Space Race Championship is out in the world. There’s plenty of details that I’d planned for this one that never appeared in the story. One of those things relates to the competitors. They all are named, or at least the 20 that progress to the main event are. But did you also know that each had an assigned spacecraft named, with a registration made for every one of those 20?
Of course, the top four were in place right from the start of planning. Maybe not their registrations, but certainly their names. Naturally, we have Tom Hughs, the competitor the story follows. One of only two people to use a Space Kicker in the event, the registration originally wasn’t A/41m2209. That change to reference Tom’s dad and his birthday came with the final drafts. But I still put the original registration of M/2209k as one Tom uses in the Space Racer game.
Next up is Sally Evans, user of a Falcon ‘craft, with a designation of Z/x1916ec. The numbers in all these registrations directly relate to a letter. In the case of Sally’s Falcon, it would read as Z/xspec when translated. It references the ZX Spectrum, one of the bestselling British home computers of the 80s. I felt such a reference fit with Sally’s drive to do her best in the Championship, thrust into it as she was with little help.
As for the other two of the top four, Adam and Daniel are neighbours who are the same age as me. Though I didn’t want to use both as first names. So, for Adam, I looked to crisps. For Daniel, I considered those names I knew from school. And so, Adam McCoy and Katie Daniels were the other two of the top four. Originally, the designations of their ‘craft were M/d2f and S/w6hn respectively. Little thought had been given to them back in 2014, with even Sally having a different designation. And even spacecraft.
When it came to finally getting the second half of the story written in 2019, I knew I needed a full cast of competitors for the events. And so, I looked back in time. To when I first concepted Space Race Championship, and even before. So, for Katie, the school I was at became her ‘craft registration. For Adam, there’s always been one gaming company that has been with me even during the earliest days. And so the registrations of L/51so23es and N/9nt5n4o were given to each respectively.
Now, before getting to every other competitor, I do want to look back at 2014. As there are four other competitors I’d named back then to go with these top four. Jack Moore with a Falcon, designation T/2if6. Pomola Muree with a Galaxy, designation P/99d. Ryan-Andrew Smith with a Falcon, designation H/x2-sd. And Daniel Tampwick with a D.O.T., designation Z/2f65. The D.O.T. being the original name of the Rotablade.
Of those four names, only one truly survived, even if the ‘craft and registration became different. Two had slight changes to names. As for Pomola Muree, I like to think they just failed to get through the initial dogfight qualifier. As back with the 2014 version of the championship, things worked a bit different. Eight would emerge from that initial dogfight to face the four challenges. The four with the highest number of points would then face the final race through the asteroids.
With the full roster made in 2019, Daniel Tampwick now owns a Falcon, with designation R/ic91r4o. After all, I wanted at least a small F1 reference, and Daniel Ricciardo was one of the drivers I followed back when I was invested in F1. Though I did drop one c from the name for some reason. Jack became Jackie Moore, still in a Falcon, but now with the registration of O/l922e. A reference to Olive Hill, the first of the schools I attended.
Ryan-Andrew Smith became Ryan Ross-Smith. The change brought in one of my oldest friends as a competitor, along with referencing the fact this friend also became a part of the Alternate Halesowen and Beyond universe. He flies with a Galaxy, designation H/157g. From this, I then put my two best and oldest friends into the championship as well.
Hayden Bell flies with a Galaxy, designation J/15ne19. Claire Beckett flies with a Rotablade, designation T/r15m1ns. And, of course, I had to get my alias Brandon Golden in there. Also with a Rotablade, the designation is G/0ld5n. One of the few registrations I actually reference in the story. With ten on the roster of competitors, I needed a good way to generate a load of names. Without just using a computer to do it. And so I looked to a film I’m very fond of.
Yes, The Magic Roundabout had a great cast of characters to easily make names from. Dougal, Brian, Dylan, Ermintrude, and Florence all are picked, with last names referencing something about them. Except with Ermintrude, where I took the first half of the name and mirrored it to use as the surname. The registrations for the ‘craft these five own use the surname of the actor who voice them. In the UK version, that is.
To reel them off, there’s Dougal Sweet, the only other user of a Space Kicker among these 20. Registration of W/9ll91ms. Brian Sheldon in a Falcon, designation B/ro142nt. Trudy Nimré in a Galaxy, designation L/1221ley. Florence Petala in a Basic, designation M/in0721e. And Dylan Hare in a Rotablade, designation N/i7825. Now, what other references could I use for characters?
Ah, I could dig into my core franchises. And so we get Bob Harrison, flying in a Falcon with the designation H/1n19ol0. Harrison Ford has played many other characters, after all, with this one fitting in two of them. Han Solo and Bob Falfa from American Graffiti. But then, I did get a bit more from Harrison Ford, with a second character called Graham Jones, also flying a Falcon, but this one with the designation of I/n49an1.
Yes, Indiana Jones is playing a part of this. Though I really don’t know where the Graham part of the name came from. The last reference I make is to Power Rangers, with Skyler Aquarion. Sky, of SPD, and the Rangers of Aquitar. Skyler flies a Basic, with the designation of P/r1916d. I didn’t want all the characters to be references to something, but failed when I thought of one more. Well, a few merged into one character.
Stella Sandford is a name that makes reference to the Cornetto Trilogy. Firstly, with the more obvious of the two. Sandford being where the action of Hot Fuzz takes place. The second being a reference to The World’s End by naming a beer. Stella Sandford flies a Falcon, designation S/k57n5ss. Reading Skegness, one of my favourite places to be on holiday when I was younger. And possibly still now. Been a while since I was last there.
The last competitor of the championship is Rachel Carrington. Of the lot, she became the most developed. There was little inspiration for the name that I remember. I just wanted something that sounded a bit rich, even though she’s a very down-to-Earth person. Which is how her Basic ‘craft ended up with the registration of E/118th. And the fact she was a nature lover and artist, who used the championship as a way of marketing herself.
All 20 competitors, then. When it came to who would get knocked out with each event, I did have a plan for it. Naturally, I couldn’t ever put any of the top four into the last four places of any event. But there was a slight narrative I wove with the positions that all competitors would come. Whether that be Brandon Golden of this universe not being a great person, or Florence Petala just scraping through until she is finally knocked out.
