Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Kettering threads have gotten a bit fragmented so I want to start a new thread for folks to post what they thought about the event. I would appreciate it if folks took the time to add both positives and negatives that way the "right things" get continued, and the "Wrong things" get addressed. I use the word addressed, because what 1 person sees as a wrong thing, many others may not.

First off congratulations to the winners: I believe it was 245, 70, 2619. What a great alliance. You fought some tough matches and had a lot of great competition.

Congrats to the finalists: 65, 2771 and 2586 (I think). This alliances really maximized there potential and showed what strategy and execution were all about.

Thank you to our partners. 548 and 862. It was a fun run to the semis.

Thanks 314 for all the support for the event. You guys did a fantastic job.

2771 thanks for the webcast, I know many enjoyed it.

The Event Itself:
Kettering was a great event. It was a ton of fun and really cool to see the close competition. Due to getting 12 events, the bots were all driving well on Saturday, and the competition was really close. 3 of the 4 QF events went to 3 matches, and almost every match was within a Super Cell (which were very much in play). What a great competition. I talked with some out of town teams that were at Midwest, and they were impressed by the strategy level and usage.
Some cool things about the event. Starting a new job, I did not have vacation time. Due to the FiM format, I was able to help get things set up thursday night, only missed 4 matches (of 12) and NO TIME OFF OF WORK. Normal regionals, I would have missed 2 days, and for this I would have only had to miss 1.

Kettering had an interesting feel to it. Very much an IRI feel. The set-up was a cross between an off season and a typical regional, but with all the teams there, the excitement level was way up.

One thing I did not like initially but actually liked later on was the above level track was for Scouts and Videographers only. While initially annoying having to show a badge, this made it a ton easier for the scouts to do their job. By the end I was really thankful for that.

Probably the biggest drawback was the lack of seating. They really needed at least 10-20% more seating (others will say more, but running the numbers 10% would have helped a bunch). I talked to the folks running it and they explained the limitations and plans to work around this next year.

The 7 people excepting awards was another thing I thought I wouldn't like, but ended up enjoying it. Results will likely be mixed on this.

One of the coolest things I saw was that at Kettering they brought all of the WFFA nominees down on the field. Usually there is a statement about so many great applications, and then a winner anounced. At Kettering every nominee who meant so much to their team got to come down and be recognized.

Last and certainly not least:
Oh and congrats to the students of TEAM 33 for winning Chairman's. It has been one heck of a ride.

Thanks to all of the volunteers and the folks at FIRST & FiM for making it possible. What a great event.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

From watching the webcast (Thanks 2771 Codered Robotics) I saw the level of competition go up from where it was last weekend at Traverse City. But with all the wellknown teams doing so well at the event, I'm afraid that w have seen some of the first teams, that we will not be seeing at the State Championship. I do hope that those teams who probably aren't gonna be selected aren't dissaproving of the format, but inbrace the oppertunity that was set before them.

Ike I hear you seating issue, but I do believe the rest of the venues do have the right amount seating. West Michigan, Detriot, Cass Tech, for sure have tons of seating ready. But, the resevered level for scouts is amazing, I have been to Kettering and been on that top level, its probably the best seat in the house to see everything.

Congrats to team 70, 245 and 2619, I almost counted the martians(70) out friday, when I didn't see much scoring, but you guys really improved and showed that you guys still win, when it matters. I'm also glad that you guys didnt have to go to a back robot before elimations started. 245 yuo guys have a great bot, you following what has been the dumper dominance of this years game. Your guys robot gives our team high hopes that are robot somewhat similar is in for big things. 2619 when I looked at this weeks Looking Forward thread, they pointed you guys out for needing a big week, you did not dissapoint. On the number 1 allaince a District regional win and a good amount of state points. I wouldn't be surpised to see you guys at the state champs.

Team 65, I was really rooting for you guys, since I golf with a couple of you, your bot is so good when being able to be filled up in auton. 2586, just like I said with 2619, you guys needed a big week and you got one, best wishes for you.

Congrats to all teams!

