Snetterton - a rider monkey's view (long)

nah, BT45s - no tyre changes for the whole season, *and* some grip in
the wet...

 

Avons. SMIIs.

"Everlasting"

 

Oh gawd, thought I'd done with all that palaver...

But, it could be managed, I guess. I'd rather do it from a nice cosy
press center than a draughty old pit garage though.

 

There's a press centre at Snetterton...

 

no, I'm with Chris on this one - "usually" during your races, someone
Texts/calls someone else who texts/calls someone etc. with an eventual
sporadic "blow by blow report" being posted on the newsgroup.

This time there was nothing - I was beginning to vaguely wonder if
anything had gone catestrophically wrong.

For your 24 race, all you need is someone sad enough to post from a
laptop/GPRS phone combination.

 

Andy, if you could do that it would be absolutely fantastic.

C'mon man, you haven't got the 24 hour bug out of your system yet....

 

"Champ" muttered

Definitely not, that's for sure. Let me check the work roster. I want
to come up anyway, even if only for the start or finish - and I'd like
to look up Rog Bennet and Mark S-H at GB Moto too as they're old mates.

I'd also have to talk with whoever does the URKM site (Darsy?) as I
assume you'd want to tag a blog page onto that as a new page or
somesuch.

If we got something sorted out, it wouldn't be hard to then keep it
working for future races. The perisher on this is reliable interweb
access at Snet and the other circuits. One assumes that Norfolk has
the web, but the secret is like endurance racing itself, to have
everything in place so you can just rock up, plug in and get on with
it.

I'd have to see if I can source a laptop too as my old Race24 one died
and I havn't had the need to replace it - should be able to get one
from work though.

 

yes, me.

snot a problem. The current hosts (Doteasy) don't have a blogging
option, but I can certainly provide templated "team-ukrm branding" for
any blog site you'd care to use, and a link to it from the main site.

 

Cool. Would direct FTP access into a new, pre-set up page on the main
site be possible/easier/neater?

BTW this seems to be rolling already, as I seem to have a press pass
organised...

 

Bloody fast bastards, too.

Darsy has just put the 2005 version up, so he should be able to add
the appropriate stuff.

Well, the next race is the 6 hour at Brands Hatch on 21st May, which
isn't very far from you. Perhaps we could trial it all there?

I can prolly get one if you're stuck.

 

Yes. Ideally, you'd have a laptop with a copy of Dreamweaver installed
on it, and I'd supply you a Dreamweaver HTML Template with a fixed
banner/menu and an editable content area.

It's possible I might come to the 24hr race, and we could simply use my
laptop (I really, really can't lend anyone else this machine though,
I'd have to be there).

smashing.

 

I have one of those...

 

can it talk to the net via a GPRS mobile phone[1]? If so, you're in
business - I can easily supply you a template that makes it easy to
edit the content area, but not screw up the navigation etc. by
accident.

[1] I'm assuming based on Andy's description of the "Press Senter" that
using an ordinary modem might not be an option. And I *really* doubt
Snetters is a wi-fi hotspot...

 

I can get a work laptop, but it wouldn't have Dreamweaver on it. I
think I have a evaluation version of it somewhere though...

Understandable.

 

I've got a GPRS mobile with Bluetooth...

It's been a while since I've been to Snet, but it was mainly
portacabins and so on last time I was there. I exagerrate a bit, but I
doubt that they've put up a GP standard Media Centre in the meantime.

Probably fair...

 

Maybe - was hoping to get over for that.

 

Yes, but my phone is really temperamental about connecting [1] - works
fairly well by IR but the bluetooth is absolute wank.

The data bundle isn't too bad: 3MB free then £1 per MB.

We can sort the fine details nearer the time.


[1] Curse you Simian...

 

There aren't any portacabins there now, and there is a proper set of
buildings by the race control tower that certainly *look* like they
could contain a media centre. Seeing as you're accredited, you could
drop Motorsport Vision a line.

 

Or I lend my laptop to Andy W or whoever's going to do it.

 

Hmmm... I've got one of those, and once I'd got Bluetooth set up
properly it was fine. Mind, I did have to junk the swanky Microsoft
Bluetooth drivers and go for the ones that were bundled with the
Bluetooth adapter, which feel like something from the last century but
appear to work OK.

Oh, arse. Just remembered: this isn't the phone that I set up with
Bluetooth, this is #3[0], so I'll have to do the configuration again. Nuts.


[0] #1 became 'unresponive' after a week. #2 worked well (and I had
Bluetooth connecting to my laptop) until I walked into something with it
in the pocket of my jeans, and smashed the screen: lots of pretty
colours, but you couldn't tell what you were doing. #3 came courtesy of
Orange business insurance thingy.