Re: 2011 Peachtree Regional
 

The alliance of 2415, 1771 and 2815 was ridiculous. From what my drivers told me, our alliance (8th seed) just threw in the towel after the first quarterfinal match and went out there trying to have some fun before packing up for the day (not to mention the left side of our robot didn't drive anymore, story for another day).

Congratulations to everyone who was at Peachtree!

Re: Peachtree Finals Video
 

That strategy only works if the robot has a loose grip on the tube, and the piece that you are throwing won't help them complete a logo. I did see one of 2415/1771 drop a tube ONCE due to this, but they picked up the original tube and scored it on their second try.

Note that this strategy is poor if there is a tube that is scored, but hanging by a thread, cause accidentally de-scoring it is a red-card in elims. This gave the #7 alliance one more chance to beat #2 (Although it ended up not mattering).

Re: Peachtree Finals Video
 

When I first saw human players doing this in our first seeding match on saturday I was initially mad and then quickly realized there was very little chance of knocking the tube out of our gripper and they were dropping tubes for us to score just like you said. Just about every match we played after that on saturday had human players trying to knock tubes out of our gripper and only one in eliminations was successful but then cost the team a red card. I would have to agree this is quite a poor strategy.

Re: Peachtree Finals Video
 

I agree as well. It didn't even cross our minds to do this in the semis. We went with the opposite and had our HPs hang onto all their tubes. Unfortunately for us 2815 was much better at pushing tubes towards you guys (combined with good throws from your Human Players) than 2420 and 122 were at pushing them away.

Re: Peachtree Finals Video
 

I told our human player during qualification rounds not to aim for it unless he was SURE it'd do the trick. Clearly it could work on nearly any team there, but the risk/reward tradeoff is a tough one (and one that diminished greatly as eliminations progressed).

Re: Peachtree Finals Video
 

I was on the opposing alliance at the time, but didn't see the tube get knocked down. Looking back at that point in that match from the recorded video(01:01:43 of http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/13427807 ) I see how harsh of a penalty that was for a tube that could have been knocked off by the moving air from a thrown tube.

From 3344's standpoint at the time it was a glimmer of hope to get our ~2 second, one-night minibot deployed during elimination matches after running out of battery during that match (didn't have a charged one so we gambled, but the 10+ minute wait time for the techs to fix the field during the previous match must have killed the battery).

Nonetheless, the #2 alliance deserved the win, and I'm glad they pushed through to finals.

Re: 2011 Peachtree Regional
 

The first person I would like to thank for ptree this year would be Mr. Jeff Rosen. Although he bad some terrible jokes as announcer he is one of the many reasons so many of the teams in Georgia exist. Without him, my former 1002 members and myself would never had made 2415. Chances are, 3091 wouldn't have had as much initial help, 1848 also got off the ground with Jeremy Roberts myself and Rosen, we also helped with getting 1746 off the ground. There are a ton of other teams that he helped to start along with over 100 fll/FRC/vex/jfll teams. You are a horrible conversationalist due to how long you talk, but you have gotten better, and have clearly been an inspiration to the mentors of 2415 (Andrew, speedbuggy76, and myself) ever since you talked us into ultimate submissions early on freshman year of hs haha. I'm glad I did not prank you this year bc I heard you brought a jack and cinder blocks this year

Kudos to the Roberts family for winning volunteers of the year award. I have known you both since the inception of 1848 6 or so years ago and it has always been a pleasure speaking with you, getting to know your family, and getting jokingly yelled at by you for being so so so late to be queued up for matches. You guys really deserve this award.

Thank you to mannie lowe, the Philips family, the spurlin family, Mr Tate, the welsch family, Mr chambliss, Connie, the folea family, Mr reece, tauhira/all the other 1002 alumni who volunteered (especially mick roper, and all the other volunteers. You guys did a great job, especially with getting us back on track when the regional initially fell behind.

Congrats to teams 1261, 3149, and my personal favorite, 1648 for doing such a great job all weekend long and giving ptree a great finals round.

Thank you president bud Peterson, sweet 6 lb 8oz baby jesus (for healing my foot and allowing me to walk again), and governess deal, for all coming to the regional.

Congrats to team 122 for the chairmans win. Your spirit, enthusiasm, and good works are all something we need to strive to attain. You guys are well deserving of the award. And Congrats to your mentor for winning the woodie flowers award.

I would also like to commend 1002 for something they did as well. not only did you and Walton (fierce ha rivals) provide scouting info for everybody, but I saw that after the event, your students were helping break down the field. Although this is the first time in 8 year that you haven't won a CA or a EI, I was so happy to see my former team up in spirits still being a role model team helping to break down.

Thank you to team 1771 and team 2815 for accepting our invitations and for putting up with us throughout the playoffs. This is the last student year for the founding students of 2415 so it was great to go out with a bang.

Thanks to troy and all of the other announces for keeping the energy high. However I did miss out on sir Charles' brief cameo which I am a little upset about. I don't even hear his catch phrase this year.

It was great seeing our old friends, alumni, and mentors from 1848, 832, 1002 , 2420, 587, 1648, 1311, 3091, 2655 and 1746.

Finally, Congrats to Alex Epstein and Rick Shanor for winning the deans list award. Especially Rick Shanor who I have had the responsibility/pain/horrific experience/privilege to work with for the past four years. This loser spent 55+ hours a week in the shop INCLUDING THE WEEKS SINCE SHIP, including his spring break. This is on top of his hundreds of hours per year of community service with the team and his mentorship of younger team members.

This was a great last peachtree as a mentor/potentially ever. I hope to catch up with many of you in north Carolina or st Louis or random off-season events.

Re: 2011 Peachtree Regional
 

It was a pleasure to work with you guys yall are a amazing team and the main thing is you did get our minibot up the pole whether it was once or 200 and we hope to see you guys again at another regional

Re: 2011 Peachtree Regional
 

Minor technicality: We didn't win either Chairman's or Engineering Inspiration in 2008 (Overdrive, the year after you graduated), but we were the #6 seed, and our crate got mistakenly shipped to Championships that year.

But nonetheless, great thank-you speech.

Re: 2011 Peachtree Regional
 

Santosh Thank you for the kind words.
As an educator/mentor is a true feeling of pride to be able to look out at all of the teams and volunteers and see so many of the young people that I worked with spreading the knowledge and passion for FIRST. I take pride in the success that you all achieve and know that for all the grief we put each other through was done with to help you all grow and aspire to achieve. Thank you to all of the 1002 students and Alums for upholding a standard that was the cornerstone of the CircuitRunner team. :D

Re: 2011 Peachtree Regional
 

Congratulations to our friends at 2415, great looking finals matches. I look forward to hanging out with the 2415 mentors again in St. Louis. I'm glad the new claw worked out for you.

Re: 2011 Peachtree Regional
 

we were given a late award today :D
Coopertition Award
122
NASA Langley Research Center/CACI Corporate Business Development/BAE Systems Norfolk Ship Repair/jcpenney/Spectrum/Canon Virginia Inc./Jefferson Lab/Planet Fitness of FLA/Old Point National Bank/Thomas Nelson Community College & New Horizons Regional Educ
Hampton, VA, USA

Re: 2011 Peachtree Regional
 

Ah! Was wondering when/if they were going to hand out that one!

Congrats.

Teams 2415, 1771 & 2815 QF & SF
 

I have posted video here for the two QF matches and here for the 2 SF matches of the #1 alliance at The Peachtree Regional 2011. The primary focus is on the red alliance.
Dave