What is happening with SAS?

[ahp005]

Check out the new website. www.buycycle.co.za

 

New website, new management, new owners...

 

My comment is simply common sense, ask anyone who has touched tech. 

It is not common sense to me! and I am in IT.

[dillon]

they are PATHETIC!!  I have sent 15 emails, phones them countless times, all i want to do is enter Sabie and the stupid system does not work!!

 

I can't even get an alternative method of entering out of them, clearly they don't want me at Sabie

[RyanAW]

Try facebook. I got an (unsatisfactory) reply within about a day.

Or comment on one of their (Fritz or Francois) rides on strava. That's worked for me before

[Lurch the stalker]

I have been actively avoiding their events wherever possible since last year's Emperors Palace MTB race.

I rode the short distance with my sister who was seeded in B batch, I was in A.

Assuming (which I admit is 100% my fault) that they were competent I just fell back like I would with Racetec and started with the later batch.

When the times were eventually loaded I had just over 9 minutes difference in time, yet I crossed the line with my sister.

Considering the start batches were 5 minutes apart I would have understood if there was 5 minutes difference.

I contacted them and they didn't bother responding for a few weeks. Sent a 'strongly worded' follow up which they eventually responded to, and eventually fixed my time, but could never explain the extra 4 minutes. To this day I believe that they make up the times as they like.

 

A new website will not fix the issues there.

It's like that old saying..."You can't polish a turd"

[Barry Stuart]

I've never seen such a *** performance from a company. They've pretty much unplugged their phones, turned off their email and logged out of their social media. Not even a banner or a post acknowledging the problems and assuring that they're working on it. If I were one of the event sponsors I'd be properly pissed.

[MTBOnly]

Check out the new website. www.buycycle.co.za

 

New website, new management, new owners...

 

My comment is simply common sense, ask anyone who has touched tech. 

 

I work in the IT industry, and I can clearly see you dont Christiaan. You seem too willing to accept bad quality service and thus it is clear you have or had some relationship with SAS and or SAS owner/director/s.

[Enduro_Jakes]

I suppose we shouldn't expect much from the organizers... 

I mean, common sense dictates that if you see the water/fluid levels are getting low at a water point...send someone to restock URGENTLY... specially when you have another 1500+ riders that are still going to pass and make use of said water point.

Advendurance mentality dictates that everything must be bone dry so as to make everyone wait an hour in the blistering sun while they try and figure out how to get liquids to the water point.

 

The fact that these people cant even grasp that simple, no-brainer task should give you an exact idea as to why they have gone and stuffed up everything....from Trailseeker, to SAS...Hell, even our NATIONAL...yes ours F***ing NATIONAL series is even a complete stuff up.

They only cater for the pro's but they forget that we, the masses, are carrying the cost of an event with our entry fees. How many races can they organise if no one shows up?

 

So lets look at this as a whole.... anything advendurance related is going to be worse off than the USN series...and that is pretty bad at this point(after last years performance from the organisers)

[Lurch the stalker]

I work in the IT industry

 

I think all of us in IT are especially baffled that they would do this with a production system when there should be change management, fail back plans, etc...

Maybe whoever does the infrastructure should go on ITIL...

[Reden]

I've also been trying to enter for events but no luck.

Site wants me to log in but when entering my e-mail address for password recovery it states that they have me on record but not my e-mail address.

I only entered my e-mail so how do they know its ME!!!!

Also sent them a e-mail but nothing so far.

[Reden]

If the service from SAS and Advendurance are bad or lacking like the current SAS problems, why don't the major race sponsors Nissan and Ashburton show their teeth a bit.

 

Maybe someone with good communicating skills should send them a mail and complain.

[Enduro_Jakes]

If the service from SAS and Advendurance are bad or lacking like the current SAS problems, why don't the major race sponsors Nissan and Ashburton show their teeth a bit.

 

Maybe someone with good communicating skills should send them a mail and complain.

 

Agreed! And add links to these forums....

[Reden]

^{For those that cannot enter into a event and get the following message.}

^{We have your details but not your e-mail address...}

 

^{Register as if it is for the first time even though your seeding is on the system.}

^{Enter your e-mail address and other details as required. The site will then take you immediately to your personal page with all the all previous details already there.}

^{From here you can enter events as required.}

[dillon]

^{For those that cannot enter into a event and get the following message.}

^{We have your details but not your e-mail address...}

 

^{Register as if it is for the first time even though your seeding is on the system.}

^{Enter your e-mail address and other details as required. The site will then take you immediately to your personal page with all the all previous details already there.}

^{From here you can enter events as required.}

just don't use facebook to login, you will fall into a dark black hole

[Fritz Pienaar]

Hi guys,

 

We spend a tremendous amount of time and money to redevelop SAS and make some really important security and system upgrades, and it sucks to hear that some of you are having bad experiences. I firmly believe that the changes are necessary and that the system will be easier to work and better in the long run and welcome any feedback going forward. Here is some of the changes and why we did it:

 

With regards to entries:

·        We now require a login with username and password, which protects your data as required by the POPI act (protection of personal information). This makes it more difficult to enter initially, but it is required by law and we believe it is the responsible thing to do. Most systems are open and it is therefore easy to steal data, but not with SAS.  