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

I agree with what Ike said, just alittle more seating , but that screen by the tables was a nice touch. Something a team might be able to provide next year would be a shuttle service from the far parking lot. That was a long walk for grandparents in the rain. Oh,and maybe we could add a rule that you are not allowed to wear any tennis shoes that require everyone else to wear sunglasses.:)

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

2619 was a HUGE reason why our alliance won Kettering. Our drive team recognized their defense early and knew they'd be a great asset in the eliminations.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Yeah, we got SHUT DOWN in the finals. Now we know we got a bit of work to do to try and overcome that sort of thing. We'll be back better than ever in Detroit. I can't wait.

Other than the lack of seating, I thought Kettering went really well. It definitely had an IRI feel to it without the fancy lighting system and all, but I can deal without that if it means more competitions for everyone and less cost to the teams - everyone knows how important that is in this economy we're facing.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

I saw this too. At first I assumed you guys would win simply because you would outscore everyone else by a wide margin, but actually the other alliances were able to keep up the scoring fairly well. 2619's defense was absolutely amazing. Several times they kept teams from scoring the whole match, and definitely won a few matches with that defense.

Congratulations to 70, 245, and 2619. You were an amazing alliance and definitely deserving of the win. Congrats to 65, 2771, and 2586 on being finalists as well. You put up a great fight. Congrats to 2771 especially, you guys are an amazing rookie team, and I think you will have many good years ahead of you.

Thank you to 1504 and 1025 for being great alliance partners. There were some tough alliances on that field, but I think we managed to put up a pretty good fight, and only fell short by a little bit. This was a much better start to our year than we usually have, so hopefully things will only get better.

Thank you to all of the volunteers and referees this weekend. There were very few problems, and I think the whole competition was run quite well. They only major issues were the problems at the start of the eliminations and the seating problem.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Just finished uploading pictures we took. We also have HD video we will be uploading along with every single match video of the whole competition (no sound do to lack of audio feed).

OUR PICTURES

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Wow what a great competition. First off, I would like to say thank you to 910 and 1025, you guys were great partners in eliminations, we were so thankful to get a chance to work with your two amazing teams. Second, I would like to thank Eric Y. from 33 for all his help this weekend. I would like to congratulate 245, 70, and 2619 for winning the event (I graduate and 70 wins, of course), and 2586, 2771, and 65 for pulling some crazy upsets off. Also congrats to team 33 for winning the Chairman's Award, it could not have gone to a better group of people. I agree with IKE that they need to do something to the stands, either add more or to get bigger ones, but all in all a great competition.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

We were very fortunate to be the last team picked in the finals by 245 - so thanks for choosing us. As a 1982 graduate of Adams, I was so proud to be once again part of my old high school in some way! Your robot is both difficult to catch and can really dump a payload!

I tip my hat to the runner's up alliance - teams 2771 (great job on the video feed - had some friends watching at home), 65 and 2586.

Great job team 33 on the Chairman's award.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Things I liked about the regional:

The volunteers and staff there were personable, and very fun to work with. I asked for a trailer on the practice field and had one in 5 minutes. I can't say enough about the couple ladies running the field (I wish I knew their names).

The access to the field was great - both before and after each day's activities we were able to go out onto the field, get measurements, see how stuff worked. It was nice taking the non-drive guys out to see that, along with some of the mentors.

The Webcast was awesome (Code Red really outdid themselves at this regional!)

The cooperation between teams was great to see. It was also nice to have judges that were slightly more knowledgable about First Robots this year. We were able to have great conversations with them about the robots and even discuss what they'd done in past years. HUGE ++++. Having Joe Johnson come to our pits to discuss control systems was awesome too.

Things I did not like about the regional (and please forgive a bit of my emotion):

The seating needs to be improved. The people who could not find seats ended up standing in front of the people who had seats on the bleachers. Later, one of the (great) volunteers brought chairs over and MADE them sit down. It was nice to finally be able to see again.

The electrical situation was borderline ridiculous. This was the first district for many people. We arrived on time on Thursday, only to find out that the central sections of the pits did not have power. That situation continued for a full hour after the pits opened. After they finally got power up, the electrician came around and told us that we were not allowed to use any plug-in power tools, because extension cords were powering that portion of the pits (and this had evidently been the plan from the beginning of the event???). To top it off, the teams along the outside walls of the venue WERE allowed to use theirs. This was extremely frustrating.

