Elections: Calling all candidates!

Posted on | by carsenkline | 11 Comments on Elections: Calling all candidates!

Two exec committee positions are up for election, and we’re looking for candidates NOW. This is a call to action for serious volunteers who want to see the BAA through the next couple years of growth. The two positions open this spring are President and Vice President. (Treasurer and Secretary will be filled in the fall so that we have some transitional overlap.)

If you’re interested, please comment on this news post with the position you want and, if you like, a campaign spiel. You can also send email to admin@cmubuggy.org if you’re too modest to speak out here.

Elections will be via an online poll early next week!

Here are some example criteria:

* Someone who has been vocal on the forum with good ideas and creative input.
* Someone who likes what we do and wants to be more involved.
* Someone who has plenty of time in the Spring to work on BAA stuff.
* Nominees do NOT have to be Pittsburgh locals.
* You can nominate someone else if he/she agrees.

Here’s a slice of what we do:
Continue reading →

Thursday Polls 2010 Wrap-up

Posted on | by Sam Swift

This post was written in advance and scheduled to get posted this morning automatically, because we don’t have time to be writing posts anymore … It’s RACEDAY!!  Well, the purists would say raceday is tomorrow, but us BAA folks are at design comp passing out stickers and tshirts.  Come on down and see us if you’re in town.

For the past 10 weeks, we’ve been polling the audience to see what the readers of cmubuggy.org think about the pressing issues of the day.  1,300+ votes later, we thank everyone for weighing in and arguing their case on some pretty entertaining topics.

So, what have we learned? Continue reading →

Game on! Carnival & new website features to match

Posted on | by Sam Swift

Classes are out (which implies people had been going recently), tents and trucks are accumulating around campus, and cmubuggy.org has just switched on a bunch of new features. It must be raceday!

Our front page has been updated with links to and descriptions of all of our raceday specific amenities, but I’ll recap some of the new exciting one here

  • Ask the Broadcasters – Our team of buggy alumni, WRCT sportscasters, and cmuTV producers have been preparing for a long time now to deliver another high-quality broadcast.  One thing they’ve wished for in the past was that viewers were able to “call in” with questions about the races as they’re going.  Now you can.  Just hit up the link above and throw out a conversation starter (it probably makes more sense to wait until the broadcast starts).
  • cmubuggy.org mobile – Buggy has always been ahead of the times when it came to composites and rubber compounds, but lately buggy fans on the move have been wishing they could follow the races from their phones.  Hit up cmubuggy.org/m from your web-enabled phone and you’ll get an assortment of raceday necessities in phone-friendly format.  It’s a bit bare bones on the aesthetics at the moment, but that way it’ll work on more phones. Continue reading →

Auction is a big success, $4,092 raised!

Posted on | by Sam Swift | 4 Comments on Auction is a big success, $4,092 raised!

Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone that participated in the second annual lead truck auction this year.  Thank you x2000 to the anonymous buggy lover that matched the first $2000 in bids.  The BAA committee was betting mid-day on Monday whether or not we would be able to reach our $2,000 goal, and only our confident treasurer, Chris Stengel put his money on making it all the way there.  He cooked the books a bit by being an active bidder himself, but there’s nothing wrong with that.  By lunch time, the total was around $1300, but the pace was quick from there on out, averaging about $100/hr.   Hope everyone had fun and got the heats that they wanted.  We’ll be contacting the winners shortly.

  • Number of bids : 365
  • Number of bidders : 38
  • Total raised for the BAA and for buggy: $2,092 + $2000 in matching funds = $4,092!
  • Most expensive heat : 1st pick for Men’s finals at $161 won by Abby
  • Number of heats won by folks from each org Continue reading →

Members-Only Raceday Preview is out

Posted on | by Sam Swift | 3 Comments on Members-Only Raceday Preview is out

We sent out one of our favorite members-only perks last night around midnight: our Raceday Preview.  This year’s 11-page publication covers each team in depth with pictures, stats, and narratives.  If you haven’t followed along all year, we hope that it gets you up to speed for raceday.  If you’re a regular cmubuggy.org junkie, we know your hunger to consume buggy material this time of year in insatiable, but that you’ll like this pdf especially.

If you’re not a member yet, follow the big “Join” button from this page:

http://cmubuggy.org/join/

It’s only $10, you get a whole list of members-only benefits, and you’re helping to support our efforts to make buggy better than ever.  If you can keep the option, “Display my name in the list of attendees for this event” checked when paying your dues on the AH site, that lets us quickly confirm that you’re paid up.  Send us an e-mail at admin@cmubuggy.org, and you’ll have your pdf in no time.

If you have already paid your dues but didn’t get the email overnight, send us an e-mail at admin@cmubuggy.org.  We don’t always have the most up-to-date data from alumni house, or we may have just screwed up.  We’ll remedy things quickly.

This is the one weekend per year that we don’t publish a rolls-report, so I apologize if you were checking eagerly this morning for that.  You’ve got to chip in to get your fix this week.  There are plenty of pictures from the weekend (here and here).

Also, if you haven’t seen it yet, compubookie’s annual post is available online here at thetartan.org

24 hours left in Lead Truck Auction, Bid now!

Posted on | by Sam Swift | 2 Comments on 24 hours left in Lead Truck Auction, Bid now!

