Use Nokogiri and open-uri to parse Golden Gate Trail Run results from HTML to XML.

GoldenGateTrailRunParser.rb

#
# Use Nokogiri and open-uri to parse Golden Gate Trail Run results from HTML to XML.
# 2012.02.13
#

require 'rubygems'
require 'nokogiri'
require 'open-uri'

# Race results for the Golden Gate Trail Run in San Francisco, California on Saturday, February 11, 2012.
race_results_page = Nokogiri::HTML(open("http://www.coastaltrailruns.com/gg_results_12.htm"))

builder = Nokogiri::XML::Builder.new do |xml|
  xml.root {
    is_half_marathon_result = false
    # The results for all the races that day are displayed in a single table.
    race_results_page.xpath("//tr").each do |row|
      
      # Half marathon results begin at the merged cell with "Half Marathon" in h1 tags and end at '30 Km'.
      half_marathon_row = row.xpath("td/h1[font='Half Marathon']/../..")
      if !half_marathon_row.empty?
        is_half_marathon_result = true
      end
      thirty_kilo_row = row.xpath("td/h1[font='30 Km']/../..")
      if !thirty_kilo_row.empty?
        is_half_marathon_result = false
      end
      
      if is_half_marathon_result
        if row.xpath("td[@colspan]").empty? 
          # W3C specs state the first element is at 1
          @place = row.xpath("td[1]/p/font/text()").to_s # 000
          if !@place.empty?
            @name = row.xpath("td[2]/font/text()").to_s # First Last
            @city = row.xpath("td[3]/font/text()").to_s # City State (no punctuation)
            @bib = row.xpath("td[4]/p/font/text()").to_s # 000
            @age = row.xpath("td[5]/p/font/text()").to_s # 00
            # @group = row.xpath("td[6]/p/font/text()").to_s # 00 M 00-00 (place gender age-range)
            @gender = "N"
            @place_by_group = @place
            @age_range = ""
            @group = row.xpath("td[6]/p/font/text()").to_s.strip.split(" ")
            if @group.length > 2
              @place_by_group = @group[0]
              @gender = @group[1]
              @age_range = @group[2]
            end
            @time = row.xpath("td[7]/p/font/text()").to_s # 0:00:00
            @pace = row.xpath("td[8]/p/font/text()").to_s # 00:00/M
            xml.runner(:place => @place, :age => @age, :gender => @gender, :age_range => @age_range, :place_by_group => @place_by_group) {
              xml.name @name
              xml.city @city
              xml.bib @bib
              xml.time @time
              xml.pace @pace
            }
          end
        end
      end
    end
  }
end

# delete if exists
File.delete("GoldenGate2012Results.xml") if File.file?("GoldenGate2012Results.xml")
# write xml
f = File.new("GoldenGate2012Results.xml","w")
f.puts builder.to_xml
f.close