Using Laced
Your drop day checklist
Six checks before a Draw opens: alert set, billing green, right release, right size, low power mode off, and entries started early enough.
Checked against app version 1.4.11 ·
The day before, open the Calendar and tap Alert Me on the release you want.
The alert arrives thirty minutes before the drop. The calendar only covers the next seven days, so a release further out will not be listed yet.
Open Billing and confirm every profile you plan to use has no red dot.
A red dot means the profile is not usable. Validation can take up to sixty seconds and errors spike under load, so do this the night before rather than at five to.
Check that the release selected in the app is the exact one dropping.
Colourways of the same silhouette often sit days apart on the calendar. Confirm the date and the colourway, not just the model name.
Confirm the size on each entry.
Each profile gets one entry per release and one size for that entry. A size you would not wear is a spent entry you cannot get back.
Turn off low power mode and put the phone on charge.
Low power mode throttles background work and network activity, which is the wrong state for a timed submission. A dead phone mid window is the same as not entering.
Start your entries about five minutes before the Draw opens.
Allow ten to fifteen minutes if you are running ten or more launches or several profiles, because Start All staggers them with delays.
Why a list beats knowing what to do
Almost nothing on drop day is difficult. It is just time sensitive, and a window that lasts ten minutes does not forgive a card that expired last month. Every item above is there because it is a failure we see, not because it rounds the list out.
The steps are in the order you should do them, which is mostly the night before rather than on the hour.
The night before is where the work is
Billing is the one to settle early. A profile validates in up to sixty seconds normally, but errors spike during heavy traffic, and heavy traffic is exactly when you will be checking. Green the night before is worth more than green at five to. If a profile is red, billing errors lists what each message means and what actually fixes it.
Setting Alert Me at the same time costs nothing and buys you a thirty minute warning. The calendar runs seven days ahead, so a release you are watching for next month will not appear until it is inside that window.
The two checks people skip
Selecting the wrong release is more common than it sounds. Nike often runs several colourways of one silhouette within a week, the names are close, and a calendar scan at speed picks the wrong row. Check the date and the colourway together.
Size is the other one. Each profile gets a single entry per release, and one size for that entry. Entering a size you would not wear turns a real entry into a spent one, and it is not something you can undo after the Draw closes. If you run several profiles, check them individually rather than assuming they carried over.
Timing, honestly
Five minutes before the window is enough for a standard run. Ten to fifteen is the right call once you are running ten or more launches or several profiles, because Start All introduces delays between entries and those delays need room.
None of this makes any single entry more likely to be selected. A Draw picks at random after the close, and the mechanics do not care when you pressed Start. The reason to be early is narrower and still worth it: an entry submitted inside the window counts, and one that did not get started does not.
Once the window opens, stop touching things
Leave the app in the foreground, leave billing alone, and let the log cards run. Editing a profile mid window re-triggers validation and takes it out of play at the worst possible moment. What happens during a drop goes through the rest.
If something goes wrong
A profile still shows a red dot ten minutes before the drop
Why it happens: Validation has failed rather than stalled, or an edit restarted it and it has not finished.
Do not keep editing it. Read the error on the profile and fix that specific field, then leave it alone for a minute. If it will not clear in time, run the drop on the profiles that are green.
You realise the size is wrong after the window has opened
Why it happens: The entry was created with the wrong size and has already been started.
Stop that entry, correct the size, and start it again only if the window is still open. Once the Draw closes there is nothing to change.
Questions people ask
How early should I start my entries?
About five minutes before the Draw opens for a normal run. Ten to fifteen minutes if you have ten or more launches or several profiles, because Start All spaces them out with delays and needs the extra room.
Does starting earlier help my entry?
No. A Draw closes at a set time and selects at random from everyone inside the window, so an early entry and a late one are treated the same. Starting early only protects you from missing the window.
Why does low power mode matter?
It throttles network and background activity to save battery, which is the opposite of what a timed submission needs. Turn it off before the window and put the phone on charge instead.
What if I only have one profile?
The checklist is the same, it is just shorter. One free profile gives one entry per release, and five minutes before the window is early enough for a single start.