Another trick we've found is to run the ground wire to the strip off to one side of the scoring table instead of to the center of the strip. That way it's much less likely to get tripped on and pulled up as referees and fencers walk up to the table.
Interesting to see the differences between what you do and what a US NAC/Summer Nationals does. One thing I can suggest to you: your method for grounding has several problems which we have long worked at and have in the past couple of years pretty well solved. First of all, unless your floors are really, really different from ours, the strip moves a bit. US competitions, the floor is almost always carpet over concrete, and you seem to have a wood floor with what? A rubber coating? Can't really tell, but I'll still bet the strip still moves a bit relative to the floor. If it does, we teach armorers to leave a "service loop", a small extra piece of wire between the strip and the first piece of tape on the floor. That let's the strip move without breaking. But the real suggestion is how to get a better contact. You are using aluminum tape on the edge of the strip. That's okay, but what we are doing now has proven to be MUCH better. We are using copper mesh that intended as a rodent barrier (we call it "rat mesh". We use a piece maybe 6" long. The ground cord is wrapped around it (we have soldered it, but that creates a weak point, and wrapping is easier anyway). We place it under the edge of the strip, spanning the middle two sections. Many fewer problems with ground wires. I don't know if you experience occasional grounding problems with aluminum strips. We used to have quite a few problems. A part of the strip would not be grounded, typically one of the last 3 sections at the ends. Relaying the sections usually fixed it. Even "kicking" the strip to compress the cams would improve it. We have fixed that problem pretty much completely. We run a length of rat mesh under the entire strip. We just put it down before we start laying it out. It doesn't have any wires,. the strip sections just lay on the rat mesh. The mesh just makes much better connections between the sections.
Another trick we've found is to run the ground wire to the strip off to one side of the scoring table instead of to the center of the strip. That way it's much less likely to get tripped on and pulled up as referees and fencers walk up to the table.
Interesting to see the differences between what you do and what a US NAC/Summer Nationals does. One thing I can suggest to you: your method for grounding has several problems which we have long worked at and have in the past couple of years pretty well solved. First of all, unless your floors are really, really different from ours, the strip moves a bit. US competitions, the floor is almost always carpet over concrete, and you seem to have a wood floor with what? A rubber coating? Can't really tell, but I'll still bet the strip still moves a bit relative to the floor. If it does, we teach armorers to leave a "service loop", a small extra piece of wire between the strip and the first piece of tape on the floor. That let's the strip move without breaking.
But the real suggestion is how to get a better contact. You are using aluminum tape on the edge of the strip. That's okay, but what we are doing now has proven to be MUCH better. We are using copper mesh that intended as a rodent barrier (we call it "rat mesh". We use a piece maybe 6" long. The ground cord is wrapped around it (we have soldered it, but that creates a weak point, and wrapping is easier anyway). We place it under the edge of the strip, spanning the middle two sections. Many fewer problems with ground wires.
I don't know if you experience occasional grounding problems with aluminum strips. We used to have quite a few problems. A part of the strip would not be grounded, typically one of the last 3 sections at the ends. Relaying the sections usually fixed it. Even "kicking" the strip to compress the cams would improve it. We have fixed that problem pretty much completely. We run a length of rat mesh under the entire strip. We just put it down before we start laying it out. It doesn't have any wires,. the strip sections just lay on the rat mesh. The mesh just makes much better connections between the sections.