The rules. I don't mean to sound sour-grapes-ish. -See later posts for clarification of what was here-

Other than that, I'd say the District went off very well. Good job done by all, and it was very fun to compete against all the other teams.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Code Red (2771) thanks our alliance partners, 65 and 2586. Your guys worked very hard and smart as our alliance climbed its way to the finals. It certainly was exciting, and we enjoyed every minute of working with such amazing teams. 2771 is also grateful for your help in getting our robot match-ready, after taking a beating in the intense qualifying rounds.

All the teams at Kettering were very supportive and encouraging to our team in the midst of the fierce competition. Our students and mentors are pretty well spent after two weeks of back-to-back events, and are grateful to all the teams at Kettering for the support. It was an honor to be at a competition with so many strong teams there.

We give hearty congratulations to 245, 70, and 2619 for becoming District Champions. You guys set pretty high standards both on and off the field. We are thrilled for our friends at 2619, who have a great 'bot and a great team.

Thanks for the cheers and the high-fives, 107 and 49. It means a lot to our students to get encouragement like that.

Killer Bees, congratulations on winning the Chairman's Award. We dream of some day being half as good as you are!

Our next step is the West Michigan District at GVSU, so we'll see many of you there.

Good luck everyone!

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

As a follow up to my first post:

On the practice field, there was a single 110 extension cord and no splitter. So only one team could use the field at a time (no DS power) until we supplied our own 4 way splitter for people to use. Might want to consider a powerstrip there fastened to the extension cord so people can utilize the field a bit more.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

We are going to fix that by bringing our test battery and an inverter with our robot cart.

Also the Allen Bradley yellow light does not allow spectators to know which color (side red or blue) the robots are on. VERy hard to keep them straight when viewing. Even worse trying to sort it out on the webcast.

Props to the Safety glasses people. #1 best effort ever I have seen in First in % years of going to competitions. Should be a model for all other first competitions.

Props to teams 1025 and 910 great alliance partners

noise in arena areas=.failCurrent Path: /

- by the end of friday the music, announcer, and pit announcer were very loud and made communication very difficult in pits. ( SAFETY hazard).
- speakers for pits should be on stands on ground, with treble normalized for surroundings This allows the voice to travel over the heads of people in pits. Teh sound was bouncing off floor and cieling and back further making hearing in pits almost impossibe. To note is as volume rises so do peoples voices etc further leading to louder everything.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Slightly off-topic, but that's what the trailer is for. Look at the color of the bumpers on the trailer to identify which alliance a robot is on.

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The RED alliance was not given more time than BLUE to get the DS problems fixed. (gotta love that DS :-/

The situation was that BLUE's DS went bad first - before the first elimination match began, the problem was diagnosed and the FTAs brought out the spare and helped them replace it. As soon as it was fixed, the RED blinker came on
because one of theirs went out. Same as for BLUE, the RED DS was replaced by a spare, only to find that it had not been flashed. The so called extra time was charged to the field (their bad for not having the second one already flashed) Turned out that both sides had the same amount of extra time to connect/reconnect their electronics. How was that unfair?

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

This was a really great event, it had a very comfortable "feel" to it.

Thanks to 33 and 548 for joining our alliance it was great playing with you! You both have awesome machines & great drive teams!


A few concerns: The seating (seemed pretty crowed) I didn't spend a lot of time in the stands though.

The awards just didn't seem as "formal" if that makes scene. Maybe they felt rushed, our the music seemed a weird fit for the ceremony. Not sure just felt weird.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Well that certainly seems fair to me. In fact, they pulled our second DS back from us as we were installing it because they were worried that IT was not flashed either.

The way that is was communicated on the field was that they had some other issue, and they had to either call in another robot or go. That whole deal took about 10 minutes (finding of initial fault, Paul giving the field explanation, etc). If it was the field's fault the whole time, that's a whole different story. :o . As you said: You've got to love those DS's. I hope having two go bad in the same elim match is lighting a big red light for First.

Nice job to 245, 70, and 2619. You guys were great.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

I'd also like to acknowledge our great team mates 70 and 2619. 70 had a great auton and 2619 was a defensive wonder. I remember playing 2619 during the last qualification match of the day and they made me feel totally helpless as a driver.

