Re: Championships for dummies
 

It's more than a mall-style food court. That food court is HUGE! Bigger than any mall's food court I've ever seen. It's enormous and it just goes UP! You go in there and look up, it sure is a sight to see.

The CNN center food court is a point of interest. It's like 5 minutes walk away from the arena, too. In fact there is a walkway from the food court to the arena.

Re: Championships for dummies
 

BTW-NEMO is starting another white paper in the hints and tips series. "Preparing for the Championship" Thanks to KathieK for another great idea. The main focus is not stuff like scouting, but how to plan ahead for this, especially with funding. We will include any best practices from this thread.

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Also check out MOEmentum, which gives weekly updates during the build season for rookie teams; it includes tips from mentors and students compiled throughout the years. The unit on the Championship hasn't been updated yet, but you can still access last years - "Championship Preparation - The Mother of All FIRST Events". It will be updated in a week or two


http://moe365.org/moementum.php

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Register to attend a conference workshop. Your peers are volunteering their time in Atlanta to present these great workshops and every team should take advantage of them. It's a good learning experience, and also another way to network with other teams you might never get to meet otherwise.

Visit the Chairmans' Award Winners Hall of Fame. Be inspired by the best in FIRST!

Visit the FIRST LEGO League World Festival (80 teams from 30 countries competing on Thursday, Friday and Sat morning) and the FIRST Vex Challenge Championship competition (50 teams from around the U.S. competing on Thursday and Friday).

Visit the many colleges and universities' booths and learn about their FIRST Scholarships. It's never too early (or too late) to start thinking about higher education options.

If you get some "down time" travel across the street to Centennial Olympic Park and play some frisbee or run through the water fountains (it's OK to be a kid at heart sometimes). Or better yet, time it so you can enter the fountain circles without getting wet and grab a picture when the fountains cycle back on!

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Be prepared to walk if you are on the Drive Team or one of those people going on field. I didn't measure last year but I'm taking a pedometer with me this year just for that walk. Someone said half-mile round trip from Newton Pit to Newton Field. Not sure about that but wouldn't surprise me.

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Looking at your VR link, where would the pits be? Build C, Level 1?


And in relation to the VR maps, where would the CNN food court be?

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Just to clarify, FLL has a practice and judging day on Thursday, competition on Friday, and awards ceremonies on Saturday. I've been asked to be a judge.

Re: Championships for dummies
 

That's umm.. Donuts.. spelled the right way. ;)

I have a much better map than the VR one that I have saved as a link at home. I'll link that here unless I can find it in the next half hour.

Re: Championships for dummies
 

I'll echo what Genia said about scouting. To put it lightly - it's difficult. Double the teams from most regionals and increase your walking distance significantly and you'll have an idea of what Nationals is like. Last year, we tried to rotate people in and out of scouting but you need a lot of team members to do this.

I found that doing it by hand is easy and more practical. Make a spreadsheet on Excel and print them prior to competition, one for each team and a few extras just in case. Get a binder and put all the teams in order by number. Have one person before your team's match go back with the papers to the pits and strategize with the drivers. Simple and effective - no computer required. We even had people put their names down on the sheets to hold people accountable for their information.

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Ok, here is some great info for first time people heading to Atlanta:

Just to give you an idea of the scale of THIS MAP, It took myself and 3-4 other people 10 minutes to walk from the outside doors of the Georgia Dome to the Front Door of the CNN Center/Foodcourt.

General info here:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...69&postcount=8

Maps and more travel while in Atlanta info in the overall thread here:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...ht=atlanta+map

More of the above info repeated in another thread, but this time a map of restaurants as well:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...64&postcount=7

And then you have the official Tourist page for the 2006 FIRST Robotics Competition from the Atlanta Tourism Board where a lot of that above info came from:

http://first.atlanta.net/

Re: Championships for dummies
 

If you'll be using the public transportation system a lot (MARTA), consider purchasing the discounted pass: http://www.itsmarta.com/howto/specia...ails.asp?id=80

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Sneakers are required in the pits. Wear them. You can wear flip flops when you get home.
__________________
Closed toe shoes are required, not necessarily sneakers. Open toe shoes are prohibited in the pits.

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Even if you're on the drive team, it's still a long walk. Make sure you have comfortable shoes on.
Another important thing that I learned last year is to make sure your cart has good wheels on it. The wheel bearings in our cart wore out last year at the beginning of Atlanta, and it was a long three days pushing that thing back and forth.

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Even if you are only there for the experience, scouting is part of the experience. 2 years ago I think we had 4 people actively walking around, and a few people in the stands. The people watching matches never wrote anything down, but they could generally give us an idea of how well the team was doing. The people pit scouting had a notebook with basic questions, but I'm not really sure how much they were used. We certainly didn't expect to go far (and didn't) but it gave people on the team something to do, which they seemed to enjoy. Even if you aren't expecting to go far, scouting is a really good way to look at other robots and pick up some ideas for next year.

Re: Championships for dummies
 

Elgin Clock said: Thanks very much for that info as I have not seen that page before and I live in the Atlanta area.

Dave :)