2012 Mid-Atlantic Robotics FRC Region Championship

[nlknauss]

It's time to get psyched for the MAR Championship April 12-14th at the Liacouras Center in Philadelphia! The event details are here.

The final M.A.R. rankings and qualifying teams can be found here. We'll start to see a list of the 54 teams populate in the next few days as teams prepare their payments and register.

I'm looking forward to a high energy event with some great competition. I know our team is also ready for some excitement in Philadelphia!

[293spike]

Has anyone had any luck getting through to an actual person at FIRST finances yet? We called twice and had to leave messages both times. We did state in the messages our preferred payment method, but we do not want to be cut out simply due to bad timing or a lack of communication on our part. We are also currently on spring break so the process is a bit hectic.

[Deetman]

One of our mentors was able to get a hold of someone in FIRST Finance about around 11:15am this morning after we surprisingly received an email saying we were qualified even though we weren't in the top 54. It sounds like things are quite hectic in general with respect to MAR Championship and we wanted to be sure that if the email we received was real that we'd be able to attend.

Just to be sure the FIRST finance number is: 1-800-871-8326 ext. 563

[293spike]

Yes the same thing just happened with us. We were also very surprised to get an email.

[Deetman]

My theory is that the email accidentally went out to all MAR teams indicating that the team had qualified, but really should have been worded such that it was a deadline reminder email.

[293spike]

Yea, I'm thinking the same thing, especially since nothing is in our TIMS account about the event at all.

[LH Machinist]

The link for who is attending is broken. The last count I saw yesterday was 35 teams had accepted. Any update?

[Jared341]

Use this link: http://frclinks.com/e/pa

[Mark McLeod]

41 teams now.

[scottandme]

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/...1YVpMQURnY 0E

Green Teams are registered. Last I heard there were at least 4 teams who declined - team 1626 is the first team to register from the "waitlist".

Also moved the columns to show teams who are already registered/qualified for the FIRST Championship. 357 won DC last weekend but doesn't seem to be on the list (yet?). Feel free to edit if I made a mistake with those.

Teams not registered (in point order):

103
1302
834
224
2729
316
555
1811
2191
1228
1143
87
75

[Akash Rastogi]

Our team is excited for MAR Championships and ready to go! The kids are CADing up a new bridge arm as well that will hopefully end up on the competition robot in time.

See you all there!

[scottandme]

We're up to 44 now, but moving slowly. They're clearly moving down the list, as 303 registered yesterday from the #58 seed.

Anybody have knowledge about which teams declined so we can cross them off the list?

I added another sheet to the google doc to calculate standings during/after the MAR champs. Does anyone know if the 5 point based spots for world champs can be declined/backfill? In the MAR bylaws it says that the 7 award based slots can only be given to the winner of that award (3x champ, 2x CA, 1x EI, 1x RAS), but nothing about the 5 next highest teams by points. It does mention that if a district winner also wins an award they would add a 6th point based qualifier. Seeing as 5 of the top 9 teams by points are already attending nationals, it would be a shame if those spots couldn't slide down.

The biggest minus of this new setup is that travel costs are going to be insane for teams qualifying next week, if you can even find a flight for 20+ people. I'm hoping that FIRST/Steele Meetings hold some rooms for week 6/7 qualifying teams, but that's probably going to be rough as well.

[Hallry]

Originally Posted by scottandme

I added another sheet to the google doc to calculate standings during/after the MAR champs. Does anyone know if the 5 point based spots for world champs can be declined/backfill? In the MAR bylaws it says that the 7 award based slots can only be given to the winner of that award (3x champ, 2x CA, 1x EI, 1x RAS), but nothing about the 5 next highest teams by points. It does mention that if a district winner also wins an award they would add a 6th point based qualifier. Seeing as 5 of the top 9 teams by points are already attending nationals, it would be a shame if those spots couldn't slide down.

Agreed. Even if the MAR rules don't do it automatically, if a team qualifies to St. Louis both through MAR due to ranking and outside of MAR, maybe they will voluntarily decline their MAR ranking spot, giving it to the next highest ranked team?

[DevenStonow]

Originally Posted by scottandme

Anybody have knowledge about which teams declined so we can cross them off the list?

Well, the declines could be any of the teams on this list posted above(as well as every team not on the list up until 303):

103
1302
224
2729
316
555
1811
2191
1228
1143
87
75
204
1672
1367

I removed 834 from the previously posted list; they're up on the list, as are 1626, who were the first on the "waiting list".

[DevenStonow]

Originally Posted by Hallry

Agreed. Even if the MAR rules don't do it automatically, if a team qualifies to St. Louis both through MAR due to ranking and outside of MAR, maybe they will voluntarily decline their MAR ranking spot, giving it to the next highest ranked team?

Part of me says they don't; I don't remember where I read it though. It wasn't explicitly saying that though, IIRC it said something along the likes of, "The 5 point-based spots cannot be passed on to other teams".

EDIT: Nevermind, my thought of that was from reading the part of the MAR by-laws about the 7 award winners...MAR Supplement says nothing about the 5 spots..just that they go to non-award winners...hopefully they'd pass it down the line.