Competition Guidelines

Christchurch Runners

Kiss and Part

This works well if there is an even spread of ability, however if there is an uneven spread it is difficult to handicap since, although each team has run the same distance, they have not covered the same proportion therefore adding handicaps together does not give an accurate combined handicap.

This can be solved by using the following handicapping system:

If Jon Sharkey and George run 6 miles between them, it should be self evident that they will do better if Jon does more running than George. Our handicap system is based upon variable time over the same distance.

The formula for 2 runners running for the same time rather than distance is :

HandicapTeam = 2/(1/Handicap1 + 1/Handicap2)

Here is the lengthy explanation from for those who like their maths:

Over a circular 1 mile course a 30 mph and 60 mph car do a kiss and part race.
The 60 mph car covers twice the distance of the 30 mph car and they are back at the start after 4/3 mins (with a quality handbrake turn).
They will match 2 x 45 mph cars doing the same event.
So the 30 mph and 60 mph cars are equivalent to 2 at their average speed (30 + 60) /2.

But speed is distance over time whereas our handicaps are relative to time over a fixed distance.

So the average speed formula SAverage = (S1 + S2) /2
is equivalent to 1/HAverage = (1/H1 +1/H2)/2
or HAverage = 2 / (1/H1 +1/H2)

To demonstrate this in our system the cars will have handicaps of 2 mins and 1 min (30 mph and 60 mph over a 1 mile course) and an average of HAverage = 2/(1/2 + 1/1) = 2/(1.5) = 4/3 min which is equivalent to 45 mph over a 1 mile course.

After some further algebra the formula can be shown as
HAverage = 2*H1*H2 / (H1 +H2)
this is how it appears in the results spreadsheet