[aprssig] Marathon support with APRS

[Bob Bruninga]

> I worked a 17 mile off-road foot race this past
> weekend and did not see that
> APRS would have been of much value to the
> communications network.

Here is the top down priority list of how we use it:
1) Tracker on Lead vehicle
2) Tracker on tail vehicle
3) Tracker on VIP in charge and other VIP's
4) Trackers on SAG wagons and other important support
   vehicles.

That covers the logistics items.

Then for the entertainment value to the thousands watching, we used the special APRSdos dead-reckoning version that 
allows all manner of humans in the race to be tracked,
without needing any RF trackers.  It simple dead-reckons the position of any special runner around the course.  TYpically then we add these moving objects to the race too:

  Lead Female
  The PACK
  Lead Wheel chair
  The Juggler (he juggles as he runs)
  Any other easy to recognize runner.

These runners are transmitted by the APRSdos DR program and appear to all OTHER APRS programs as if these runners had trackers on them.  This lets eveyrone see where these key "runners" are too.  Only one person with headphones runs the APRS-DR program and keeps objects updated with his cursor as new reports come in.  The progam keeps them moving...

de WB4APR, Bob