[thefro526]

The Championship:

1) Fields in the pits weren't all THAT bad (excluding seating). It was cool being able to see teams like 1114, 2056, 1503, 254, 968, 2415, and 233 play up close, you definitely get something out of it that can't be gotten in the dome.

2) The Finale, from what little time I spent there, seemed pretty cool. Not sure if it was better than the ATL finale, but it wasn't bad.

3) The Concert was really cool, and I can finally understand why the Stage took up almost half of the dome. I guess if you're going to do it, do it big.

4) Einstein's setup was very cool this year, the visual effects added something that had been missing before.

5) The Dean's list presentation was really, really cool. FIRST definitely stepped up the presentation for this award.

The Game:

1) Cheap and relatively available game pieces were awesome. being able to have half a fields worth of pieces without breaking the bank was really, really sweet.

2) Playing with a familiar game piece seemed to raise the overall competitiveness of many events from previous years.

3) Valuable autonomous was a nice touch, I enjoyed seeing most teams attempting to score and ubertube.

4) FIRST is onto something good with the concept of the Mini-Bot Race. It is exciting, but it's execution leaves something to be desired.