Tom I was the alliance captain and I was just as confused. The head ref came over and said you either use one of your cards or you run with a dead robot on the field. I told him we'd go with the dead robot option and I had no idea why they gave us so much time.

By the way some of the match videos are up!:
http://vimeo.com/channels/adambots#3531366

I've still got most of the HD videos to render though, so stay tuned.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Yeah there was absolutely no way that we have won without 2619 or 70 on our team. Even though our robot scored well and moved fast, if we were taken on by a defensive robot, our score would be cut in half. In order to win we had to have a another high scorer and a defensive robot. We got both.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

As a mentor from 2619, I would like to thank teams 245 and 70 for a great showing at finals. Hope to see both of you at State!

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Congrats Matt, from an OLD friend. I was cheering you guys on the whole time.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Well, that was fun. Glad 33 and 548 joined us. Thanks!

Here's my views on the good, the bad, and the ugly.

The good:
- Nice, small regional feel.
- Much smoother than I expected, the volunteers did a GREAT job.
- The volunteers were all so NICE too.
- The second screen in the cafe area was nice to have.
- Good judging. Good judge selection.

The bad (or at least, could be improved):
- Lack of seating. That was inconvenient.
- Lack of power. That was frustrating.
- The sound level was actually painful. We couldn't even talk to the person next to us.

The ugly:
- The number of teams that had trouble getting to the field. I could care less about how that affected the game. (Trust me, I really don't). But I could feel the frustration from the teams. I wish they had more time to prep. Maybe it's just growing pains.
- My team might noogie me for this, shaking more gray hairs loose (hence the ugly), but I like hearing from guest speakers. Please don't get rid of too many.
- You should SEE some of the pictures I got of my team when they were not looking. Talk about ugly. :) heh heh heh.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

[quote=Not2B;833365]Well, that was fun. Glad 33 and 548 joined us.

The ugly:
- The number of teams that had trouble getting to the field. I could care less about how that affected the game. (Trust me, I really don't). But I could feel the frustration from the teams. I wish they had more time to prep. Maybe it's just growing pains.
QUOTE]

This is the downside of the 12 match/40 team format. There is not a lot of prep and fix-it time. All that aside, believe it or not, there were fewer No shows than at Midwest which had significantly longer times between matches.

This format reinforces the need for a robust robot and prepared pit crew.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

It also reinforces the need for Labview to improve their build times. 5+ minutes to build means that teams utilizing labview are taking a big gamble trying to make a code change between rounds - one error compiling and you're in trouble.

C++ teams? Not so much.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

I agree with the slow down load time. Our programer had the program ready to down load, but it sure seemed to take for ever when they are calling you for second call and it is still loading!!!! Evrybodys saying hurry up but all you can do is watch the line get longer.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Here are the results:

Kettering - http://www.firstinmichigan.org/stati...ults_Week_2_KU

Overall - http://www.firstinmichigan.org/stati...esults_Overall

Looks like 2771 is going to States Congrats, you guys are an amazing rookie team.

Thanks to 818 and 1 for selecting us to be on your alliance it was great. Juggernauts your shooter was awesome, dropping both Super Cells in the final seconds against 1504, 910, and 1025.

Congrats to 245, 70, and 2619. It seems like 2619 always gets the best of us at Kettering (Rookie Regional 2008 and Kettering District 2009).

Team 33 congratulations on winning chairmans you are truly an inspiration to us younger teams.

-Oris-

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

ill agree with you on that one... we got lucky and our robot still hasn't suffered any major breakdowns (knock on wood) and we missed all the practice rounds because we did another one of our famous "change our strategy/robot on the first day of competition" like at Atlanta where we did a huge re-mod last year which, like in this instance, made us WAY more competitive than we would have.

oh ya, if anyone was wondering why we didn't move on the first match of quarter- finals, bad batts SUCK. we checked it with the volt meter and it read out 13 volts, when it went under a load it dropped to 9. couldn't move at all. i feel kinda bad because a lot of us thought it was the programmer's fault, thought it was bad code.

so, heads up to other teams about the tricky batteries. the only way we could check it was to run it for a second in the robot before the matches.
maybe you guys can come up with a better solution but thought i would give everyone a warning.

