Trusty Track

Trusty Track is race management software for Cub Scout Pinewood Derby events. It runs in a web browser and handles everything from racer registration through final standings — so you can focus on the race, not the paperwork.

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What It Does

Before Race Day

• Set up your race — name, date, location, and racing groups (dens).
• Register racers individually or by bulk-importing a CSV from your pack's roster.
• Assign car numbers automatically or manually, with flexible numbering strategies (global, per-den, or fully manual).
• Print pit passes, driver's licenses and check-in codes — a sheet at a time, on a normal printer.

On Race Day

• Check in racers — verify each car passed inspection and optionally capture racer and car photos. Scan a printed code to jump straight to a racer.
• Schedule heats automatically using a fair scheduling algorithm that ensures each car races in every lane.
• Run the race with live timer integration — results appear automatically as each heat finishes.
• Advance to a championship round — the top finishers race again for final placement.
• Race the slowest cars — a just-for-fun Slowest Race bracket where the last one down the track wins.
• Elimination racing — ladderless elimination: lose too many heats and you're out, no bracket to draw, last car standing wins.
• Balanced racing — each round of heats matches cars doing about as well, so more children get a heat they can win.
• Run free races — practice, exhibition and end-of-day fun heats that never touch the standings.

After the Race

• Race statistics — lane fairness, per-racer averages and consistency, den comparisons, and CSV exports for your records.

For the Audience

• Live observation display — show current racers, the next heat on deck, and a live leaderboard on any screen or projector. All displays update in real-time as the race progresses.

Make It Yours

• Seven themes — pick a look for your own screen, the wall display, and the printed pages, independently: an evening race, a patriotic derby, a keepsake-style certificate, or an ink-conscious pit pass run.

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Documentation

For the full documentation and user guides, visit: https://trusty-track.com/docs/

User Guides

Guide	Description
Getting Started	First-time setup: system settings and creating your first race
Race Setup Guide	Managing dens, registering racers, and preparing the roster
Race Day Operations	Check-in, scheduling heats, running the race, and final standings
Scoring & Championships	How scores are worked out, and how championship rounds pick their field
Awards	Speed trophies, and the judged ones the timer cannot decide
Printables	Pit passes, driver's licenses, and scannable check-in codes
Free Race	Practice and exhibition heats that count for nothing
Hardware Timer	Connecting an electronic finish line, checking it works, and sending us a test report
Fake Timer	Running the whole thing without a track, for practice
Observation Displays	Setting up audience screens and projectors
Race Stats	Lane fairness, per-racer numbers, and CSV exports

Installation

Method	Difficulty	Best for
macOS App	Easy	Mac users
Windows App	Easy	Windows users
Docker	Medium	Home servers, NAS devices
Raspberry Pi	Medium	Dedicated race-day appliance
From Source	Advanced	Developers

Not sure which to pick? See Which method should I use?

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Quick Start (From Source)

# Install dependencies and build the frontend
./scripts/install.sh

# Start the server
./scripts/serve.sh

Then open https://localhost:8005 in your browser. serve.sh always runs over HTTPS with a self-signed certificate it generates on first run, so your browser will warn that the certificate isn't trusted — that's expected for a local install; accept it to continue.

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Developer Documentation

If you're working on Trusty Track itself:

• Development Guide — local setup, testing, and troubleshooting
• Design — architecture, data models, and API design
• Specification — detailed product requirements and user journeys
• Scheduling Algorithms — how heats are generated (PPC / Perfect-N)