NRS Firsts

Credit where credit is due, right? At NASA Rally Sport, we're proud of the innovations we've delivered. Here are some of the things we've pioneered as an American rally sanctioning body. You want to know what we've been up to, here it is! And of course, more new stuff is waiting in the wings, so get ready!

Innovation is about coming up with new ideas. Evaluating the existing scenario and imagining creative new solutions. Hours of 'what if?' and 'could we?'. And when you're full of innovation, you end up with a lot of firsts.

• First. Online scoring inquiry submission via user account integrated with the scoring back-end tools. 2021.
• First. Electric rally car class. 2020.
• First. Created a digital GPS odo app that downloads the official route book, auto advances to the correct tulip, and speaks the turns using voice synthesis over Bluetooth. 2017.
• First. Created a GPS location tracking tool that can be used to track racers, crew, zero cars, and volunteers and made it available to all events for free. 2017.
• First. Redesigned our user accounts so that racers and volunteers can do all their signup and registration in the language of their choice, to support all the native French speakers we now have in Canada. Approximately a tenth of the users of the NASA system are doing it in a language that is not English. 2017.
• First. Made an online tool that computes the correct check in time for navigators. Just tell it what rally you're in, what stage you ran, and what times you got, and it tells you when to check in with zero math and it's right every time. 2016.
• First. Built a budgeting and expense tracking tool into registration to help organizers manage finances. 2016.
• First. End to end mobile-enabled web site, from public front end to racer/volunteer accounts back end . 2016.
• First. Build rally specific software for smart-watches. 2015.
• First. Score a rally event where 100% of the data for start and finish stage times was uploaded digitally from devices in the field. 2015.
• First. Use digital devices to replace paper log sheets for all arrival controls at a rally. 2015.
• First. Created easy to use online tool for road book creation that can generate instant PDFs in multiple formats. 2015.
• First. Created a Test Day program designed to help racers get more seat time and develop their driving skills. 2015.
• First. Built a "911 Dispatch Board" type of software for the radio Net Control to use. It can pull in reports from registration and volunteering, aids in tracking cars, and pushes live status information on each stage out to the officials. 2014.
• First. Created our own new timing clocks, built on Nook hardware with a from-scratch Android app developed in-house. And the app is available to everyone in the Android Store. 2013.
• First. Increasing the excitement level of our events with big branded flags. 2013.
• First. Generating the scoring output in multiple languages simultaneously. Rally is a world sport, we want the rest of the world to follow our races! 2013.
• First. Online training videos for the scoring team. Separate videos for the data entry team and the scoring chief, to teach them about all the intricacies of scoring software. 2013
• First. A mobile-ready, crowd-sourced event information updates system to make getting new about the rally published much more inclusive. This lets the event organizer manage updates from photographers, racers, and volunteers with a few clicks. 2013.
• First. An volunteer ID badge generating tool integrated with the volunteer database to reduce the work for organizers. 2013.
• First. Online training videos for the event registrars so they can learn the options and flow of the racer registration system and the volunteer management system. 2013.
• First. Online racer profiles. This began with the Racer of the Day front page promotion that came about during late 2012.
• First. Instructional videos for volunteers. This began with simple videos on how to set and use rally clocks in summer 2012.
• First. Gave over 200 rally car rides in one day. 2012 HyperFest.
• First. Broadcast live in-car footage for a single racer covering over half of that racer's entire rally. 2012 Sandblast Rally.
• First. Smart phone app. This Android app lets spectators time the rally cars in the middle of the woods. 2012.
• First. The RallySolo program allowed drivers to tackle the rally stages with no codriver to usher in a new group of racers. 2012.
• First. A registration system that lets organizers manage the complication of online payments while getting their funds deposited directly into their accounts.
• First. QR codes for smartphones integrated into posters, spectator guides, road books, and banners. 2011.
• First. Stepped away from unusable paper-based appendixes in the rule book. Converted our main appendix to an online resources that were actual usable by organizers instantly and printable from our web site. 2011.
• First. Database driven spectator guide system keyed together with event registration. This technology enables super fun things like massive, over 70 page spectator guides loaded with driver bios. 2011
• First. Press release distribution system for racers. 2011 blew this wide open.
• First. Broadcasting live in-car video from rally stages. 2011.
• First. Broadcasting stage-side live video. 2011.
• First. Umbrella girls at a rally. Really, it took this long? 2011.
• First. Comprehensive document and execution package for new organizers. RallySprint In A Box debuted in 2011. We're hard at work actually making new rallies happen.
• First. Virtual online licenses for folks that travel to other countries. Hello 2010.
• First. Replacing the avalanche of insurance paperwork at registration with a simple signature. 2010.
• First. Online scoring system available to all rallies that run with NRS featuring remote data entry. Online in 2010.
• First. Volunteer signup/ management system for all rallies that run with NRS. First used in 2009. Continuously upgraded since, and it remains the most advanced rally sign up database available.
• First. Mass SMS / text messaging system to inform spectators, volunteers, and racers about what's happening in the 800 square miles of rally. It's been a big hit ever since we rolled this out in 2010.
• First. Comprehensive rally history of all American competitors. Goes all the way back to the year 2000. Online in 2009.
• First. Live video broadcast to the internet of the rallies. We did this in 2009.
• First. Online payment for license/membership payment. Put that together back in 2008, because geez, if we can't have flying cars can't we at least pay online? It's the 21st century after all!
• First. Motorcycles. 2007. If they can race in Dakar and call that rally, we can do it here too. To date, in the US this has been the most quantifiably successful program at getting new racers into rally, ever.
• First. Tarmac rally. The first full length, multi-day, all tarmac stage rally in the US showed up in TN in 2005.
• First. High level stock class. Years before other super high production classes, in 2005 NRS recognized that STis and EVOs in stock-ish form needed their own place to play.
• First. Rule books optimized for the web. Not everyone had high bandwidth back in 2003. We squeezed that first rule book down to about 2 meg.
• First. Naturally aspirated AWD class. Yup, way back in 2004 when we put out our first ever rule book, this was called "Prototype 2". At the very beginning NRS realized that this is a great place for affordable grassroots racing.