Starting a Meet

Purpose

Help operators choose the right starting path from the 2Timer home screen.

What you see on the home screen

The main meets screen gives you two top-level actions:

• New
• Import

New is for building a fresh meet in 2Timer.

Import is for creating a meet from an existing source file instead of starting from a blank setup.

Path 1: Create a meet from scratch

Use the New button when you want to build the meet directly in 2Timer.

The New menu lets you choose the sport:

• Run
• Cross Country
• Track & Field Indoor
• Track & Field Outdoor

After you choose a sport, 2Timer opens the new-meet wizard. This is the best path when:

• the meet is brand new
• you want to choose the sport, genre, dates, and venue yourself
• you want 2Timer to create the event structure from its built-in setup flow
• you plan to import athletes or results later

This is usually the most flexible option.

Path 2: Create a meet from import

Use the Import button when your starting point is an existing file rather than a blank meet.

The current import options on the home screen are:

• From 2T Backup
• Hytek Semicolon Delimited

Both of these create a meet from imported data, but they are useful in different situations.

From 2T Backup

Use From 2T Backup when you already have a .2t backup from 2Timer.

This is the right choice when you want to:

• restore a meet from another machine
• recover from a backup
• reuse a prior meet as the starting point for a new one
• effectively clone last season’s setup before making edits

This is the closest thing to a “clone meet” workflow on the home screen. If you exported a previous meet to .2t, importing that backup is the fastest way to bring its structure and data forward into a new working copy.

See Importing a 2Timer Backup.

Hytek Semicolon Delimited

Use Hytek Semicolon Delimited when your source of truth is a semicolon meet-data export file and you want 2Timer to build the meet around that file.

This is a strong fit when:

• registration or meet-management software already produced the meet file
• the source file already defines much of the meet structure
• you want to start from imported meet data instead of entering basics manually

Even though the label says Hytek, this format is often used as a general interchange format by more than one system.

See Creating a Meet from a Semicolon File.

Which path should I choose?

Choose New if you want to create the meet from scratch in 2Timer.

Choose From 2T Backup if you want to restore, reuse, or clone a previous 2Timer meet.

Choose Hytek Semicolon Delimited if your meet already exists as a semicolon export and you want to create the meet from that import.

Practical recommendation

If you ran this meet in 2Timer before, start from From 2T Backup.

If another system already has the meet structure and can export semicolon data, start from Hytek Semicolon Delimited.

If neither of those is true, start with New.