Good luck to everyone in the coming weeks and congrats to team 33 on chairmans

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Looks like 2771 is going to States Congrats, you guys are an amazing rookie team.

Thanks to 818 and 1 for selecting us to be on your alliance it was great. Juggernauts your shooter was awesome, dropping both Super Cells in the final seconds against 1504, 910, and 1025.

Congrats to 245, 70, and 2619. It seems like 2619 always gets the best of us at Kettering (Rookie Regional 2008 and Kettering District 2009).

Team 33 congratulations on winning chairmans you are truly an inspiration to us younger teams.

-Oris-[/quote]


Thanks Oris. We certainly are enjoying the ride, and learning a ton from other teams

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

I wholeheartedly agree. I think that was a wakeup call for lots of teams.

It never occurred to me that the main auto mode for 90% of the teams would be FULL STEAM AHEAD into walls, robots, metal bars, etc... Glad we seem to be holding up without issues.

Hey - other Michigan teams yet to compete! Get ready for fast turn matches and robot beatings.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Apologies in advance for such a long post...

Over the last two weeks I had the chance to attend the Midwest Regional as an inspector, and then the Kettering District as a competitor. I don't think any of these comments will be a surprise to the FiM people - you have heard them in private and in public at various times.

First, the core volunteers who are making the 2009 Michigan District system happen deserve many many thanks for working so hard on making sure the events run. The relatively small number of people who spent so much time interacting with and helping the teams solve technical issues at Kettering deserve gold medals.

The amount of money we are saving this year by going to nearby district events, and not staying in any hotels, and replacing nicer team dinners with pizza while still at the venue, is a lot. If ever there was a year to save money, this is it. It makes the activity a little less big-time, but I think we would have had to make such sacrifices anyway in this year of financial challenges.

The increased number of matches is great. It makes you realize how important a robust robot and an easy-to-update control system are. Friday and Saturday were non-stop and long.

So far, the "coverage" of the district system has been limited. We need some actual objective evaluation of it. I don't know what FIRST-Manchester's evaluation plan is, but I worry that there is not enough objective evaluation - there is a lot of repeating of talking points, and some avoidance of the negative issues. The talking points are: 1) I worked a full day at work on Thursday, 2)more plays, less money, 3)the event went great, 4)no shipping. But it would be nice to get some more objective statistics and details.

Some possible statistics would be 1)does a 2-day district + Thurs night practice + 8-hour Access Period take more time away from work/family than a 3-day regional? 2)how many people attended vs a regional? 3)could they see/hear the action? 4)did they have seats? 5)Was press coverage better? 6)what are the no-show robot statistics? 7)were field issues similar to the non FiM events? 8)was tech support from FIRST/NI/FMS sufficient? 9)How did the self-shipping work out? (It is NOT being suggested these are all problems - but these are useful fact- and data-based criteria for an objective evaluation).

While it is difficult to be objective about the "feel" of the event, my opinion is that the Kettering event was like an FRC off-season event. Someone likened it to an FLL event, but it did not have the same "show" quality of the FLL State Championship that I have been judging at for the last several years. I saw some video from the Traverse City event, and that did not look as good as Kettering. Does anyone disagree that the District system has replaced the "arena show" with a "gym event"?

The compressed schedule makes the show a little less impressive. Because teams have less time to get up and running at the event, and because for many it will be the first time they are on a real competition field with game conditions, some of the learning curve happens during matches instead of during practice. Are there any statistics capturing how many teams used matches (instead of practice) as their "get it running" learning curve? For example, what are the FRC vs. FiM statistics on how many teams were running an autonomous mode in their first couple of Q-matches as compared to their last couple of Q-matches? You would think that this might be a positive statistic for the "more plays" concept. It could also be a negative statistic showing that teams needed the practice session.

Speaking of practice, is there any data on how many teams took advantage of the open practice sessions on Thursday night and Friday morning? Was there enough time to cycle all teams through a practice (assuming they were ready, which they should be at later events)? My impression was that many teams who needed the practice were not yet ready, and that open practice time was being used by the "prepared" teams. It would be interesting to see data on who got stick time on the field during practice.

