Heat Sheet

A heat sheet is a draw format which combines competitors into 1 or more flights in which they compete against each other as a group, in contrast with a group pool play brackets where players compete in matches individually against each competitor within the group.

Heat sheets are typically used in sports such as surfing, racing, swimming, gymnastics, etc where the competitors are either judged using a points system, or when a group of people race against each other all at the same time.

A heat sheet can have multiple rounds or only one. The winners of each round advance into later flights until they reach the final heat competing against winners from other heats to determine the champion.

A heat bracket with death heat can be used if you want losers of a round to compete against other losers to advance back to the main heat. Heat tabulations sheets are used to determine who advances to the next round

The heat sheet also defines a lane assignment / jersey color during competition so the participants can be tracked and judged.

A multi-round heat sheet is usually seeded in such a way as to keep the higher skilled competitors in separate flights in the early rounds so they knockout the lower and average skilled competitors first. When seeded correctly, all the highest skilled competitors meet up in the last heat for final standings in the division.

Advantages:

A heat sheet allows a group of participants to compete against each other all at the same time.

Heat Sheets are easy for director to control competition schedule time. Changing the number of competitors within each flight, or changing the number of participants advancing from each round will create a different set of heat sheets.

Disadvantages

An improperly seeded heats sheets can put higher skilled competitors against each other in early rounds, keeping them from advancing. Sometimes the best participants may not all be in the final heat to determine the champion of the division.