TMX Says - Don’t overlook club volunteers
By TMX Archives on 9th Dec 16
ANSWERING the phone up here at TMX Towers is almost as terrifying as playing a round of Russian roulette because you never quite know how bad the ear bending youre about to receive is gonna be.
The calls are usually results-related and normally from an irate parent telling us that ‘little
While I wasn't planning on going ‘here' in this particular column let me just say that the answer is nearly always the same – ‘we're sorry and we only used the results that were sent by the organising club/promoter'.
What people don't seem to realise is that the person who made that mistake is also the same volunteer who put the track up the day before, signed you on in the morning, marshalled all day in the pouring rain, brought the track posts and marker tape back in afterwards, tidied the car park and then spent what was left of their Sunday evening filing a report and results for TMX and the club website.
When you put it like that, the fact that a small error may have made it into their report is definitely forgivable, although heaven forbid they mix up two names in the
Of course, sometimes the mistake is ours and we inadvertently copy and paste something incorrectly, or ATEX – that's the software we use to lovingly craft TMX each week – goes on an absolute bender and prints something that doesn't even come close to resembling the page we'd asked it to. In that case we hold our hands up and apologise – we're sorry!
Anyhoo, I've digressed massively from where I was planning on heading this week and I've run out of room now anyway so let's pick up on a couple more things that grind my gears instead...
#7: Course cutting
While watching the Geneva SX at the weekend I noticed that eventual Main Event winner Marvin Musquin ricocheted off the track through a rhythm section, rode alongside it for the next 100 metres or so before rejoining still in the lead as though nothing had occurred.
Erm, what happened to rejoining the track where you left it rule? Yes, I know that the version is ‘rejoin at the next point that it's safe to do so' or words to that effect but how is that fair? It's not, end of...
#8: The price of sweets
Old folks like me will no doubt remember the time when you could go into your local corner shop and swap a 10 pence piece for a selection of 10 sweets of a substantial size that came hand-picked and delivered in a paper bag. That was good value for money.
These days 10 pence is absolutely nothing and even a Freddo – a long-time favourite for aficionados of chocolate treats costing exactly 10 pence and not a penny more – requires more than double that amount of investment. Absolutely shocking!
