Many people wonder what this is all about apart from hearing that it charges a levy on North East BRCA Regional events - and it has been suggested that as a result the entry fees are "the highest in the UK for such events". To this end I will try to enlighten you on the origins of "The Consortium" and it’s basic intent and future intentions.
When I (Derek Bradby) became your Regional Rep in 1991 (following on from Es West) we felt that the region should be run more by, and for, the clubs and their officials than just me in consultation with the main club officer.
Subsequently the consortium was created in a similar style to the one that had been created in the North West by Robin Smith. Robin was their long-term representative, and a model of efficiency. My initial aim was to try to standardise the basic method of running regional events, and to this end a common race programme was used (as originally used by the local Scarborough club) this being the BBK ARCS system which eventually become standard throughout the region and now a large part of the UK also. The idea was so that as you went from club to club for the events the race start/finish signals, printouts etc became standard rather than extremely variable as was generally the case at the time. A knock-on effect was also to make it possible to run an automatic lap counting system (such as AMB) if we could borrow one on the odd occasion, to avoid the "you were late counting my son’s lap" etc.
Fortunately the father of one of the top racers (Chris Fowle) of the period came to our rescue and donated a complete AMB system to the consortium (for which we should all be extremely grateful). This improved the quality of racing and standard of events, to such a point that at the moment every club active on the regional calendar now have their own system.
The consortium’s system in the future may well be able to help if another club appears on the scene, one that is able to run a regional but probably will not have a system of their own.
The levy imposed on the clubs who have run BRCA NE sanctioned events have helped to maintain the system, buy an extra set of transponders, charging rack, a better charging system, replacement transponders (about £45 each), the electronic scales and check weights that go to each event - which all help to keep things "right". I think it can be said that the North East Regional Series events are probably the nearest thing to doing a National in standard than most other regions.
Steve Kemp was your Regional Rep from 1994 to 1999, then Mark Sanders until 2002, and most recently Tony Snee continues to move things forward. In recent years a basic frequency scanner was acquired to further improve things.
THE PRESENT AND THE FUTURE
The next thing recently being sought (at the right price) was a laptop computer (to act as a spare on race day) and to accept the scanner programme as used at the ‘98 Euro’s at Teesside. These have now been acquired and becoming operational and starting to go to events to make checks during racing and can also be used to check out competitor’s radio gear when not racing (which should help everybody).
By doing this, the Consortium is using the funds created by the racers over the years for the benefit of the current and future competitors. In fact as of February 2000 we now have a meter to check the quality of signals from AMB System transponders - and so it goes on.
Derek Bradby