.

See the file “NGSrsPts.csv” as an example of a file created in this format.