Action in this year’s Lead Truck auction has been lively through the first 61 hours, but like they say on the back hills, we need to finish strong. The currently winning bidders have pledged $899 which is awesome, but we’ve got a ways to go to make the most of our $2,000 matching gift.  Don’t let us leave money on the table that could go towards making buggy more fun and exciting for alumni and current students.

http://www.cmubuggy.org/auction

There are still plenty of affordable heats, and some high profile heats that aren’t as high yet as they were last year.  Remember, every dollar you put it in is worth $2 to the BAA!  A summary of the current winning bids for your convenience:

Women’s Prelims

  • $21 : Fringe C, KKG-ZBT A, SDC D
  • $11 : SDC B, Spirit B, CIA B
  • $25 : SN A, PiKA B, SigEp B
  • $31 : Fringe A, SDC C, CIA A
  • $10 : Spirit A, SAE A, AEPi A
  • $30 : PiKA A, Beta A, Fringe B
  • $11 : SDC A, SigEp A, Spirit C
 Women’s Finals

  • $71 – first pick
  • $70 – second pick
  • $25 – third pick
Men’s Prelims

  • $21 : SAE A, PiKA D, PhiKap C
  • $21 : Fringe C, CIA C
  • $21 : Spirit B, KKG-ZBT A, AEPi C
  • $16 : SDC B, PiKA C, CIA D
  • $36 : SN A, Spirit C, PhiKap B
  • $10 : SigEp A, SDC D
  • $35 : Fringe B, CIA A, AEPi B
  • $31 : PiKA B, SigEp B, Beta A
  • $22 : Spirit A, CIA B, Fringe D
  • $32 : PiKA A, SDC C, Pioneers A
  • $35 : Fringe A, AEPi A, SN B
  • $31 : SDC A, SigEp C, PhiKap A
 Men’s Finals

  • $66 – first pick
  • $65 – second pick
  • $55 – third pick
  • $50 – fourth pick
  • $49 – fifth pick

Hey SDC, Spirit, and SigEp alumni, you’re not going to let your A team heats go for less than $15 are you?  That’s right, I’m calling you out, support your teams, they’re going to think you don’t care about them!

Update: There was interest in lead truck rides during the exhibition heats (especially the PiKA – Beta – SN showdown), so we have added those to the auction.  Click here to see the current bidding.

Heats are selected; Start bidding now in the auction

Posted on | by Sam Swift | 11 Comments on Heats are selected; Start bidding now in the auction


55 teams will contest this year’s men’s and women’s races, up 5 from last year.  That’s what we like to see.  Mission #3 of the buggy alumni association coming up spades.  Even though we’re up 5 teams, there will be only 19 heats which is 6 fewer than last year.  The trick is that since hill 1 was repaved this summer, buggy can once again use all three lanes and set up some action-packed heats.

Now that the heats are settled and it is 9am Friday morning, the auction is open for bids!  Head right on over to

http://cmubuggy.org/auction

and get in on the action.  Remember …

and the heats are:

Update: There were  few last minute changes to the heats which are now marked in orange …

  • Phikap will not be entering a Men’s C
  • CIA C moved from lane 2 to lane 3 in Men’s heat 2
  • CIA A moved from heat 7 to heat 6

Continue reading →

Thursday Poll: Who’s going to get a trophy?

Posted on | by Sam Swift | 19 Comments on Thursday Poll: Who’s going to get a trophy?

Trophy count by team 2000-2009Today is the last Thursday we’ve got before the circus comes to town, so I’m going to cut straight to the heart of the matter with this, the final Thursday Poll of the year.  Who do you think is going to go home with a trophy from this year’s races?

When it comes to raceday predictions, picking the winners is the more obvious game, but it’s not nearly as interesting.  Over the past 10 years, we’ve only seen 3 teams win the men’s or women’s races.  It’s the same three teams in each contest, and I don’t think you’d find many people betting on anyone else to win either of this year’s races.

Picking the trophy winners (1st-3rd for the Women and 1st-6th for the Men) on the other hand, requires a more nuanced and sophisticated look at the field.  8 different women’s teams and 13 men’s teams have taken a trip on stage to claim hardware in the last 10 years.  3 of last year’s 9 winners were not on stage the year before.  So, with that historical context, pick which teams you think will have something to drink from this year.

Keep in mind, DQs and spins are part of the equation.  Look at that 2004 column if you don’t believe me.  Teams on the ballot have either won a trophy in the last 5 years, or made it to day 2 last year.


Click through to vote or see the results … Continue reading →

$2000 matching donation for the BAA!

Posted on | by Sam Swift | 8 Comments on $2000 matching donation for the BAA!

Lead TruckIt’s that exciting time of year in the buggy world for teams and alumni alike.

We’ve just been contacted by an extremely generous anonymous donor that is pledging up to $2000 to the BAA as a matching gift to whatever we raise from the lead truck auction.  This is by far the largest gift we’ve received to date, and we can say how honored we are to warrant such a generous contribution.  It just goes to show how much buggy means to all of us buggy alumni, and we’re just glad we can be here to help keep everyone connected.

That said, the most important thing we need to focus on now is that this is a matching donation. We don’t have any of that gift yet.  It’s up to you! Every dollar that you bid in the lead truck auction will be doubled.  To earn the entire $2000 pledge, we need to get $2000 in bids from all the rest of you passionate buggy fans. Continue reading →

DTD down for the year, but not out

Posted on | by Sam Swift | 5 Comments on DTD down for the year, but not out

Sweepstakes has officially decided, and DTD has confirmed, that 2010 is not going to be the year they break back onto the raceday scene.  DTD made its first appearance on the buggy course in recent history in October and got off to a good start.  They had their share of incidents, but in the fall that’s just part of being new.  Problem was that the incidents kept piling up regularly into the spring and it didn’t seem like they had a reasonable chance of making it around the course on raceday.

One of the BAA’s stated goals is to encourage greater participation in the sport, so we’re interested in their experience and how we can help teams like them in the future.  We got in contact with DTD’s co-buggy-chair, Ian McIntyre, and asked a few questions: Continue reading →