Feature Request: Avoid Consecutive Heats

[stati0n]

Thanks so much for DerbyNet! It has been a game changer for our Derby.

One thing I would love is an option to schedule that automatically avoids cars running in consecutive heats. I have an 8 lane track and I interleave dens for scheduling. When I have dens of greater than 8 but less than 16 Scouts, I wind up getting the same Scout in subsequent heats (i.e. Bears Heat 1 Round 1 and Bears Heat 2 Round 1), which is physically complicated to execute (we basically have to wait for the car to get collected and then run it to the top of the track) and delays our race.

I'm also open if you have alternative scheduling ideas. I'd rather not separate the den into two scheduling groups as the kids want to race against all of the other Scouts in their den, though I do realize that would solve the issue logistically.

[jeffpiazza]

The existing scheduler does actually give weight to avoid repeating a racer in consecutive heats, but it's not always possible to accommodate this preference. As you observe, if there are fewer than 16 racers in a group for an 8-lane track, some consecutive heats will always have some racers in common. (E.g., for the second heat, there are only 7 unrepeated racers and 8 lanes to fill, no matter what the scheduling algorithm.)

[stati0n]

Can I run the lanes empty instead of racers back-to-back? I'd rather take on the extra heats.

[PorkChopExpress86]

You could reduce the number of lanes in the settings to avoid running someone twice in a row. Running more heats with less time between them could speed it up. You probably want the number of to be twice the number of lanes, so if you have 8 lanes, you should have at least 16 cars per group to avoid the race twice in a row scenario.

$R = \frac{N} { L}$ where N is the number of cars and L is the number of lanes. You want R to be greater than 2.