Is the compressed schedule the reason why there were no awards on Friday, and why only 7 students per team can go up to receive awards on Sat? I think anything that gets the students up in front of a cheering crowd to receive an award they won is worth the time. I understand that we cant do that in Atlanta, where there are many thousand people, but it seems like we could/should do it at a district/regional.

Do the non-Michigan teams know that we get to bypass the 40 lb withholding allowance for parts made during the 8 hour robot access period?

Were the rules being applied consistently? I have two issues which I think are big ones:

(1) I walked into the building Saturday at a couple of minutes past 7AM. There were dozens of people in the pits, and some teams were working on their robots. I do not know how long they had been in there, and I did not see any officials (safety, inspection, etc.) monitoring any of this. The agenda indicated pit opening time was 7:30 AM.

When I asked one of the key volunteers what was going on with teams in the pits so early, he said that one of the FiM officials told him "this is the new FIRST." When I then went to that specific FiM official and asked him about teams in the pits early, he told me that it was important that people didn't have to wait outside in the cold. Huh? This is disingenuous. We were talking about people in the pits, and it was unseasonably warm outside.

It is things like this that have made me wonder about the management of FiM, when we hear different answers at different times, depending on who is listening.

(2) This issue was already raised by another competitor, but I think there was at least the appearance of favoritism on the playing field. A team had a DS problem at the very beginning of eliminations, and it was announced that it was a DS problem (a team problem) as opposed to a field problem. Several minutes went by while this problem was being worked on and eventually resolved. No timeout was taken. In the finals, this same team had a problem at the beginning of match1, and at that time a timeout was taken. An extension cord was run out onto the field from under the scorer's table in order to allow the team to power up their DS so they could run a motor on their robot. I thought this was going too far.

In summary, I am thankful for the cost savings, but worried that the so-called "new FIRST" is diverging from "old FIRST" in an unsupervised fashion that may not be following the rules/guidelines/philosophy of FIRST. I think more should be done to maintain consistency and transparency.

Respectfully submitted,
Ken

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

I'd be EXTREMELY interested to see any data of this type. Quantitative comparisons of the "new FIRST" vs the "old FIRST" interest me significantly more than opinions like "Dude, the event ran great!".

If none of this data exists, that would cause me to question exactly who is evaluating FiM, and how they are doing it. After all, that is the answer we were given when this program was leaked/announced: "This is an evaluation". I seem to remember one of the concerns voiced back then was that this would be a sham evaluation and the program would be declared a success regardless of what happens.

No Data = No Due Diligence?

-John

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

John and Ken, I think you both have valid points about data, and I would also like to see data of this type being released by FiM. However, I'd also say that simply how the teams felt about the competition is as important, as well as how inspired the students were. It's hard to objectively measure satisfaction and inspiration.

The two most important competitions to watch in regards to collecting data and making comparisons will be Detroit and West Michigan. These two events are still being held at the same venue, as far as I know, so you can make a comparison between new and old FIRST while maintaining the venue as a constant.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

At GLR last year, late in the eliminations, a laptop battery ran down as a team was loading code, which rendered them useless. An extention cord was run from under the scorer's table (with FTA permission) to power the laptop and get the code loaded. My team had seeded in a ten-way tie for second on QP, but ended up eleventh on RP. We didn't get picked, but were first in the que for back-up robot. I didn't see that action as giving the appearance of anything, other than an example of cooperation and fair play. As a matter of fact, I was the one who ran and got the extension from our pits for them to use.

IMO, there is no "Old FIRST" nor "New FIRST", only the same FIRST that preaches coopetition. I hope that FiM continues to practice what they preach, rather than harden their hearts for fear of it being perceived as them playing favorites.

Re: Kettering Results from Week 2
 

Possible suggestion for a district event:

Lighting. I liked that the lighting was the same for the pits and field during competition. I think this made it easier for teams to tune in their cameras. For awards I would have liked to have seen it turned down. With the team reps down on the floor, there should be less of a tripping hazard, and I think it adds a formal touch to the event. I am OK with the Robot Competition being a bit less dramatic, but the awards ceremony should have some intentional pomp to it.