Just received the whistle in the mail today, and I am very impressed. The whistle is very loud and has a great sound. As @tomek75 said, the finger grips are the same size, but luckily they fit me perfectly. Definitely worth it for the money, although I noticed the price went up significantly, but still about half of retail, guess I was just in time. Can post pictures if anyone wants.
Awesome and thanks for the follow up! I mean, they’re plastic- probably the easiest thing ever to make a perfect copy of.
I know this is an old thread but I didn’t feel like starting a new one. I have one question: What is the best referee watch one can get for $200 or under?
I got a Spintso for Christmas and I’ll be hard pressed to go back. In terms of your “under $200” range - just about any watch that you get recommended, outside of a high end Garmin, is gonna top out at that $150 Spintso price. I wear a Spintso and a Garmin 230 when I ref.
Spintso is fantastic - but the batteries only last about a year and unless you pay a pro to change them you can void the warranty. I learned that one the hard way. Edit: Their top watch model is regularly available for $135.
Or search on here for the thread about the garmin vivoactive watch and referee ap. The Spintso may be better (I haven’t used it), but the garmin with the ref ap does everything I would want from a watch on a soccer field, and also became my day to day watch. I believe it costs a bit less than the spintso.
question on garmin vivoactive app - does it vibrate periodically to remind you when you have stopped one of the running clocks?
I need some new scoresheets for this season. So I was wondering: What are the best scoresheets to use in terms of organization and space to write?
I use the backs of old rosters from HS fold them into squares for rigidity. I worked with a national that used two index cards pasted together. I also worked with a college guy who had write on custom made cards but they were kinko'd. I guess it's all a preference thing.
I just buy a pack of 4x6 index cards. They fit perfectly in a referee wallet. You can fill them in by hand, or what I'll do is print them out after filling out the appropriate information in Microsoft Publisher (of the LibreOffice equivalent). I'm rather simple. I have the date, time, field, my position, and the other officials names on the top. Then the team names and a place to write down colors. Then an empty space to record goals and then a place for misconduct or injury notes on the bottom.
This is personal preference. I made my own (perhaps from an idea here) years ago. I have a column in the middle for time, and then a wide space on each side to write what happened (gol or misconduct). It gives me a chronology.I don’t see a reason to be more complicated than that—and for me it is quicker and easier than any of the forms I’ve seen. I just print them and cut them up a couple of times each year. But to each his own.
I use the cards meant for the b+d wallet. Not b+d’s, but the ones made by refereestore.com. I keep it in my left shirt pocket and set it on the top of a card for stability when writing. However, in the rain I’ll use the fifa wallet and rite in the rain.
Well I got for Father’s Day something I’ve been wanting for a while, a garmin forerunner 230. They don’t make it anymore but I didn’t want the added thickness and lower battery life of the 235 just for hr monitoring. I got a used one off of eBay for about $100. The referee timer app available in their App Store works exceedingly well, as others have mentioned, BT sync automatically to my iPad when I get home. (Didn’t pair to my phone because I don’t want to get notifications all the time on it). I haven’t pushed it yet but it looks like I can get at least six hours of gps time on a charge, It is very lightweight and comfortable, lighter than my other watches, and nice large numbers. Screen is not very bright at night but not really a problem to see even then. I’m confident enough in it to use as a primary.