October 3, 2004

Last modified October 3, 2004 - 2:17 am

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Associated Press

BOZEMAN - The annual River Bank Run in Missoula each spring draws participants from across Montana, and most of the estimated 3,500 runners who show up each year are eager to know their times and places nearly the minute their feet cross the finish line. That kind of pressure calls for professional race timers.

For that, the YMCA turns to Perfect Timing, a Gallatin Valley company owned by husband-and-wife team Kyle Klicker and Celia Bertoia.

"They've created a company that can really serve Montana in road races and timing," said Beth Woody, spokeswoman for the Missoula Family YMCA, which organizes the race. "They're professional and organized and their demeanor is calm and collected."

Bertoia and Klicker, both competitive distance runners, started Perfect Timing from their home between Bozeman and Belgrade in 2000. They built the company from scratch, using obsolete computers, homemade software and a camper trailer.

Today, they are paid to provide results for more than a dozen Montana races, including the Bridger Ridge Run, the Bozeman Classic and the John Colter Run - all of which they've run themselves.

"Being a runner definitely steered me into this," Bertoia said, sitting at her kitchen table with two second-place trophies she and Klicker won in a recent marathon.

The fact that Bertoia and Klicker love the sport so much - they both have the characteristic willowy limbs and sinewy muscles of competitive distance runners - sets their company apart from other timing companies, Woody said.

"We feel confident they'll handle any question with the utmost professionalism and the interest of the runners, since they're runners themselves," she said. "They can see both sides, the runner's side and the timing side."

Bertoia moved to Bozeman about eight years ago and joined the Big Sky Wind Drinkers running club, becoming its president. She was assigned the task of helping organize the Bozeman Classic during the annual Sweet Pea Festival. The event has both 5- and 10-kilometer races and draws hundreds of runners, so she began looking for a professional race-timing company.

The closest one she could find was in Portland, Ore., she said.

The Portland company came to Bozeman and did the job using all of the latest technology, but Bertoia and Klicker weren't all that impressed.

"They didn't necessarily make it any easier," Klicker said. "I thought, 'We could do this ourselves and make a business out of it."'

The pair didn't have much startup money, so they had to get creative. Instead of the expensive electronic equipment used by many of their competitors, the couple started with several out-of-date notebook computers and software that Klicker designed to turn those computers into virtual stopwatches.

"I do all the computer work and have created software that ... allows us to use old, inexpensive computers instead of expensive timing devices," Klicker said.

During a race, Klicker stands at the finish line. As each runner crosses the line, Klicker hits the "return" button on the computer to record the time. He then enters the numbers printed on the runners' bibs.

Meanwhile, another person tears an identification tag off the bib, and takes it into the camper, which is Bertoia's office on race days. Inside, she uses a computer to coordinate runners' times, numbers and names. The results are quickly posted on the sides of the trailer. Perfect Timing also e-mails runners their results.

But race timing is not just about matching runners with their times. It's also about accuracy and speed. In a 5K race, it's a short time between the starting gun and when runners cross the finish line. The more runners there are, the more confusing it gets.

"The first runners come in within 15 minutes," Klicker said. "There are a lot of details jammed into a short period of time."

Also, runners often get out of order in the chute, people run races without registering and others cut corners - all situations that make race timing a headache. But Bertoia and Klicker have a reputation for handling those situations gracefully. They generally handle the small races - such as Bozeman's Drop and Trot - on their own. And for larger races, their friends pitch in.

"It's pretty hectic," on race day, said Katya Steele, who helped time runners at the Race for the Cure in Helena this summer.

But Woody said that awareness is part of what makes Perfect Timing so good.

"That's the difference we saw from hiring out-of-state, to working with (Perfect Timing) - they're calm and they can manage a crisis in an incredible way," Woody said.

The race-timing business can be stressful, but it has its perks. The busy running season is generally from May to October, and the rest of the year Bertoia and Klicker are free to do other things. And they both enjoy working for themselves after having worked for other people for years. Bertoia worked as a real estate agent and for Montana State University. Klicker is an engineer by trade.

"I work well alone," Bertoia said. "And just being able to work out of my house is fabulous."

They also enjoy working in a field they both love. Their favorite race to time is the local Bridger Ridge Run, a grueling 20-mile run through the Bridger Mountains from Fairy Lake to the "M" in August.

"We've both run it several times and we know the experience the runners go through," Bertoia said.

Bertoia plans to start marketing the service out of state. She'd like to expand so the company can handle more than one race at a time, but still keep the company's homegrown character.

"I don't want to grow the business too much, but it can get a little bit bigger," she said.