Racing by Frank MacCrory (FrankM) writing as Oveur A. Cheever - Short, Sci Fi - Winning At Any Cost: Cream Soda, Go-Kart Track, Pilot - pdf format

Rather a lacklustre title for such a full-on entertaining script.
Don't worry, that's a very mild criticism. And that's just my opinion so... :)

This year might be the armpit of
history,
;D

Loved the soda/beer line too. What a character she is.

Good job, writer. So much packed into a pretty crummy combo of elements. Loved the social commentary.
Theme? Well, it was part of Nicole's OCD personality. Half the time I had no idea what was going on anyway but well written and thoroughly entertaining.

This is bold and creative. It just needs some ironing out (don't they all).

The heavy science exposition at the beginning makes this tough to get into. Also, the time expedition taking such risks in a previous era, a plague zone as well, just so Nicole could stretch her legs seems a little thin.

However, once Nicole transforms and goes into New York this becomes a lot of fun and relevant. Winning at all costs, almost literally!

Good job.

-Mark

Second script I've read with a montage, wish I'd have thought of that to get more of the story into less space!

Some great and pertinent commentary in here and I really liked the setup, nice.

Criteria are all there, theme... yep, though I sort of expected the cost to be higher - like marooned forever ;-)

Good job writer

While some of the exposition gets a bit heavy handed, overall, the script is creative and well written. All the boxes checked.

Nice job.

Very entertaining little short. All your requisites met and fairly solid on the theme. Although not pertinent to the story, she sure did enjoy the hell out of that cream soda.

Not much to say, a fun read. Good job, writer.

This was a fun read. I definitely struggled the first couple pages though. Lots of technical words and a few times I has a hard time picturing what you were describing. But the last few pages were great. Love your take on the theme.

Nice job, writer!!

Wow, this is very inventive way to use your stinky (wow, super stinky!) variables and you did really well.

The story is nice. And I'm glad you were stuck with sci-fi. This is really colorful.

The middle part got a little (a tad) muddled and slow. But you really tried something different and bold here. Congrats.

A fair bit of shoehorning with the variables especially the go kart track - neither it nor the soda affect the story - but a cool time travel one which I'm a sucker for.  Writing was competent so good stuff.

Good use of all that was needed. Pretty sure she was going to end up stranded on Earth. It was humorous and had a bit of "Star Trek IV" vibe to it.

Whoa, cool and smooth.  I am not a pro, and apparently I'm easily amused. Just some comments, no big analysis here. You know you're in for a fun, unpretentious ride. but it feels more like time manipulation than time travel... not saying that's a bad thing, but overall, I liked it. My 2 cents. Good luck! :)-ghostiegirl.

Good stuff. Really enjoyed this one.

Couple of notes: the petroglyphs line threw me. Read it multiple times before I finally got it. Now I understand it, there's no trouble -- it should have been obvious. But, I did stumble on it.

1st software line also threw me. Didn't totally understand it until the 2nd reference. (Not that you should change anything... just wanted to point out where slow people like me stumble.)

That's it. All I got.

Fun script. Great use of bizarre parameters.

Enjoyed this read. A little muddled at the beginning but good use of the criteria, and it's pretty cool how this pilot was seduced by the go-kart track. One of the better entries of the week.

AJR

I admit I did get a bit confused at times but after a couple of reads it was clearer.

Well done.

Thank you to all the readers who stuck it through five grueling weeks of the Writers' Tournament.

A lot fewer complaints about muddled writing this week, so I must be getting better at this.

Everyone seemed to get the gist of the story, but missed that Nicole herself has the same traits as the go-kart customers. She's ignoring risks she was made aware of, and displays the longterm/shortterm orientation of a toddler. She's immune to Covid-19 (presumably part of Coronavirus Group Five), but risked being marooned for an extended period relative to her own time. She ended up getting scooped on a study she'd spent a lot of time and effort setting up.

All of the character names are mishmashes of cultures, and I picture them all being what we'd today call mixed-race, since that'll be normal by then.

There were some unfortunate cuts due to page limits, though I realize one choice I made actually used up more space. Having Nicole see a read-out of the new immunizations in an action block would have taken up fewer lines.

Didn't get a chance to poke fun at New Yorkers having no practice driving whether they have a license or not, or go into anything that the customers said. Not sure if including customer lines would add or detract from a slightly longer rewrite.

A revised version of this has been posted as Misplaced Priorities, which hopefully addresses everyone's concerns about the title and unclear bits.

It still meets all of the original requirements, though now spills onto a sixth page.