·        Minors cannot enter themselves and needs a parent to enter them. This is again required by law and we felt it was the right thing to implement. We will change this slightly so that the minor can enter himself for further events, after the parent has done so on the 1^st time, but the parent will receive an email in which they need to click a button in order to grant consent. Other systems allow minors to enter, but it is wrong.

·        Id numbers are verified so a person cannot enter without the correct ID number. This stops people from entering friends or minors with ID’s that have the date of birth and then 000000 for instance. This is important to identify the person that entered and link it to the profile on the system so that his seeding is updated correctly etc… We also establish gender and age cat automatically from this.

 

We are not aware of any issues with the entry system and processed over 9000 entries in January (mostly Jeep Warrior race). The only exceptions was where users had duplicate profiles on the system, and we have corrected most of these.

 

There has been other functionality added to the entry system to make your live easier:

·        Login with Facebook

·        If you are logged in with Facebook you can see your Facebook friend who have also logged in with Facebook before and add them to entries without needing any further details

·        You can enter multiple events or people on single checkout

·        You can enter friends without knowing or needing to enter all their details, because the system will require only the email and cell and then mail them with a prompt to complete the rest of their details an accept the T’s and C’s.

 

The other aspect of SAS is the tracking and loading of results. We have not loaded new results from November last year, because we are cleaning the database. All the results are on file and will be updated before 20 Feb. This is not an error, but a clean-up process to insure that we have the correct results linked to every person and the correct ID number for every person.

 

You are welcome to contact me personally fritz@cyclesport.co.za if you are not getting a response from the office. I do sincerely apologise if that was the case. 

[Robrider]

Hi guys,

 

We spend a tremendous amount of time and money to redevelop SAS and make some really important security and system upgrades, and it sucks to hear that some of you are having bad experiences. I firmly believe that the changes are necessary and that the system will be easier to work and better in the long run and welcome any feedback going forward. Here is some of the changes and why we did it:

 

With regards to entries:

·        We now require a login with username and password, which protects your data as required by the POPI act (protection of personal information). This makes it more difficult to enter initially, but it is required by law and we believe it is the responsible thing to do. Most systems are open and it is therefore easy to steal data, but not with SAS.  

·        Minors cannot enter themselves and needs a parent to enter them. This is again required by law and we felt it was the right thing to implement. We will change this slightly so that the minor can enter himself for further events, after the parent has done so on the 1^st time, but the parent will receive an email in which they need to click a button in order to grant consent. Other systems allow minors to enter, but it is wrong.

·        Id numbers are verified so a person cannot enter without the correct ID number. This stops people from entering friends or minors with ID’s that have the date of birth and then 000000 for instance. This is important to identify the person that entered and link it to the profile on the system so that his seeding is updated correctly etc… We also establish gender and age cat automatically from this.

 

We are not aware of any issues with the entry system and processed over 9000 entries in January (mostly Jeep Warrior race). The only exceptions was where users had duplicate profiles on the system, and we have corrected most of these.

 

There has been other functionality added to the entry system to make your live easier:

·        Login with Facebook

·        If you are logged in with Facebook you can see your Facebook friend who have also logged in with Facebook before and add them to entries without needing any further details

·        You can enter multiple events or people on single checkout

·        You can enter friends without knowing or needing to enter all their details, because the system will require only the email and cell and then mail them with a prompt to complete the rest of their details an accept the T’s and C’s.

 

The other aspect of SAS is the tracking and loading of results. We have not loaded new results from November last year, because we are cleaning the database. All the results are on file and will be updated before 20 Feb. This is not an error, but a clean-up process to insure that we have the correct results linked to every person and the correct ID number for every person.

 

You are welcome to contact me personally fritz@cyclesport.co.za if you are not getting a response from the office. I do sincerely apologise if that was the case. 

 

The above bold is  false and was confirmed by a reply from SAS when I queried it.

 

I could not enter the full and half marathon for myself and my wife, since they are on different days and therefore are regarded as different events. It required two separate check out and payments. Even entering myself for the Full and Half required 2 check outs.

[Li Mu Bai]

My issue with SAS is the random % weighting that is applied to events to determine seeding.
A single day event may be a tough event resulting in a hard fought for placing. Then it is marked down 10 or 20 percent.
A manicured event like Sani2C for example, has become an easy way for guys to bump up their seeding as the 3 events (race, adventure, trail) are not related to each other in terms of seeding index. Although the route is the same, instead of one finishers ladder for all 3 events that compares the individual finishers position to the winning pro, the adventure and trail have an arbitrary percentage applied to them. This results in guys getting seeding indexes that are lower(better) than what the usually are capable of, with the knock on effect that at subsequent races they are seeded in groups faster than they are capable of. Consequences: traffic on the single track when things get a little technical etc etc.

As the rider is not compared to the race winner, this system does not accurately place the rider in the correct order of actual ability in the real world.
It also subverts the 3 event average seeing index used to determine seeding because each day carries its own index rather than just one index for the whole event. A rider thus can only have his Sani2c 3 day event count towards/manipulate all other event seeding/start positions he enters in that particular year.
This practice needs to be overhauled. It affects other entities that use SAS for reference such as national standing ladders, or tread buffalo positions for example.
Time to keep things real.